Customer Reviews

Angels & Outlaws, Vol. 1

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Prime Cuts: You Ain't Just Whistlin' Dixie (with Alan Jackson), If I Said You Had a Beautiful Body (with Dolly Parton), Old Hippie (with Montgomery Gentry)

What the Beach Boys is to pop music is what Bellamy Brothers is to country music. Blusterous, effervescent and convivial, all through the 70s to the early 90s, David and Howard Bellamy had made country music beguiling without making it frivolous. These siblings showed that country music is more than just about crying-in-your beer and hits like "If I Said You Have a Beautiful Body" showed that country music can be as strident as its rock counterpart. However, of late, due to recording companies' esurience for profit, copious collections of their greatest hits have been issued. Aside from the avid fans, many of these collections have gone unnoticed. What makes this collection piquant is that the brothers are joined with the best of the current Nashville stars in re-recording 10 of their biggest hits plus two newly written tunes, namely "Guardian Angel" (with Willie Nelson) and "Alligator Alley" (with John Anderson).

Of the newly scribed tunes, both of which are penned by David Bellamy, "Guardian Angel" finds Willie Nelson dueting with the brothers on a midtempo Waylon-esque tune. Nelson's trademark off beat vocals perfectly complements the Bellamys in bringing out the spiritual dimension of this affecting love song. A rejuvenated sounding John Anderson joins the brothers in a swampy-blues rocker "Alligator Alley." Though the song fits Anderson to the tee, it somehow doesn't sit well with the Bellamy siblings.

On a class of its own is the duet with country music's panjandrum Alan Jackson. "You Just Ain't Whistlin' Dixie," the only track not produced by the Bellamy Brothers, is produced by Jackson's regular helmsman Keith Stegall. Here Jackson steals the show by turning this top 5 hit into one of his signature tunes. Backed by Stuart Duncan's relentless sounding mandolin, this homily of self worth hits the floor running. Without a doubt Dolly Parton, with her libidinous sounding vocal mannerisms, is the perfect partner for the Bellamy Brothers' biggest hit "If I Said You Had a Beautiful Body." Though the song is on the novelty side making a parody of bad pick up lines, it still works and it's one of the most entertaining tracks from the brothers' repertoire. Though not as rowdy as on their own records, Montgomery Gentry strikes a perfect blend with the Bellamys on their number 2 hit "Old Hippie."

However, not all works. Though Hal Ketchum's supple vocals does bring out a bluesy element to their break through number 1 pop hit "Let Your Love Flow," we can hardly hear Lisa Brokop who is supposed to share the microphone. Same can be said of Rhonda Vincent who is pushed to the background in lieu of Chris Hillman out of tune vocals on the otherwise catchy "Crazy from the Heart." Though Tanya Tucker sounds as amazing as ever, she's somehow out of place in singing "Reggae Cowboy." Newcomer Trini Triggs sounds quite anonymous on the light weighted "Dancin' Cowboy."

Frankly if there's a second volume, it would have been even better if more of the brothers' ballads were included and some of their more interesting (though less successful) tunes like "Country Rap" or "Drive South" were included. Also, get Keith Stegall back, his deft production touches has certainly made "Whistlin' Dixie" a masterpiece. Overall, there are enough names here to warrant non-Bellamy Brothers fans to purchase this CD and there are enough tunes here to make them fans.

Even though their last big hit may have been "I Love Her Mind" in the 70's-80's,(with LET YOUR LOVE FLOW being their most famous) they have contunued to put out excellent albums, and finally this one. Most of these are from their earlier era of music, but do not disappoint. Excellent songs such as "Blue Rodeo", "Lonely Planet" , and "Vertical Expression (Of A Horizontal Desire), however are not included here. Except for one song, their foray into Island Influenced/reggae backbeats are also not here.

HOWEVER what is there is excellent. Being from Florida and loving John Anderson as a favorite, "Alligator Alley" is a great highlight. There duet with Alan Jackson, (You Ain't Just Whistlin' Dixie) needs to be played on radio, but unfortunately corporate radio only plays a limited base.

Montgomery Gentry fans will appreciate "Old Hippie", and the Dolly Parton cuts brings great mental pictures to mind. Nuff said there.

The appearance of Bobby Bare and David Allan Coe was a great surprise, and are very good cuts.

Only other drawback is some filler by newer artists, but they are not bad and are actually better than most.

The Bellamy Brothers can be described as "Old School Country MOR", write with a wry humor, and have imaginitive lyric hooks which they continue to issue even today.

The music makes me smile, its good time music. Its worth a listen.

First of all, how great was it to hear all of these great Bellamy Bros. songs again. It really is a shame how country radio has just prety much forgotten about how successful they truly were. And here we have a great album, "Angels and Outlaws, Vol.#1" to rediscover all of these great songs. You have such an eclectic mixture of singers covering these songs, how could it miss? To hear Alan jackson sing on "You Ain't Just Whistlin' Dixie" is just a perfect blend of singer and song(Alan probably would have covered it on his own if he hadn't already been asked.)Willie Neslon singing on "Guardian Angel" is just sublime. We get The Possum singing "Sugar Daddy" which when he sings it you truly believe him. Dolly Parton, Tanya Tucker and Charlie Daniels all make appearances here. Why we even get David Allan Coe and a wonderful appearance by John Anderson on "Alligator Alley". Shame on you country radio for ignoring this great album!!!!! (You know I might have only given this album four stars, but I rated it five because I believe every country music fan should add this to their music collections, so they can discover or rediscover the timeless music of The Bellamy Brothers!!!!!)

I like the Bellamy Brothers' music and especially like this CD because it combines their voices with their guests - so you get to hear Howard and David AND singers like Dolly Partin and Alan Jackson. I love it!

This is a great and unique album. All songs are sung with other well know great singers. I highly recommend it.

Looking at the track listing, it is clear that this essentially a greatest hits package, but with various guests joining Howard and David singing re-recordings of their old hits. As such, the volume 1 appendage to the album title is intriguing. I know that the brothers had a long string of country hits but most of the really big ones are represented here.

As with any album that features a cast of guests, the tracks you like best will be generally influenced by who your favorite guests are as well as which songs you like best. So nobody will be surprised when I nominate the track featuring Dolly Parton as my favorite, but I was worried when I looked at the track listing prior to playing the CD. As things turned out, my worries were entirely unjustified, because Dolly's impish sense of humor made her ideal for the song If I said you have beautiful body. Dolly actually does most of the singing, but is ready with the quips to respond to the brothers, making the song a lot of fun as it should be, but avoiding the trap of descending into nonsense.

There are, of course, many other great tracks here. I particularly like You ain't just whistling Dixie (with Alan Jackson), Guardian angel (with Willie Nelson), Reggae cowboy (with Tanya Tucker and David Allan Coe), Kids of the baby boom (with Charlie Daniels and Bobby Bare) and Alligator alley (John Anderson) but everything here is fantastic so I won't be surprised if your favorites are among the songs I haven't listed.

Having delivered such a brilliant volume one, I'd love to hear volume two if it ever appears, but which songs will they select? Nobody knows, but I won't be holding my breath waiting to find out, since the Beach Boys only recorded one track for their intended Stars and stripes volume two, but enjoy volume one anyway.

This CD is good, but many of the songs are on other CD's that we have. There are other singers singing the songs. We didn't like it as well as others that we have, but it is still a good one of The Bellamy Brothers.