Customer Reviews

Drinkin Songs & Other Logic

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

 

 

Prime Cuts: A Big One, Back Home in Heaven, Rainbow in the Rain

Clint Black has return to his mother milk of what nurtured him into fame way back in the early 90s: swinging Texas honky tonk stompers interjected with those traditional sensitive tear-jerking ballads. Gone are those delusory attempts to cross over to the pop market (a la the extremely misfired "Money or Love" and the shoddily pablum "Easy for you to Say"). As the title suggests, Black has decided to tip his Stetson to the venerable tradition of country drinkin' numbers. This does not mean that this CD is entirely an inebriant to the sonically dipsomania. Rather, only 4 of these tracks (the title cut, "A Big One," "Thinkin' of You" and "Longnecks and Rednecks") contain explicitly alcohol-related themes, with the rest dealing with thoughtful ruminations of love lost, missed opportunities, cherished friendships and a couple even dealing with death. Thanks to Black and his longtime band mate Hayden Nicholas who co-penned most of these 12 cuts, these songs reverberate back to Black's "Killing Times" days where the music is unadulterated country nuanced with a roiling mix of honesty, urgency and credibility.

A listen to the scintillating lead single "Rainbow in the Rain" is enough to convince that one is listening to greatness. Giving the well-worn theme of despair in the throes of a breakup a makeover, Black dives into the emotional depths to create one of his most compelling uptempos in his vast catalogue. Co-written by Nicholas at the time of his mother's death, the spiritually searching "Back Home in Heaven" is given a cherubic boast with the angelic backings of label mate Little Big Town. The sparse acoustic sounding ballad "Go It Alone" offers a sobering look at death again as two friends had to part at the last phase of life. But not everything here is morbid, drawing on the traditions of Faron Young and Ray Price, the swing shuffle "I Don't Wanna Tell You" turns heartache into a delightful Texas dance hall gem. With regards to the drinkin' songs, "A Big One" is a honky tonk barroom crowd pleaser complete with a sing-a-long chorus. Old pal Steve Wariner joins Black and Nicholas in penning the title track, a great upbeat number bolstered by some tasty sounding guitars from Wariner himself.

Despite being a fetching album, there are a few weaker moments: the sleazy "Undercover Cowboy," a tale about a Casanova having his ways with the ladies, hits an all time low. With a melody reminiscent of Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers' "Undercover," this track is very much on the obligatory side. Scheduled as the sophomore single "Code of West" is a feeble attempt in creating one of those John Wayne cowboy movies. With a wordy plot and trying to draw too many fortuitous connections to the war, lyrically this track is messy at best.

For fans who wonder where the Clint Black of earlier hits such as "A Better Man," "The Hard Way," "When My Ship Comes In" has gone, "Drinkin' Songs and Other Logic" is proof that this CMA Award winner is back. And he's back in fine form. Drinking deep into the recesses of the honky tonks, the smell of whiskey has never been more pungent and the consanguinity of the bar stool crowd has never been warmer; thus, putting asunder any logic to stay away.

This is the best album from Clint Black in a quite a while, although it is not up to the standard of his first albums. It does represent a return to the traditional country music that first brought him into prominance, although there are traces of the Adult Contemporary focus of recent years.

The album opens with the title track, an uptempo song that pays homage to country's past. "Heartaches," the second track, is a nice honky tonk song. After that comes "Code of the West", a rather cliche-ridden number that fails to interest.

These first three songs set the pattern for the CD, two pretty good songs for every one mediocre or indifferent song. I'm not sure which is my favorite track, perhaps the very western swing influenced "I Don't Want To Tell You" with it's great fiddle backing, but clearly "Undercover Cowboy" is the biggest stinker of the set - a song about a cowboy Don Juan whose sole mission is to get "under the covers" with "undercover" cowgirls. Perhaps I am being generous giving this four stars, but the best tracks are very good indeed and the worst tracks (except "Undercover Cowboy") are at least listenable

Interesting, the shifts taking place in Country Music these days. You have the newcomers who are, in many cases, doing their damnedest to shift the genre away from real Country music toward a sort of weird, hybrid animal that pulls a lot of new listeners into the pseudo-Country herd.

And as the music shifts, many expect the mainstays of the genre, the Straits, Chesneys, Jacksons and, in keeping with this review, the Clint Blacks, to follow suit. They complain that Black's newest offering, DRINKIN' SONGS & OTHER LOGIC, is the "same old Black" and seem to want him to take on the perverse sounds of the Country-nouveau in order to please them. I thought it was the other way around. I thought fans like me followed artists like Clint Black because his music struck a chord. I wouldn't give a hoot in hell for artists who keep changing their sound in order to meet the demands of an audience.

Let's make this simple. If you don't want classic Country Western music, as only Clint Black can deliver it and, mind you, has delivered it over his entire stellar career, then jump on the bandwagon of any of the new monstrosities currently commanding Country Music acts and stages all over creation. But, if you want to hear Country sung as it should be, this terrific album, as well as any other of Black's previous releases, should do the trick. It's every bit as fresh, every bit as musically excellent, every bit as Country as when Black stepped on stage for the first time.

THE HORSEMAN

I am enjoying this CD. It's much closer to his original style, which is what drew me to Clint Black in the first place.

Very pleased with this album, this is real country/western music and great all the way through. Wish I would have bought this years ago. Way better than alot of the newer stuff they play on the radio these days, too bad these songs never really charted much.

I have heard three songs from the CD. The standout of the CD is Back Home In Heaven . The other two songs I have heard are:Code Of The West, Rainbow In The Rain
You can download these two tracks from Clint's web site: These three songs are all typical Clint Black.
[...]
Clint's remarks on Back Home In Heaven
Clint Black/Hayden Nicholas
Hayden's mother died recently and fortunately we have enough guitar players in the band to cover for him. He was able to spend a lot of the year at home and was there to hold her hand when she passed. I keep lots of songwriting notes and every day we're working in the studio I'm very careful to gather them all up in my notebook and take them with me. I keep them right by the bed because I wake up sometimes and a song will have sorted itself out. So I'm very particular about keeping all those notes with me. I've had the idea for "Back Home In Heaven" for a while, and it was going to be about coming home to my girls, Lisa and Lilly, from being out of town. And I planned to write it alone. For some reason I really can't explain, the scrap of paper with that title on it didn't make it back into my notebook one night. I came into the studio the next morning and Hayden was sitting there holding it. I'm trying to figure out how I could have possibly made a mistake I never make, and he says, "After my mom died your mom sent me a card that said, 'Your angel is in heaven watching over you.'" And we both about lost it. I told him this had to be providence. Something I never do just happened to relate to a note my mom sent him. He turned the line of the song around and it was just perfect. When it came time to record background vocals I wanted to bring in Little Big Town because I love their sound. Before the session, Kimberly's husband died unexpectedly. I called the label and said just mark that off the schedule. We can address it down the road. They called back and said Kimberly had heard the song and wanted to be a part of it-that this song meant a lot to her. It was going to be the first thing they did when she went back to work. So I said, fine, but if at any point they want to cancel -- if they pull up in the driveway and she has second thoughts, cancel it. Well, they showed up and, to be recording anything was remarkable. But with the content of this song it had to be so personal to her. And she lost it several times during the session. I went into clown mode and tried to keep everyone distracted. It turned out to be a really good evening for her. She gave every indication that, even though it was tough, it was what she needed to be doing. They did an incredible job, and just added one more layer of meaning to a song that has plenty.