Customer Reviews

Read My Mind

5 star:		(36)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(31)

 

 

Many consider this to be Reba's best album, I'm going to take it one step further and say that this is one of the greatest albums ever recorded. From the blues/jazz influenced opening "Everything That You Want" to the closing love song "Till You Love Me," Reba covers a variety of sounds and genres. The title track may be one of the best songs Reba has ever recorded, yet it never found its way to radio. The #1 hits include "Till You Love Me," "And Still," and "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter." The first single, which is one of my least favorite songs Reba has recorded, is the 50's rock influenced "Why Haven't I Heard From You." The song is cute, but falls far below the standards set by the other great songs on this album, and failed to top the charts. Reba became the first country artist to address the AIDS epidemic in the poignant "She Thinks His Name Was John." It is a moment of pure magic and is beautifully presented. This album truely is a masterpiece.

A very consistent and listenable album with awesome vocals, great guitar work, aggressive drumming, and overall phenomenal studio production. I listen to this album frequently. Also, this is the 4th album in a row where Leland Sklar plays bass. He of course has played with everybody including Phil Collins, Jackson Browne, and Jerry Garcia. He also played on Rebas albums For My Broken Heart, It's Your Call, and Rumur Has It. Reba also has some R&B back up which really complements her vocal range. I really liked wish I could tell you, don't know how to help you, his name was john,and 7,8,9, and 10. The songs have some very technical guitar work including some great classical guitar work on don't know how to tell. For a country album, which usually has no surprises, Reba nails it and puts this one in a category with other phenomenal albums. The other albums mentuioned earlier could also be in that category. This is my favorite reba album overall.

Reba sings her heart out on this CD! It's one of her best offerings TO DATE! It had 5 HIT singles and sold over 3 million copies and it's still going strong! GO REBA! Keep on ROCKIN'!

This CD won the BEST COUNTRY ALBUM award at the American Music Awards and it's NO WONDER! The CD also helped Reba win Entertainer of the Year at the Academy of Country Music Awards! You couldn't ask for a better country album! It's perfect from start to finish! It's gone on to sell over 3 million copies and has become one of the best country records produced in the '90s!

This CD is one of my favorite albums EVER! Reba sings every song with such conviction and you can hear the emotion in her voice! Songs like "And Still" and "She Thinks His Name Was John" are just heartbreaking! Also there are two amazing love songs "Till You Love Me" and "Read My Mind"! Not to mention the up tempos, the #1 SMASH "The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter" and of course "Why Haven't I Heard From You"! Everyone needs this CD! It's also one of Reba's favorite albums!

THIS CD IS PERFECT FROM START TO FINISH! Loaded with two #1s and three more Top 10s! This album has sold over 3 million copies and it's no wonder! Reba really put her heart into this CD and it shows! Who else in country music would sing about AIDS? Reba is that kind of artist!

Of the many brilliant albums that Reba recorded in the nineties, this may be the best. I can think of a few of her eighties albums that I like even better, but not by much. The style of this album could be described as contemporary nineties country. It is some way from the traditional country that Reba recorded in the mid-eighties, but still has enough of a country feel to appeal to most country fans,

The outstanding song here is She thinks his name was John, a very sad story about a woman who died of AIDS, Despite the fact that it only tells the story and does not offer advice or opinion, it was too sensitive for a lot of American country radio stations, otherwise it might have been a much bigger hit than it was.

And still, The heart is a lonely hunter and Till you love me (all great love songs, but very different from each other) were all country number one hits, while Why haven't I heard from you (a brilliant up-tempo song) was also a huge country hit. The opening track, Everything that you want, is particularly interesting. It has a jazz-blues feel to it more like I'd expect on an album from New Orleans or Memphis than Nashville. Read my mind is a song about a woman unable to express her feelings. I won't stand in line, I wish that I could tell you and I wouldn't wanna be you are all wonderful songs.

With five singles released from the album, you might not feel the need to buy this set if you've already got those tracks on compilations but I don't think it could have been easy to select the songs to be released as singles and that's why this album is so good.

No self-respecting Reba fan should be without this album, which should also appeal to anybody who only wants some of Reba's music.

Read My Mind is the best Reba album, EVER! Every song on here is the cut, there is not one song on here that is out of place or not as good, they are all awesome.

It starts off with the jazzy Everything You Need, then to the title track Read My Mind which happens to be one of her best songs ever. The album tackles many issues, as McEntire's albums usually do. She Thinks His Name Was John is one of the most powerful songs sung by her, a song adressing AIDS and its impact on those who lose their loved ones to the disease. Other powerful songs include I Wish That I Could Tell You, And Still and others. The album closes with another great song by Reba, Til You Love Me. Beautiful arrangements and vocals make this album, her best!

Reba McEntire was another country artist who arrived in the 1980s when it sounded more like pop than country. Like a lot of artists from that time who are still going strong now, her earliest music was definitely her most country-sounding, less so as time went on. But I think Reba is different than any other country artist who's "going pop". From her voice, it's clear Reba wasn't made just for country, but other genres as well. She must be a big R&B and soul fan for she has the power to emote with her voice unlike any other country singer around. That's certainly rare, a country singer with a powerful voice to sing just about anything, but is still firmly based in country, but it's true. Even while Reba has claimed recently that she's sort of divorcing herself from country music (maybe in protest to it sounding too much like pop), what may be her best album ever is from the time when she was still very much country: 1994's READ MY MIND. While Reba may have been a huge star in the 1980s, it seemed the 1990s were even bigger for her, most of her best known songs coming from this decade. That and her equally successful acting career helping to make her a household name. But whenever she gets back to music like on READ MY MIND, we have proof that she hasn't totally left her roots behind. This album had a whopping 5 of its 10 songs become hits, and they also still stand up to repeated listens. My personal favorite is the swinging "Why Haven't I Heard From You". It had been a while since a horn section was used to great effect in a country song, and that combined with soulful backing vocals worthy of the Pointer Sisters had to make this song one of the most unique ever to reach country's top 5. And yes, Reba soars to the heavens with her voice on this song. As truly country as she was back in the 1990s, Reba was still a bit of a risk-taker when it came to subject matter. "She Thinks His Name Was John" was a touching account of a person dying of AIDS, and how she couldn't even remember much about the man who gave it to her other than his name. Not everyday fodder for a country song, this probably explains why it only reached #15 on the charts, but it shows that country music can deal with subjects more diverse than those it normally sings about. READ MY MIND's other 3 hits were some classic Reba ballads with some more soulful performances from her: the very gospel-drenched "Till You Love Me", "The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter" (a #1 hit) and the heartbreaking "And Still". But the rest of the album is not bad in itself with songs of devotion like the title track, and two different approaches to unrequited love: sadness with "Everything That You Want" & "I Wish That I Could Tell You" and defiance with the "down-but-not-out" mentality of "I Won't Stand In Line" & "I Wouldn't Wanna Be You". Throughout her career Reba McEntire has been one of country music's most "country" of artists without becoming a purist. Sure, she's added elements of pop, soul and other non-country sounds to her music, but Reba never tried to totally take the country element out of her music altogether. An album like READ MY MIND is proof of this philosophy, showing that country music needn't be too closed-minded nor overly welcoming of outside styles like today. Simply put, country music of today needs to include a little more, not a lot, of its older traditions than it currently does now. And if country does indeed want to make itself more palatable to those who don't like country necessarily, it should make more albums like READ MY MIND which just barely straddle the line between all things country & non-country.

READ MY MIND is easily one of Reba's most accesible albums, and among some of her best too! I have found the album to be a very personal one, it just tugs at your heartstrings and affects you in a deep way. The sadness felt in songs like "She Thinks His Name Was John", a song about AIDS and its affect on people's everyday lives. "And Still", about an old flame, and finding he's not single anymore, in fact having a family and children. "I Wish That I Could Tell You", a sad song about someone who doesn't want to let go, having trouble saying goodbye. Then on the flipside, there are the love songs like the beautiful title track, which was sinful it wasn't released as a single, and the final track "Til You Love Me" which is just beautiful. As well there are the uptempo tracks which so Reba's fiery attitude like "I Wont Stand In Line", "I Wouldn't Wanna Be You", and "Why Haven't I Heard From You". This album simply put is amazing, the songs just touch you so deeply. Reba always chooses quality material, well she outdid herself on this one, there's so much great material here, its too bad it wasn't a bit longer! Its a wonderful album I highly reccomend it!