Try Again

Mike Ireland, Mike Ireland & Holler

Product Details

• Audio CD (May 21, 2002)
• Original Release Date: May 21, 2002
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Ashmont Records
• ASIN: B000066AM6
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #235,211 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Mike Ireland's 1998 debut album, Learning How to Live, was an out-of-nowhere stunner, a gut-churning emotional blowout crafted in the aftermath of epic personal turmoil. Like that disc, its follow-up is classic country, the kind that echoed from AM radio 30 years ago. And it's no mere revival act: from the lush, wistful opener "Welcome Back" through the swinging "Sweet Sweetheart," the pensive piano ballad "I'd Like To," and the doomed-love ode "Close Enough to Break Each Other's Hearts," all the way down to the last dying notes of the plaintive closer "Let Me Hold You," not one second sounds forced. Ireland's tenor is versatile and sweetened with a twist of Ozark twang; his lyrics are less crushing than inspiring this time, but just as unflinching and true. And his band Holler handles weepers and rockers with equal aplomb, always seeming to know whether to lay back or leap forward and never failing to color with just the right lick, fill, or string section swoon. Though it took Ireland four years to muster the players, songs, money, and courage to make his second disc, Try Again is a wire-to-wire winner and well worth the wait. --Anders Smith Lindall

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Tried Again, Did it Right Again, July 6, 2002

By	Allen Stairs (Takoma Park, MD United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Country music is sometimes clever, and these days a little too often sappy or shallow. Thank God for Mike Ireland, who reminds us that there's such a thing as intelligent country.

Not that anyone who actually knows the genre ever doubted it. But I've come to think that Mike Ireland is in a class by himself on this score. What he does really is country; he's no poser. And it's not "intellectual" or "cerebral" or any other such BS, let alone maudlin, sappy or pandering. But it's clear-headed, thoughtful, and wonderfully well-wrought.

This is a _really_ good album. It is so much better than most of what you hear on country radio that music row ought to hang its head in shame. There's nothing here that hits you over the head; it's _all_ good, and good in ways that don't necessarily make themselves plain until you've listened a few times.

Mike Ireland's last album didn't sell all that well, which, for anyone who needed to know, proves that the world isn't just. But this one could be different. All you need to do is buy it. And listen. And tell all your friends.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a modern classic, December 19, 2002

By A Customer

Even better than his debut album, this is one of the best country albums in years. No one has ever done countrypolitan better.