Justin Moore Off the Beaten PathValory Music B+The canny and generally pleasurable third record by Arkansas native Justin Moore will only increase his profile in that cutthroat genre of country music. In its first week of sales, Off the Beaten Path sold more than 100,000 copies and landed at the top of Billboard’s country album chart.
Moore’s approach is a sharp one, wrapping old-fashioned attitude around a guitar-driven country/pop sound. This is perfectly captured in “Old Back in the New School,” where needle-like guitar sets a foundation for a pedal steel to do various backflips. In the song, Moore wants “the working man back on the bar stool,” and notes that “Johnny rocked and Willie rolled/but they just did it with more soul.” The rest tries to match that energy and innovation and falls just short.
“Old Habits,” a duet with Miranda Lambert, is a well-constructed heart-wrencher. “This Kind of Town” paints small-town life with a specific brush (everybody cashing checks at the Wal-Mart) and “ way-oh” backing vocals. Moore loves the slower tempos, which bog down the second half of the record. He also makes a big misstep with “I’d Want It to Be Yours,” a song about a female derriere that is more lurid than funny.
Hot tracks: “Old Back in the New School,” “Old Habits” and “This Kind of Town.” - WERNER TRIESCHMANN
Glen Campbell See You There Surfdog B
See You There, recorded when Arkansas native Glen Campbell was working on 2011’s Ghost on the Canvas, is packed with sparely orchestrated versions of some of his best-known hits by John Hartford (“Gentle on My Mind”) and Jimmy Webb (“Galveston,” “By the Time I Get to Phoenix,” “Wichita Lineman”) along with Larry Weiss’ “Rhinestone Cowboy.”
Even more intriguing are less well-known cuts such as “Hey Little One,” “Postcard From Paris” by Webb, and the odd “What I Wouldn’t Give,” written by Campbell and Julian Raymond. The vocals on these songs are strong, emotionally powerful and coherent, all the more so without the distraction of the heavy instrumentation that marks so many of Campbell’s studio releases.
Some of the material appears to be filler, such as two versions of “Waiting on the Comin’ of My Lord,” which dilutes the album’s impact.
Hot tracks: “There’s No Me Without You,” “True Grit.” - KAREN MARTIN Mavis Staples One True Vine Anti -A
Mavis Staples’ second set of mostly gospel tunes with Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy as producer follows their 2010 collaboration You Are Not Alone.
Staples’ voice is a vibrant,sensual, heartfelt instrument that powered The Staple Singers to chart success in the 1960s and 1970s with hits such as “I’ll Take You There” and “Respect Yourself.”
One True Vine is intimate; Staples speaks directly to us. It is more hushed, darker in tone and thoughtful as it contemplates the state of the spirit, loneliness and the human condition. Guitars are stark, almost provocative.
Hot tracks: “Jesus Wept,” imbued with longing and hope; Nick Lowe’s wondrous “Far Celestial Shores”; and the standard “Woke Up This Morning.”
Staples performs at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 11 at Christ Episcopal Church, 509 Scott St., Little Rock. Tickets are $35 and $20. Information: (501) 375-2342.
- ELLIS WIDNER The Band of Heathens Sunday Morning Record BOH B+
Lineup changes and the natural aging process have drained the wildness and funk leanings out of this veteran act from Austin, Texas. Sunday Morning Record sums up as more of a quiet folk album, with some sweetly contemplative and beautiful tracks, such as “Had It All” and “Girl With Indigo Eyes.” The latter is a real psychedelic throwback, with an acoustic guitar bed and an infectious whistling that makes it bloom before your ears.
The uptempo numbers such as “Shake the Foundation” are few, and don’t have the force needed to put them over into a list of favorites. This will probably be seen as a transition record, as The Band of Heathens act likeready converts to a different musical faith.
Hot tracks: “Girl With Indigo Eyes,” “Had It All.” - WERNER TRIESCHMANN Robbie Fulks Gone Away Backward BloodshotA
The previous Robbie Fulks record was a bunch of Michael Jackson covers called Happy. No, really.
Thankfully, this album is nothing like that. Gone Away Backward is a stellar collection of folky country tunes lamenting the death of small-town America, chronicling good love gone bad, and trying to find a place in a world that seems to be moving too fast.
Produced by noise maven Steve Albini, this all-acoustic, intimate album is often somber, the strings of fiddles and guitars sounding as if they were being played in some old barn late at night. Fulks’ fingerpicking, especially on the bluegrass-tinged instrumental “Pacific Slope,” is maddeningly great.
The prodigiously talented Fulks, known for his clever, wise-cracking ways, remains pretty serious here. Don’t come looking for “Let’s Kill Saturday Night,” or that kiss-off tune about Nashville whose title we can’t print. Instead, on songs like “Where I Fell,” “That’s Where I’m From” and “Sometimes the Grass Is Really Greener” he explores the complexities of small-town life and, in the case of the latter, the temptations to sell out.
Of course, there’s no fear in Fulks selling out. Dude is 12 albums into a career in which he seems to pretty much do whatever he feels like doing. He’ll follow his muse no matter where she takes him. Thankfully, this time it was Backward.
Hot tracks: “Where I Fell”; the sweetly sexy “Imogene,” which could have been a Mississippi John Hurt track; the bluegrass tale of a love that never blossomed, “Rose of the Summer.” - SEAN CLANCY
Style, Pages 29 on 10/01/2013