A Ashley McBryde
Girl Going Nowhere
Warner Bros.
Nashville let one slip through.
The famed control freaks at the capital of country music couldn't scrub the personality, sass and, most importantly, talent out of Arkansas native Ashley McBryde (Mammoth Spring salute!) and the result is her striking major league debut, Girl Going Nowhere. A record that puts the lie that current country has to be bland quasi-rock anthems sung by the latest male hunk, Girl Going Nowhere immediately tosses McBryde into the top-tier Nashville artists, right up there rubbing elbows with Miranda Lambert, Eric Church and few others.
McBryde's personal story is punctuated by many years toiling away as a songwriter and then hitting the road for months at a time playing solo wherever for tips. Girl Going Nowhere has more than its share of life-on-the-road songs including the gospel-tinged, heart-tugger, "Home Sweet Highway." What makes McBryde's take on this familiar territory different is, as usual, the details. Happily, there's not a tailgate party or Mexico beach in sight.
While McBryde breaks with Nashville tradition in several places -- including the record cover where she cheerfully displays her tattoos -- she continues the country tradition of sharing songwriting credits with several others , the exception being the excellent conflicted ballad "Andy (I Can't Live Without You)."
Even with the help, McBryde makes this all her own. The sound of Girl Going Nowhere is more rock-country blues than country honk-tonk (the latter sound was featured in her 2016 album, Jalopies and Expensive Guitars). You can hear a bit of Springsteen throughout but particularly in the uptempo radio-is-my-savior, "Radioland." She hits a swampy, soulful note with "Southern Babylon."
Perhaps the highlight is the memo from the front lines of the flyover country drug wars, "Livin' Next to Leroy." The narrator of the cautionary tale ("See how high that class ring will get ya") is implicated in the harrowing business. It is A-plus songwriting and McBryde's booming voice cinches it.
The most hopeful sign is that McBryde was able to make this unique and personal record within the confines of Nashville. If there's any justice at all, it will be the first of many.
Hot tracks: "Livin' Next to Leroy," "Andy (I Can't Live Without You)," "The Jacket"
-- WERNER TRIESCHMANN
Special to the Democrat-Gazette
B Sting & Shaggy
44/876
A&M/Interscope
The combination of telephone country codes for Sting's England and Shaggy's Jamaica makes the numerical title of a warm collaboration between the Jamaican dance-hall king and the cool, intellectual Englishman.
The teaming makes sense, considering Sting's use of reggae rhythms as part of The Police. And, there is real chemistry between Shaggy, whose deep, thick cadences made "Boombastic" a hit, and Sting's flexible, honeyed voice.
The duo helped write every song on the album and their collaboration has triggered some interesting songwriting, including lifted poetry from Lewis Carroll for "Just One Lifetime."
The title song smartly honors Bob Marley -- Sting says Marley's ghost "haunts me to this day/There's a spiritual truth in the words of his song" -- as a way of inoculating everyone for this quirky offering.
"22nd Street" is like a rejected cut from Sting's 1985 solo album The Dream of the Blue Turtles until Shaggy and his bearish voice arrive. "Don't Make Me Wait," a sway-inducing pop song with a reggae sheen, turns out to be only a taste of what these men can bring, their two vocal and musical styles melding into something as delicious as a plate of jerk chicken washed down with a cold beer.
Guests include saxophonist Branford Marsalis, who played on The Dream of Blue Turtles, and influential reggae bassist Robbie Shakespeare.
Hot tracks:"22nd Street," "Don't Make Me Wait"
-- MARK KENNEDY
The Associated Press
B+ Ben Harper & Charlie Musselwhite
No Mercy in This Land
Anti-
With a Grammy for best blues album for 2014's Get Up! Ben Harper and Charlie Musselwhite put themselves in contention again with No Mercy in This Land.
Harper wrote or co-wrote the 10 tracks, sings and plays guitar (slide, acoustic, electric) and co-produced the record. "All" Musselwhite does is play the harmonica and intone some emotional verses on the title track -- just like all Shakespeare did was write plays and poems.
The album veers between electric and acoustic, from songs about the challenges and thrills of love to a couple of tunes about alcoholism and others about seemingly insurmountable hardships.
There are sharp observations and knowledge of the world in Harper's songs -- "Everybody says I love you/But not everybody lives I love you" and "You may have learned to hustle/But you never learned to dance" -- and they're a great fit with the duo's magnetic blues repertoire, blended with gospel, soul and rhythm & blues.
"The Bottle Wins Again" rages, "Bad Habits" shakes, "Moving On" struts and "Found the One" sounds ripe for a cover by Harper's other veteran collaborators, the Blind Boys of Alabama.
Musselwhite's tones range from Little Walter-like overdriven vamps to a caressing contribution reminiscent of Larry Adler on the excellent ballad "Nothing at All." Lead guitarist Jason Mozersky, whose solos blend beautifully with Musselwhite's, bassist Jesse Ingalls and drummer Jimmy Paxson form a tight, flexible unit.
There's no audible generation gap, just a pair of kindred souls who know how to make great music.
Hot tracks: "The Bottle Wins Again," "Bad Habits," "Nothing at All"
-- PABLO GORONDI
The Associated Press
Style on 04/24/2018