Tough All Over - 7576

Product Description Tough All Over, Allan's overwhelming sixth collection, on MCA Nashville, is true to all aspects of Allan's past work, beliefs, and successes. He remains a staunch believer in risk-taking tunes, evidenced here particularly by the forceful "He Can't Quit Her," which sees love as addiction, and "Nickajack Cave (Johnny Cash's Redemption)," which portrays a dramatic turning point in the late country legend's life after drugs and alcohol had "him strung out on the ropes." But Tough All Over also moves on. Previous Allan albums presented his music as the play of a mainstream Nashville artist making his strong and sweet peace with California country traditions stretching from the rich balladry of Roy Orbison to the ornery truths of Haggard and Owens to the post-punk roots allegiances of the Blasters and X. That play is now gone. In its place is a fully integrated command of California and Nashville country that leaps out as Gary Allan music at its most immediate, satisfying, and mature. For Allan, Tough All Over has become his favorite record; he describes the final sessions now as "the most expensive therapy I've ever had." He worked, after all, with the same group of musicians -- among them keyboardist Steve Nathan, drummer Chad Cromwell, electric guitarist Brent Rowan, bass player Michael Rhodes, acoustic guitarists Jake Kelly and John Willis, percussionist Eric Darken, fiddle player Hank Singer and steel player Robby Turner -- that he had been friends with and recorded with since his very first studio album. Amazon.com As the title of Gary Allan's sixth album suggests, there's no change of pace or lightening up on his darkest collection to date (and first since his wife's suicide). Love goes bad on the bittersweet "Best I Ever Had," gets brutal on "I Just Got Back from Hell," and turns positively lethal on "He Can't Quit Her." The closest Allan comes to an affirmative sentiment is the schmaltzy "Life Ain't Always Beautiful," though an extended guitar solo brings the rock balladry of "Putting My Misery on Display" to a soul-stirring finale. "Nickajack Cave" evokes the mythic redemption of Johnny Cash, but there's no redemption for Allan here. He sounds like he's trying so hard to convey life's hard lessons that the comparative understatement of "Puttin' Memories Away" comes as a relief. --Don McLeese Review "...this CD is subtly devastating...elegant...dazzling..." -- New York Times "Chillinglingly authentic...churning out one power chord at a time." (4 Stars) -- Rolling Stone "One of the bravest and most stunningly intimate main-stream country albums ever made...demands to be listened to carefully..." -- Country Weekly "Sometimes chilling, always heartbreaking...achingly beautiful." (4 out of 4 Stars) -- USA Today "a bold album of soul-piercing beauty" (Rating: A) -- Entertainment Weekly Gary Allan sings poignantly about the loss of his wife. -- USA Today - 4 STARS - 10/11/05 He deserves a tip of your 10-gallon hat for bravely dealing with his pain. -- People Magazine, 3 Stars, 11/7/05 The disc examines emotional turmoil without turning sappy or sanctimonious. -- Dallas Morning News - 10/10/05 The songs are inseparable from his story, what makes them powerful is the way they tug in a different direction. -- New York Times - 10/6/05 Tough All Over is a bold album of soul-piercing beauty. -- Entertainment Weekly ** A - 10/21/05 About the Artist Over the course of five albums, including his 1999 breakthrough Smoke Rings in the Dark, Gary Allan has established himself as a country singer who knows exactly and communicates richly his own mind. He is a songwriter who often has chosen not to write, because of his great ability to sing to life certain songs written by others, and because of his expertise at grouping those selections into albums that expose his own unvarnished emotional truths. He is a native southern Californian who always has believed that vintage choices -- '50s guitar tones; rhythms from honky-tonk clubs where people gather, talk, and dance; lyrics unafraid to deal with whatever appears on the table at the time -- should form the bedrock of country music that remains in touch with modern realities. Last October Allan's path abruptly changed when his wife of three years committed suicide. "Your whole life, all your plans come to a halt," he says, "and you need to start over again. I was definitely in a place that I had never been, by a long shot, when I made this record." "So I had started writing again, and then when she passed writing songs became a healing process for me. All of my records are personal, but this is by far my most personal record. I have four songs on this one -- 'I Just Got Back from Hell', 'Puttin' My Memories Away', 'No Damn Good', and 'Putting My Misery on Display'. You can definitely see where I was on each of my albums, mentally. But I think this one, yeah, this one got closer to me, more inside of me, than you would normally see. Just beca
ASIN: B000ASATOE
VSKU: 4EKGU90080VN_ns
Condition: Good
Author/Artist:Gary Allan
Binding: Audio CD