Robbie Fulks Country Love Songs CD

Personnel: Robbie Fulks (vocals, guitar); Ora Jones (vocals); D. Clinton Thompson (electric guitar); Paul Carestia, Tom Brumley (pedal steel); Keith Bauman (lap steel); Tuey Connell (lap steel, banjo); Casey Driessen (fiddle); Steve Rosen (fiddle, background vocals); Joe Terry (piano, keyboards); Brett Simmons, Daren Wilcox, Lou Whitney (bass); Dan Massey, Bobby Lloyd Hicks (drums); The Skeletons (background vocals).
Personnel: Robbie Fulks (vocals, guitar); Ora Jones (vocals); D. Clinton Thompson (electric guitar); Keith Baumann (lap steel guitar); Steve Rosen (fiddle, background vocals); Casey Driessen (fiddle); Joe Terry (piano, keyboards); Lou Whitney (bass guitar); Bobby Lloyd Hicks (drums); The Skeletons (background vocals).
Recording information: Chicago, IL; Springfield, MO.
Photographer: Elaine Moore.
Robbie Fulks is cleverly twisted, deliciously irreverent, and one of the best of the new country singer/songwriters. Musically, Country Love Songs supplies plenty of hardcore, bottle-tippin', honky tonk country, with a '50s production that sounds like it's supposed to be there. Fulks writes and sings country music that bears little or no resemblance to what dominates the airwaves; rather, his material harks back to an era when humor and dark subject matter shared the same page of a writer's composition book. Paying homage to the classic Bakersfield sound, with former Buckeroo Tom Brumley shining on pedal steel, Fulks delivers "The Buck Starts Here," which just might be the best country song since "He Stopped Loving Her Today." Lyrically, Fulks can travel some pretty spooky highways, as in the descriptive ballad "Barely Human," a drinking song that's as tortured as they get, with the song's character "barely human from twilight till dawn." Other strong tracks include the saga of an aging movie starlet who loses it in "She Took a Lot of Pills (And Died)" -- which first appeared on the second volume of the label's Insurgent Country compilations -- and the swingin' "Every Kind of Music But Country." ~ Jack Leaver
On his debut album, Fulks keeps the spirit of cry-in-your-beer honky-tonk music alive. While he's musically conservative, employing traditional, mostly acoustic instrumentation and classic country song structures, his lyrical muse runs further afield. On "She Took A Lot Of Pills And Died," the mere title of which should earn him a spot in the Country Hall Of Fame, and "Let's Live Together," his sardonic humor adds a twist to the proceedings, but he never gets self-conscious or detached enough to mitigate the emotional impact. Stark, self-effacing tunes like "Barely Human" and "Rock Bottom, Pop. 1" combine heartfelt sentiment with Fulks' knack for killer songwriting, making a direct connection to the heart and head simultaneously.
Fulks, who has already been covered by country-rock cult heroes the Five Chinese Brothers, is backed here by some fine players, including members of the celebrated roots-rock band The Skeletons, and the album moves with ease between the various sub-genres of trad country. From barroom weepers to barnstormers and western swing, Fulks' rough-and-ready vocal delivery and top-shelf tunes come across with freshness and vitality. COUNTRY LOVE SONGS is the closest a fella whose name ain't George Jones can come to making a perfect honky-tonk album.Option (11-12/96, p.104) - "...Fulks backs up his tales of quirk and strangeitude with traditional hillbilly, honky-tonk and western swing arrangements, but it's his personality that drives the material past 'neotraditional' into the realm of the bizarre."