RECKLESS KELLY
Somewhere in Time
Austin, Texas-based roots rockers Reckless Kelly are performing songs by American singer/songwriter/relative-unknown Pinto Bennett, and doing a bang-up job. This album of a dozen honky-tonk, country carousers and moon-burned shuffles is likely going to be one of the more highly regarded albums of 2010, and it may even get the obscure Bennett a few more fans. Like a cross between Joe Ely and Billy Joe Shaver, Bennett writes songs about those that plug away through life’s emotional highs and lows to cut loose at some local watering hole on Saturday night. The album leads off with a couple of attention-getting rockers which set a tone that is immediately switched to the classic country sounds of “Bird on a Wire,” “I Hold the Bottle, You Hold the Wheel,” and the fiddle and steel driven “I’ve Done Everything I Could Do Wrong.” You’ll find it difficult to get this out of your head, and your music player… it’s just that good. Both Joe Ely and Pinto Bennett guest, making Somewhere in Time pretty much a modern classic of the form. (Yep Roc, www.yeproc.com) Jeff Monk
Winnipeg music & culture since 1989