Richard Skanse
April 11, 2008
Most discerning music aficionados will agree that an artist’s best work isn’t always the stuff that grabs you on the first spin; a lot of truly great records only reveal their beauty and depth over time and many repeated listens. Sure enough, time’s been good to the Old 97’s last outing, Drag It Up, but fully embracing the record’s melancholy heart on its own terms still feels like the chore implied by its title; it remains the only album in the band’s catalog that just isn’t a whole lotta fun. Fortunately, the new Blame It On Gravity delivers fun in spades, along with all the hooks and lyrical smarts that set this Dallas foursome apart from the middling alt-country crowd even before there was much of an alt-country crowd to speak of. Like 2001’s excellent Satellite Rides, the focus here is more pop than the punkified yee-haw of the band’s mid-’90s albums, though it sounds positively scrappy compared to the two sparkling solo albums frontman Rhett Miller released on either side of Drag It Up. From start to finish, the album is stacked with jumpy, infectious energy, even as the lyrics grapple with the thorny topic of love lost, unrequited and just plain foolhardy. Guitarist Ken Bethea and drummer Philip Peeples keep the engine barreling along at giddyup speed, and Miller, who for a spell seemed to be hoarding his best stuff for his solo gig, brings his A-game to standout tracks like “The Fool,” “No Baby I” and “Ride.” But it’s bassist Murry Hammond who contributes the heartbreakingly beautiful country lament, “Color of a Lonely Heart Is Blue” and the album’s most ebullient charmer, “This Beautiful Thing.” Come to think of it, that would have made a dandy — and fitting — album title.
Texas Music