It always strikes me how big country music is. I say that as a fan of 30 odd years, but still it surprises.
Earlier this year I was able to go and see both Chase Rice and Brett Eldredge in the space of a week or so. They both played the same venue, Rice sold out the middle room, but Eldredge filled the big room to the rafters (I mean that literally too, given that they were using the upper tier of seating that they never open).
“Only Truck In Town” is a four track follow up to Tyler Farr’s two albums – the last one was released five years ago – and both of them crashed the US top 10, selling three hundred thousand copies more or less, in the process. Millions of streams too. There is every reason to suppose that “….Town” is going to do the same.
Produced by his friend Jason Aldean – he’s got so many Gold Discs he uses them as coasters for his glasses, you imagine – what you have here is the perfect country pop record.
“Only Truck In Town”, the song, sets out the ground rules for the EP. The blue collar, working class hero who lives for Friday Night, and knows he’s lucky to have the girl he’s got: “girl like that, in a town like this, she could have her pick…”. And that’s important too. Because this is for the Tommy’s the Gina’s the ones livin’ on a prayer, and that’s why these songs resonate.
Put simply, they are easy to listen to, easy to get a handle on, and brilliantly well put together. The guitar solo here is wonderful.
The second one “Soundtrack To A Small Town Sundown” is probably the Saturday morning reflection to the Friday night before. Working on the principle of “don’t bore us, get to the chorus”, it is the tale of a moment. “It’s just music, its not magic, like it was in your daddy’s car,” he sings here, and anyone who’s loved and lost, can relate. That’s the point. It’s not about whether you like it or not, but everyone understands this emotion.
“I Wish Dogs Could Live Forever” adds some lap steel for extra effect, but the key part is not man’s best friend, its this: “I wish love wasn’t so hard, I wish people could stay together, I wish girls couldn’t break hearts….”
It ends on an upbeat note. “Heaven On Dirt” has him as the king again. The girl at his side on the backroads, and that’s cool, because it means the world is as it should be. That’s what you want from Country pop rock.
Which is why even thousands of miles away, where I sit, on a showery, windy cold June day, with the world going hell and worse to come (and Farr’s wife is working in a Missouri hospital so he knows that too), this record hits home. Not just down home, as it were. The concepts here are the American Dream to those of us who love this music. Whatever your politics (and mine would have had me on a blacklist in the US in the 50s….) this is about dreaming of a better time.
Mention of Rice and Eldredge at the start was deliberate too, given that he’s from the same ballpark as both, and if unlike the pair he doesn’t seem to get involved in the writing much, then Tyler Farr still owns the tracks here.
If you love a certain type of mega-selling modern country, then this really is an EP for you.
Rating 8.5/10
