Description:
This isn`t tidy, genre faithful music, folks. "California Country" is a dark and daring turn for the Hawks, with stellar guest pickin` by Chris Hillman, Rick Shea, and Cody Bryant, with lead vocalist Rob Waller`s familiar wry charm. The record covers a terrain as varied as California: a honky tonky lament on the paving over of farm and desert; a rock anthem tale of a poser`s showdown with Slash from Guns N` Roses; a fiddling waltz valentine to cranky Senator Robert Byrd`s heroic anti-war moment; and coming home with the tour money blown in Jackpot, Nevada. William Michael Smith of The Houston Press says, "Seldom has there been an album with such joyous music-making, such corrosive, acid-etched lyrics. Way cosmic." This is songwriting that breaks any current mold: playful, deeply but obliquely political, flirting with despair but innocent at the core, literate and complex--and it`s (California) country. (Western Seeds Record Co.)
