This CD isn't as bad as I've heard. Give Jack a chance and a few of the tracks will suprise you. The songs I like the best are written by Jack but I'm a vintage Jack fan. It's no "Hey You" but its not bad minus a couple songs.
Wish I could be as enthusiastic as the other critics...bought this one for Lips Of An Angel and probably should have bought Hinder's version instead. Sorry, Jack!
This CD is great. Measure of a Man, Great Divide, Make a Wish, and Don't Want to Hurt are the highlights, but I think the whole CD is great.
preach on moteltan. cant be said any better than that. excellent album.
I love the new album and have pre-ordered several. Can't wait for the arrival.
I am so thrilled by the success that Jack is experiencing right now and I don't feel he has sold out at all. I have been one the fans that have been around since the very beginning. I do miss the small intimate shows that we used to attend with him, but we are all human with a need to experiment, try new things and reach for the stars.
I hope he flies high for a long long time.
Jealousy is an interesting thing. In reading these reviews, I sense a great deal of it. We all want to be part of some exclusive group, don't we? "Texas Music" fans... the hallowed membership. Our Clan knows Townes, Wall, JJW, REK, Wills, Ramsey, Earle, Ray Wylie, Lovett, Pat, Cory, Roger, Red Dirt, Willie, and the list goes on. As long as those acts stay "ours", we're pretty keen, ourselves, huh? We’ve got our ears to the ground and we are tuned-in and elite!
But let the secret get out, let a whole nation discover someone's talent and then our fan-pool is somehow diluted and we're not as cool to be in it. I mean, how cool is it to like someone everyone else likes? Never mind the dude's music or its merit relative to the global body of work that spans all time, fad, and genre boundaries. Naw, just keep him small, and keep him mine.
Jack's not consecrated. He's not yours. He's not Texas's. He's his own man and he knows what the F he's doing--"Nashville" doesn’t make Jack do anything. He took a big chunk of Texas with him for 14 years and beat Nashville over the head with it to no avail. Then it dawned on him... Waylon was the narrator for the cheesiest sellout-show on television for 5 years. The Bakersfield sound went on to host Hee Haw. Willie did movies, crapped out Stardust, and recorded with anyone who had a remote chance of bringing in a hit. JJW does frat shows and wears a smile in front of an audience he absolutely loathes. Hell--you can't come close to finding someone who didn't have to compromise their art in the name of commerce at least once in their career.
You want great Texas music? Make it yourself. I'll email you the formula--it's pretty g-damn simple. Or go listen to that decaying lot of unoriginal big fishes in a small pond and watch as they go broke and get sick with no health insurance, all the while dreaming that they had the talent to get a song up to number 1 in the country (they are already hits, a-hole). Me--I'll be sticking to the practice of listening to good music--Texas or otherwise.
If you are tired of the Texas pep-rallies, you'll dig this. If not, this record ain't fer you. But there's luckily plenty of derivative weeds still out there making Texas Music who sprang from Jack's flower, so rejoice.
Why is this album significant? A million people are going to buy an album with a fantastic song-portrait of west Texas called Great Divide. A million people are about to accidentally buy an album with a heart-wrenching love-soaked tune from a father to his daughter, Ava Adell. A million people are about to unwittingly stumble upon a father’s fantastic advice and hopes for his newborn son in the tune Make A Wish. Oh... they’ll be buying for the radio hits, but they’ll walk away unknowingly inoculated with true Texas gut. And that makes them a better set of ears, a set more receptive to some of the other good music out here. When Jack rises, everyone from Pat to Keen to Creager to you-name-it also rises. Exposure---that’s all you need to become a fan of this music, and Ingram's bringing it to a well-deserved genre.
Finally The Great Divide is on a CD, ive been waiting for this song for about 4 years now. Thats all I can see good about this album though.
Why did he put 2 songs from his previous album on this album? Only 12 songs total and half of them he didn't write. Sounds like a watered down Nashville sound and he doesn't even sound like his old self. I wouldn't pay money for this. Download the disappointment if you really want to hear it.
Dude, get off his back. He picked up a few songs that he didn't write to get on the map. The Great Divide is a song he wrote and has been performing for a really long time (since before Wherever You Are), and I have been waiting on it to be on a studio album since the first time I heard it. It's vintage Jack. Give this one a chance, people.
