1 	Somehow Tonight 	2:58
2 	Lonesome And Dry As A Bone 	3:52
3 	Tall Cornstalk 	2:47
4 	Fit For A King 	4:11
5 	Route 5 Box 109 	3:57
6 	Rainin' On Her Rubby Dolly    (Featuring – The Grascals)	2:54
7 	I Know How It Feels 	3:39
8 	Tennessee Tea 	2:50
9 	Free And Easy 	3:00
10 	Stormy Weather Once Again 	3:02
11 	'Til Death 	4:28
12 	Hard To Handle 	2:30

Joe Diffie - Vocals, Primary Artist
Mike Compton - Mandolin
Charlie Cushman - Banjo 
Mark Fain - Bass 
Aubrey Haynie - Fiddle
Rob Ickes - Dobro 
Bryan Sutton - Guitar (Acoustic) 

During his career as a country singer, Joe Diffie always walked on the traditional side of the street, or maybe the long lonesome highway. He was known as a hit songwriter before he started his career as a country music singer, but before that he played in rock bands and gospel groups. He also spent six years touring and recording with a bluegrass band called Special Edition. When Rounder asked him if he'd like to make a bluegrass album he jumped at the chance. With Grammy-winning producer and engineer Luke Wooten at his side, Diffie assembled an impressive cast of super pickers like Rhonda Vincent, Alecia Nugent, Rob Ickes, and the Grascals, who add their chops to a new tune penned by Diffie and pal Shawn Camp, "It's Raining on Her Rubber Dolly Now." The song is a take on divorce with the kind of over the top emotion that often gives country a bad name, but Diffie's understated vocals and Jeremy Abshire's weeping fiddle strike the perfect balance between pathos and despair. He revives the shoulda-been hit "Tennessee Tea," a tune he wrote in his days with Special Edition, and takes it at a faster than light tempo. His phrasing on this ode to illegal drink suggests George Jones at his wooziest. Diffie settles down into a relaxed grove for a cover of Flatt & Scruggs' "Somehow Tonight" and pulls out all the emotional stops for Camp's "Lonesome and Dry as a Bone," the tale of a man mourning for his deceased lover without the aid of alcohol. There's not a weak track here, and Diffie's wailing lead vocals and name recognition will hopefully fan the fires of the current revival of interest in traditional bluegrass. ---j. poet, AllMusic Review

He’s had success in the country field – maybe not as many as some, or as much as a singer of his caliber probably deserves – but Joe Diffie has done all right for himself, both as an artist and as a songwriter. But his new project on Rounder, Homecoming: The Bluegrass Album, shows what can happen when a pure singer like Diffie takes on a project that’s close to his heart.

Featuring a great mix of songs by some old friends, some classic artists, and the singer himself, Diffie is joined on Homecoming by a band of some of Nashville’s finest bluegrass players, including mandolinist Mike Compton, guitarist Bryan Sutton, and dobro whiz Rob Ickes. And the background vocalists are no slouches either, with Rhonda Vincent, Alecia Nugent and Harley Allen among them. Diffie’s delivery on every track is on the money, and his affinity for bluegrass comes through loud and clear.

The album opens with the Flatt & Scruggs classic “Somehow Tonight,” with a vocal that shows that Diffie isn’t just a country singer trying to do something new. He sings like a broken man on Shawn Camp’s heart-rending “Lonesome and Dry As a Bone,” and Camp also appears as a co-writer on the humorous and appropriate “Rainin’ On Her Rubber Dolly Now,” with music from the Grascals. And it’s all produced by Luke Wooten, who understands what to do with this material and instrumentation as well as anybody on Music Row.

The Diffie original “’Til Death,” a pure bluegrass song with recitation about adultery and murder, may be the lyrical highlight of the album; when Diffie matter-of-factly sings “evil thoughts ran through my mind/I began to track her down/I would not be satisfied/’til she was in the ground,” there’s no way a listener can’t be glued to the edge of his or her seat to see what happens next. The biggest surprise on the album, though, is Diffie’s treatment of the old Otis-Redding/Black Crowes number “Hard to Handle.” If Diffie and crew were able to play and sing this thing any faster it would sound like the Chipmunks.

Enough already. This is a wonderful record that pays tribute to the masters with the freshness of 2010. Here’s hoping Joe does more work like this in the future. ---Rick Moore, americansongwriter.com

download (mp3 @320 kbs):

yandex mediafire ulozto gett

back

01. In Another World – 3:46			play
02. My Give A Damn's Busted – 3:19
03. If I Lost Her – 3:44
04. Stoned On Her Love – 3:57
05. Hollow Deep As Mine – 3:41
06. This Pretender – 3:54
07. Like A River Dreams Of Rain – 3:56
08. Live To Love Another Day – 3:13		play
09. What A Way To Go – 3:15
10. The Grandpa That I Know – 5:26

Country is more a music of songs than albums, as its practitioners scour Nashville publishers for ten good compositions in the established style, then hope one or two of them will connect with fans. Joe Diffie has put together a decade-plus career in country largely on his ability to succeed in this quest. An adequate but undistinguished singer, he has proven versatile enough to score with a variety of material, and if he has never ascended to superstar status, that he is still going after ten years is a considerable accomplishment. His albums as albums tend to suffer from the typical country flaw: They sound like ten separate songs instead of coherent collections. That's true of In Another World, too, but, as usual, there seem to be enough potential singles to keep him going. The title song, which, typical of the current market, was on country radio for months prior to the album's release, isn't really one of the stronger tracks; it's a wistful reflection on lost love, but a bit sketchy. Far better is the second track, the raucous kiss-off song "My Give a Damn's Busted." Diffie has made a small specialty of such novelties, and he gives a letter-perfect reading to this one, which sounds like a hit waiting to happen if country fans don't find it a tad too sarcastic. Typically, though, it's a one-off; nothing else on the record sounds remotely like it. "If I Lost Her" is the best ballad, while "This Pretender" sounds like something the Eagles could have done. The rest of the tracks are sturdy formula country with their twisted clichés, sentimental messages, and instrumentation. The producers have achieved a remarkably high-tech sound for a country disc, even if the result comes off as freeze-dried on occasion, especially in the harmony vocals. ---William Ruhlmann, AllMusic Review

download (mp3 @192 kbs):

yandex 4shared mega mediafire uloz.to cloudmailru uptobox ge.tt

back

01. Tougher Than Nails - 3:10			play
02. Nothin' But The Radio - 3:26
03. Good News, Bad News - 3:47
04. The More You Drink, The Better I Look - 2:24
05. Am I - 2:56					play
06. Movin' Train - 3:31
07. If I Could Only Bring You Back - 3:54
08. What Would Waylon Do - 3:16
09. Something I Do For Me - 3:44
10. Daddy's Home - 3:37
11. This Time Last Year - 3:10
12. My Redneck Of The Woods - 3:58

Personnel: 
Joe Diffie (vocals, guitar); 
Scott Sanders (steel guitar); 
Aubrey Haynie, Audrey Haney (mandolin, fiddle); 
Larry Franklin (fiddle); 
Jonathan Yudkin (strings); 
Steve Nathan (piano, Hammond b-3 organ); 
Gary Lunn, Larry Paxton (bass guitar); 
John Willis, B. James Lowry, Biff Watson (acoustic guitar);
Brent Mason , J.T. Corenflos, Jason Roller (electric guitar); 
Paul Franklin (dobro); 
Randy McCormick, Tim Akers, Gary Prim (piano); 
Lonnie Wilson (drums, percussion).

Joe Diffie left Sony after 2001's In Another World, and three years later he released Tougher Than Nails, his first independent album. The switch from major to indie hasn't altered the essential sound of Diffie's music -- he's still a good-time neo-traditionalist, as comfortable with a twangy country-rocker as he is with a sweet ballad -- but there are some subtle changes. He co-writes five of the 12 songs, the most since 1999's A Night to Remember, and he co-produces the album, keeping the sound bright and accessible, but just a little more country than current contemporary country radio constructs. Apart from that, there's nothing new, but there doesn't need to be, since Diffie is still a satisfying straight-ahead country singer, capable of delivering solid records on a regular basis. Tougher Than Nails is no exception to the rule, and while only a handful of songs truly stand apart from the pack -- the sentimental Jesus tale in the title track, the nostalgic "Nothin' But the Radio," the rolling and summery "Movin' Train," and, best of all, the rowdy barroom raver "The More You Drink, the Better I Look" -- there are no bad tunes, either. Of course, that makes it no different than most Diffie records, but that's hardly something to complain about, since this is a solid and enjoyable collection of neo-traditional country, as enjoyable as most records he's made. --- Stephen Thomas Erlewine

The 90s saw an aggressive onslaught of neo-traditionalists trying to put a contemporary edge spin to traditional honky tonk. Joe Diffie, with his southern flavored baritone, has certainly left an indelible mark with novelties such as "Prop Me Up Beside the Jukebox," "Honky Tonk Attitude," "If the Devil Danced in Empty Pockets" as well as his more solemn "Home," "Ships That Don't Come Home" and "Is It Cold In Here." However, due to the copious release of tepid material, Diffie's popularity waned at the turn of the millennium. His last album, 2001's "In Another's World" was not acerbic enough to set this Okie apart from Nashville's saturated crooners.

After being released from his contractual agreements with Epic Records, Diffie returns three years later with his first independent effort "Tougher Than Nails." With drummer and Diffie's seasoned producer, Lonnie Wilson still on the helm, Diffie continues what he does best: honky tonk with an attitude. However, unlike his last couple Epic outings, this time the material is a tad stronger with entries from Diffie as well as some Nashville heavyweights such as Leslie Satcher, Frank Myers, Wynn Varble, Harley Allen, George Teren amongst others.

Sprightly, finger-picked acoustic guitar lines, insistent fiddle quotes, a taste of moaning pedal steel, constitute the mise en sc?ne for the title cut and single "Tougher Than Nails," a moral tale of forgiveness crafted around the story of a father giving advice to a son to "do as Jesus would have." Diffie showcases his own gritty vocal prowess on "Nothin' On But the Radio," a catchy hard-rocking scorcher. Without any trace of slowing down, Diffie locks in high gear on his self-composed "Moving Train," a song describing the feelings of a man in love. Not a man to abandon his paternal upbringings, Diffie pays his tribute to his dad on the midtempo "Daddy's Home," a track reminisce of his earlier hit "Home" both in terms of lyrical content and melody.

However, the better moments of "Tougher Than Nails" are the ballads. A sonic cousin to Diffie's biggie "Is It Cold In Here," "This Time Last Year" finds a passion-packed performance by Diffie over a picturesque tune of heartbreak. Equally provocative, though a tad more clich? is "If I Could Bring You Back." With its wailing steel guitar forming the backdrop of the song, Diffie's plea for his lover's return is heartfelt. "Something I Do For Me" is another powerhouse ballad coming from the pens of Diffie and Harley Allen (writer of John Michael Montgomery's "Little Girl").

However, George Jones' presence as Diffie's duet partner on the Leslie Satcher/Wynn Varble composition "What Would Waylon Do" is predictable and tiresome. Though "What Would Waylon Do" is a 2004 copyright, but hasn't such a title and song idea been used before? "The More You Drink, the Better I Look," "My Neck of the Woods" and "Good News, Bad News" are obligatory uptempo numbers. They are by no means offensive, just humdrum. ---Tomothy Yap

download (mp3 @320 kbs):

yandex 4shared mega mediafire uloz.to cloudmailru uptobox ge.tt

back