CD Review – ‘All About Tonight’ – Blake Shelton

14 years ago Liv Carter Comments Off on CD Review – ‘All About Tonight’ – Blake Shelton

‘All About Tonight’ – Blake Shelton (Reprise/WMN, 2010)

Having split his new album in two ‘six pak’ offerings, Blake Shelton releases the second set of six songs. The title track and first single is an unpretentious and fun honky tonk song that is currently soaring up the charts.

As with all previous Blake Shelton albums, there is space for humor. ‘Draggin’ the River’, which features Miranda Lambert, has a couple planning to elope, and avoid her disapproving father, by faking their own deaths. Miranda’s mischievous vocal performance makes this song; it’s pure fun.  

There’s more fun to be had on ‘Got a Little Country’. Blake throws a party with this track, singing about a girl who looks big city but had a little ‘country’ inside. After the onslaught of ‘I’m just so country’ songs, this is the right way to sing about this. The country also comes back on ‘That Thing We Do’, a slightly plodding ‘let’s escape to the country for some alone time’ track. The wonderful, fresh vocals add lots of energy and turn this into the perfect road trip song. 

Things are slowed down ballad ‘Suffocating’, a strong, classic tear-in-my-beer song that’s one of the staples of country music. The final track, and upcoming second single, ‘Who Are You When I’m Not Looking’, is the only track that I didn’t immediately take to. It has the singer wondering about his girl’s habits when she’s alone, which brings up some endearing imagery of her sliding down the hallway in her socks, but has the puzzling chorus: ‘My oh my you’re so good-looking/hold yourself together like a pair of bookends/but I’ve not tasted all your cooking/who are you when I’m not looking’. What? He’s comparing her to bookends? Then there’s the line ‘do you paint your toes cause you bite your nails?’ Really? Who bites their toenails?! I love the music on this track, mellow but not melodramatic, but the lyrics are just plain weird.

‘All About Tonight’ is solid and entertaining but doesn’t really break new ground, perhaps with the exception of ‘Draggin’ the River’. The no-risk production choices make this fit nicely with Blake’s previous work so I still don’t see the logic of these ‘six pak’ releases. It would make sense if each was centered around a different theme but neither had a theme to begin with; they are both just 6 songs in a row with nothing to link them.

‘All About Tonight’ will be in stores on August 10, 2010.

Disclosure of material connection for this review. 
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Liv Carter

Liv Carter

Liv is a career coach for creatives, and the people who work with them.
She holds several certificates from Berklee College of Music, and a certificate in Positive Psychology from UC Berkeley.
Her main influences are coffee, cats, and Alexander Hamilton.
Liv Carter

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