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"Alright Guy"
It's rare for a staunch traditionalist
to project an image as a serious musician and a sex symbol, but
that's what Gary Allan has been aiming for--and achieving--of
late. His 1999 star-making album, Smoke Rings in the Dark, played
that sensual card with the title single and its smoldering video,
as well as with the randy "Right Where I Need to Be."
Now he reprises the formula with "Man of Me," this
album's first single, a hard-driving, libido-strutting rocker
with such sexual heat it threatens to burst into flames. If that,
and its hubba, hubba video are what draw buyers, so be it, but
there's plenty else to like here, even if Alright Guy, with too
many novelty songs and edgy fillers, falls short of its predecessor.
While this album takes Allan farther from the honky-tonk than
his previous efforts, there's no resisting a guy who can imbue
the heartbreak ballad "What I'd Say" with such restrained
anguish, or handle the Western swing of "Adobe Walls"
with such aplomb. Of all the stylish guys in Nashville in 2001,
he's the one to keep your eye on. --Alanna Nash |
