Search - Prairie Oyster :: Oyster Tracks

Nice debut for Prairie Oyster & previously unavailable in US

06/11/2000

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Prairie Oyster's debut album "Oyster Tracks" is a fine accomplishment and a sign of great things to come for this Toronto-based country band. It is interesting to note that this album has been previously unavailable in the US. Thanks to Amazon, this has been rectified. It would be nice if their other US-released, but now out-of-print albums ("Different Kind of Fire" - 1990; "Everybody Knows" - 1991; and "Only One Moon" - released in 1994 in Canada and 1996 in the US) would be made available in the US as Canadian imports via Amazon.com as well as their Canadian- only release "What is this Country?" (1998)."Oyster Tracks" successfully blends traditional and contemporary country in a unique synthesis with a wonderful Tex-Mex remake of the George Jones/Wynn Stewart classic "Rain Rain" (complete with Spanish horns) and the very beautiful slow dancing country waltz "Man in the Moon." Other standout tracks include the bluesy, Fats Domino-inspired "I'm Learning" which breaks out into a Dixieland arrangement (fun and swinging); "Juke Joint Johnny" (raw country blues); and "Give it a Little More Time." This is the only Oyster album where Keith Glass shares in some of the lead vocal work ("You Got a Way, "Give It a Little More Time", "Other Side of Town") with bassist Russell deCarle, and both sound very fine. Joan Besen's piano playing is like tasty barbecue sauce; John P. Allen's fiddle playing is terrific; and Dennis Delorme's pedal steel guitar work is the "icing on the cake." The production of this CD is very tasteful and much better than their following album "Different Kind of Fire." Only criticism: a short CD but most country CDs are............. Discover the album that led to a bucket of Juno awards in their native Canada."