Society
Album: A Crooked Mile
Label: Self Released
Tracks: 11
Website: www.myspace.com/societymusic

Society's "A crooked Mile" is full of surprises. A review will, of course, spoil the biggest ones:

First, this is indeed a new CD, despite having the sound of a classic album that has originally sold truckloads of Vinyl copies in it's day (with the antiquely faded cover design fitting well into that concept): The original and well crafted country rock melodies with their harmonic arrangements are likely to convince an unprepared listener that this music goes with rare television footage from a time when microphones had cables. From the intro of the opening track "Wheels A' Turning" one feels pleasantly familiar and comfortable with this band and their product: A distinctive, yet far from old-fashioned or generic Americana sound is consistent throughout the album.

As a second surprise, this is a young three man band from West Sussex (albeit with the support of different guest artists on various tracks), not the five or six West Coast Americans the listener would imagine: The American drawl in the vocals as well as the subtle twang of the pedal steel sound very genuine and are both dosed just right to stay out of Nashville. The full and flawless vocal harmonies clearly stand out from the beginning.

My REPEAT button has been pushed most after "Crawling Over Town", a treatment most tracks on this perfect album deserve!

Alex Kottenhahn