Duane Rutter
Album: Crazy Things
Label: Busted Flat
Tracks: 10
Website: http://www.duanerutter.com

Effects prelude fierce opening track Don't Forget, there's a tape rewind at the end of ''I Don't Ask' and throughout 'We Find Ourselves At Last' a reflective, waltzing heartbreak ballad of loss, there's the sound of one of those annoying chirping cricket boxes. Why? Rutter, a rugged voiced singer-songwriter from Canada, doesn't need such gimmicky touches to make him or his music stand out. Born on the shores of Lake Erie in the Tobacco Belt of Southern Ontario, which may go a long way to explain that voice, with a CV that includes everything from grave digger to lay preacher and a backstory that involves familiar tales of too much booze and too many women, he released his debut album in 2006 and this is now his third.

Working from an indie-folk template, it's steeped in blues and country while the closing track, Take That Water, is littered with jazzy piano fills courtesy of The Band's Garth Hudson whose wife Maud duets with Rutter. Driven by plenty of muscle, there's few soft edges here as Rutter and his band barrel through the likes of the swaggery alt-country rock of 'Will I Ever Learn' and the more outlaw-like 'Who Found Who' (with Hudson on organ) or the lyrically idiosyncratic, rolling southern-fried country 'The Cat'.

Not that it's entirely devoid of more subdued moments, as evidenced by the keening pedal-steel led title track, the throatyily sung 'Number One' (where he has touches of Bruce Cockburn) or the self-lacerating Kristofferson/Guy Clark flavoured 'Ain't No Good', both of which are built predominantly around acoustic guitar.

A solid rather than inspired collection, nevertheless it makes a persuasive case for keeping a keen eye on his career trajectory.

Mike Davies