Enough Rope
It might be tempting to describe Kentucky's Chris Knight as the poor man's Steve Earle (if the original weren't still doing a pretty good job at it). While the hard twang of the guitar and the hardscrabble lyrics recall Earle's early classic albums, Knight continues to establish himself on his fourth release as one of the most powerful (and underrecognized) artists in alternative country. Produced by Gary Nicholson and mixed by Earle's "twangtrust" partner Ray Kennedy, the album pulls no punches, whether rocking the roadhouse at the end of "River Road," venting anger at the developers who are treating Grandpa's land like "Dirt," or detailing a dead-end life in the title track. Yet the redemptive "Saved by Love" and the yearning "Too Close to Home" evoke equally strong emotions that balance the album's darker strains. If "Cry Lonely" isn't a hit for Knight, it deserves to be one for somebody. Knight's eye for detail and command of tone have the compression of great short stories, though Southern Gothic rarely rocks this hard.--Don McLeese