Search - Justin Rutledge :: No Never Alone

Excellent Debut

Brent Wittmeier | Alberta, Canada | 03/01/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I recently heard Justin Rutledge's "A Letter to Heather" on a community radio station and ordered it after I couldn't find it in stores. I was drawn by his awesome voice, which is young and sweet and sad and weary. This is a great album for many reasons. The production value is simple and clean. The instrumentation is spare, heavy on acoustic strings: dobro, banjo, guitar undergird the vocals and occasional piano. The lyrics are understated and true, drawn without pretense from the lexicon of roots music: equal parts Bible, booze, and heartbreak.The only possible drawback is pace --- with the exception of the moderately raucous "The Suffering of Pepe O'Malley," the tracks are almost entirely spacy and slow. While at times sluggish, Rutledge is never self-indulgent (which is forgivable in an artist in his mid-twenties). While I've heard comparisons with Gram Parsons, this CD reminds me of Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska/Ghost of Tom Joad or Bob Dylan's Blood on the Tracks. Of course, these are lofty comparisons, but Rutledge has set a high standard for his future work."