Warner Bros / Wea
1998
Connie Smith
About This Album
Connie Smith is a bona fide country and gospel music legend; she is quite literally the only person who deserves to share a reputation with Patsy Cline -- Tammy Wynette and Loretta Lynn notwithstanding. Considering that this album is her first in four years and only her second in 20, there were no stakes other than her own expectations. Her husband, Marty Stuart, and Justin Neibank were enlisted as co-producers. (Neibank, who also produced Stuart, is one of the finest engineers and sound-mix technicians in the business, having worked on 25 Top Ten records in one capacity or another.) There's a slew of her own newly written material with Stuart, Harlan Howard, and others; Smith co-wrote nine of the album's ten tracks. Stylistically, this is tough traditional honky tonk music with an edge that makes it very attractive as a rock & roll record. Neibank understands how important the balance of electric, pedal steel, and acoustic guitars is to counterbalance the vocal and fiddles. The ballads, such as "Looking for a Reason," feature Smith's lyrics as end-of-the-road desperation in seeking a truth that is elusive as the steels whine in the foreground and the acoustic guitars and electrics wind around one another and a lonesome fiddle slides around as a backdrop.
Track List (try tracks 2,5,7 and 8)

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.