Reggae's Gone Country

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Cristy Barber, a VP at VP Records, the world's biggest reggae label, just happened to be a country music fan as well, and he had a vision of combining the two genres in what one has to admit is an unlikely hybrid. Parts of the 13 tracks on Reggae's Gone Country, the album that was born of this, were recorded in Kingston with reggae producer and saxophonist Dean Fraser, and parts were recorded in Nashville by producer John Rich, the Rich part of the country duo Big & Rich. Does it work? Sometimes it does but mostly it doesn't. The sound is clear, sharp, and smooth, full of sweeping pedal steel lines, and it's exactly what a Nashville reggae album would sound like, because that's what it is -- there isn't a whole lot of Kingston here, outside of the light and sunny island vibe. Some of these tracks, though, are pretty interesting, and Tessanne Chin's wonderfully jazzy and soulful take on "Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue," Freddie McGregor's appropriately jaunty "The King of the Road," Gramps Morgan's seductive and funky "Feels So Right," and L.U.S.T.'s Kingston jug band romp through "Flowers on the Wall" are all well worth a listen. They work because somehow those songs translate well between Nashville and Kingston. Most of the tracks here don't do that, though, and seem more like sideshow rides at the carnival. They hint at way more than they deliver. ~ Steve Leggett