Calling From A Country Phone

Calling From a Country Phone is sometimes referred to as Robert Forsters country album, but the folk-rock sound (with occasional pedal steel) recalls Felts Me and a Monkey on the Moon more than anything that has ever come out of Nashville. Forsters no-frills production suits his idiosyncratic and dramatic style, which requires very little in terms of accompaniment for its effect. Atlanta Lie Low seems too low-key to open an album, but it is immediately followed by 121, an unusually straight rocker on which Forsters delivery actually suggests Elvis Presley at times. Drop was the albums single, a dynamic song that deserved to be heard but would have found no place on the charts of the day, and Falling Star is just as good. Calling From a Country Phone is the only one of Forsters solo albums that was never released in the U.S., which is both disappointing and understandable since it probably would not have gained an audience beyond the adulatory cult surrounding the Go-Betweens. ~ Greg Adams