** Moonshine Willy

BOLD DISPLAYS OF IMPERFECTION

(Bloodshot)

This Chicago fivesome aren't as bold or as imperfect as the title of their second CD tries to suggest. Which is both a good and a bad thing. Led by singer/songwriter Kim Doctor, who likes to supplement her hearty diet of old-school gallop-and-twang with western-swing fiddling and bluegrass banjo picking, Moonshine Willy play the kind of faux country or country-inspired music that the Chicago indie Bloodshot have come to specialize in. The irony, of course, is that the fake stuff sounds more like the real thing than the slick product Nashville mostly churns out these days. But Doctor and her crew stumble into the roots rut that lies somewhere between the (alcohol-) inspired amateurism of, say, the new country offering from the Supersuckers and the note-perfect retroisms of Bloodshot's top-notch Robbie Fulks. They're less drunken fun than the former, and not as nimble as the latter, which leaves them sounding like a spirited live outfit who toned things down just a little too much in the studio this time around.

-- Matt Ashare

(Bloodshot Willy open for the Shods and the Gravel Pit at T.T. the Bear's Place this Saturday, June 28; call 492-BEAR.)