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