Vintage Review: Walk The West’s Walk The West (1986)

There’s a new breed of cowboy roamin’ the range these days, pahdner…fierce young men with one foot in the saddle and one foot on the hot asphalt of the city street…six-string guitarslingers, uniquely American artists mixing C&W influences with an undying allegiance towards Rock ‘n’ Roll with a capitol ‘R’, bands spurred on by the success enjoyed by their musical antecedents (such as the ever-amazing Jason & the Scorchers, the still-vital granpappies of the “cow-punk” legacy), bands such as Nashville’s Walk The West.

Walk The West’s debut LP is a dark, smoky slab o’ petroleum by-product, a record that reinforces as well as illustrates the basis for their incredible local popularity. Rich in texture and heavily-laden with the wailing riffs of lead guitarist Will Goleman and vocalist Paul Kirby. Walk The West experiments with a variety and diversity in styles, ranging from the Pettyesque “Backside” to the country-tinged, rollicking “Sheriff of Love,” to the urban-rocking “Living At Night.”

Kirby’s vocals are strong and clear, if appropriately nasal, and the production is almost invisible, never interfering with the music. The result is an enjoyable and solid debut that combines some of the best elements of thirty years of rock music and country influence into one nice, neat, and potent little package. The intensity contained within their music and their sense of roots proves that rock ‘n’ roll lives outside London or Los Angeles. (Capitol Records, released 1986)

Review originally published by The Metro magazine

Vintage Review: The Cactus Brothers' The Cactus Brothers (1993)

The Nashville rock ‘n’ roll scene of the mid-’80s was an exciting and invigorating tonic of youthful innocence and energy, with unbridled creativity matched by awkward inexperience. One the many bands working to define this scene and garner world-wide critical acclaim (albeit without commercial success) was Walk The West. One of the area’s most popular outfits, these country-influenced rockers hung up their spurs at decade’s end. Their achievements included an excellent self-titled album for Capital (which has become a bona-fide collector’s item) and the creation of an innovative hybrid of country and rock which owed as much, thematically, to Johnny Cash as to the Byrds and Gram Parsons.

The nucleus of that band has been reincarnated as the Cactus Brothers, and both sides of the rock/country equation are much better for it. Their self-titled Liberty Records debut manages to capture the intimacy and acoustic-oriented style which made the Cactus Brothers a live draw equally as popular as their predecessors ever were. This is a band awash in instrumental talent, from master dulcimer player David Schnaufer to dobroist Sam Poland, from the multi-talented Tramp to the Goleman Brothers, Paul Kirby, and drummer David Kennedy...and they make the most of the talent they’ve got.

The music here is a hybrid of country roots and rock spirit, with covers like Merle Travis’ “Sixteen Tons” and the Everly Brothers “The Price of Love” performed in a manner unlike any you’ve ever heard. Traditional instrumentals such as “Fisher’s Hornpipe” and “Blackberry Blossom” showcase the band’s musical abilities while the originals fall somewhere in between. Whereas singer/songwriter Paul Kirby comes across like a stone-cold country crooner on material like “Bubba Bubba” or “Crazy Heart,” songs like “Devil Wind” and “Big Train” are strongly reminiscent of Walk The West’s best stuff. All in all, The Cactus Brothers is a solid album, a fine introduction to a highly talented group of guys who have the vision, the skills, and the hard-won experience to achieve whatever they wish. (The Metro, 1993)