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Pete Anderson: Birds Above Guitarland

This rockabilly blues hits all the expected notes, but there's not much more here than what's expected.
Pete Anderson
Birds Above Guitarland
Little Dog

Detroit’s Pete Anderson offers up a fairly predictable if competent form of twangy, guitar-driven, swinging rockabilly blues on his latest full-length, Birds Above Guitarland. Uptempo jams like “36 Hour Day” and “Big Money” utilize a full sonic palette of horns, keyboards and guitars, while Anderson’s smooth-but-smoky voice ties it all together. Even on slower numbers like “I Got Mine” and “Talkin’ Bout Lonely” the energy never flags, although it rarely takes the listener anywhere unexpected either. The album is consistent all the way through, with no particular song emerging as a standout. Everything tends toward competence rather than any kind of transcendence. It’s an record that is consistently good enough, without ever managing to be great.

RATING 5 / 10