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Reba McEntire - Keep On Loving You
| Boston |
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Performed by anyone else, “Strange,’’ the ready-and-raring first single from Reba McEntire’s new and 31st album, would make you pity the protagonist whose man has just left her. But this is Reba McEntire, so instead of a hanky she’s waving a victory flag. “Strange, I oughta be in bed with my head in the pillow cryin’/ Over us/ But I ain’t/ Ain’t love strange,’’ she sings with serious attitude on the defiant chorus. The song, with the top of the country charts dead in its sights, is a snapshot of McEntire’s mindset on “Keep on Loving You’’: No matter how bad it gets, her sass and her spirit keep her afloat. It’s a sturdy and at times exuberant country album with big production and McEntire’s even bigger voice leading the charge on low-key ballads (“I Keep on Lovin’ You’’), rocking kiss-offs (“Strange’’), and her signature story songs about ordinary lives (“Maggie Creek Road’’). Only a few of these songs (“But Why,’’ “Over You’’) feel faceless, the kind of power ballads that could be hits for McEntire, or Martina McBride, or Faith Hill. Of course, this being a radio-friendly record, there’s the requisite tip of the cowboy hat to spitfire women who buck the odds (“Pink Guitar’’) and rugged, downhome men (“I Want a Cowboy’’)....full text |
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| Ew |
| Reba McEntire leads off her 31st album with "Strange," an addictively sinister kiss-off that the next 12 tracks struggle to match. Though her voice has aged well, few of these tunes provide it enough of a challenge, and the ones that do often sound like something she's already done better. Such strong, female-centric lyrics are too rare nowadays, but if they're not catchy, how will the message sink in? B–...full text |
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| Latimesblogs |
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Things are tough out there for women: working women, single women, married women, lonely women, abandoned women. But they've all got Reba, the Oprah of country music (and billed first-name only here), to turn to for a word of wisdom, comfort, advice or some down-home common sense. The Oklahoma-born singer-turned-actress, 54, has an uncanny way of staying connected to longtime fans and bringing new ones aboard. It can't hurt that she's kept herself plenty visible in recent years on television, on Broadway and on concert stages, while musically she reaches out on each album with songs for pretty much every one of those aforementioned constituencies. Over the course of the album the messages get a bit mixed: in "Consider Me Gone," she sings of cutting losses and moving ahead quickly when the passion has left a relationship; then in "I Keep on Loving You," the recommendation is patience and forgiveness for a partner who missteps time after time; in the sinister "Maggie Creek Road," it's serious payback time for one pistol-packin' mama who's scarred but not scared....full text |
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