Country

Blake Shelton

“Startin’ Fires”

3 ½ stars

“Startin’ Fires,” his fifth album, is just what you’d expect from Blake Shelton: a few fun songs that show a sense of humor, some sexy numbers and some ballads wrapped up with a duet with his girlfriend, Miranda Lambert.

That song, “Bare Skin Rug,” details the seduction of young girl and was recorded live in front of a campfire, capturing a naturalness and spirit that wouldn’t have been heard in the studio.

“Green,” the record’s opener, typifies much of its attitude, taking today’s fixation with environmental issues and giving it a lived-in, we’ve-already-done-this country feel.

The love songs, which are Shelton’s stock in trade, are well enough done, if slightly on the mushy side. And there’s not much honky-tonk edge to be found anywhere on the disc. That will likely be just fine with Shelton’s legions of female fans, and it sure will work on country radio.

— L. Kent Wolgamott

“Boots, Buckles & Spurs”

3 ½ stars

This three-CD set celebrates the 50th anniversary of the National Finals Rodeo with 50 country songs about cowboys and rodeo that date back to the singing cowboy Gene Autry and the yodeling of Patsy Montana and run rapidly to the contemporary pop country of Lonestar and Montgomery Gentry.

You can quibble about some of the song selections: There’s no “Amarillo By Morning” from George Strait or “Rodeo” by Garth Brooks, and just one tune by the late Chris LeDoux, who was a world saddle bronc champion and filled his albums with rodeo-related fare.

But the concept works, especially on the first two discs, which are filled with classics from The Sons of the Pioneers’ “Tumbling Tumbleweeds” and Eddy Arnold’s “Cattle Call” to Michael Martin Murphey’s “Wildfire” (which namedrops Nebraska) and Willie Nelson’s “My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys.”

— L. Kent Wolgamott

Rock

The Modern Society

“The Beat Goes On”

4 stars

This Georgia foursome feels like a well-kept secret. It’s catchy, breezy power pop that falls into that narrow overlap of (A) music that would fare well on the radio and (B) music that’s actually good. I could see most any one of these hooky tracks popping up on Billboard.

For the band’s second album, shaggy-haired frontmen Woody Brown and Tyler Bence tagteam the vocal duties over crisp guitar melodies. The lyrics are of the “Hey girl, I like you, but I’ll probably end up leaving you” variety, but the boys’ sentiments are always sincere. They’re clever, but not so clever they become annoying. On “Black Daisies,” the guys charge forth with the chorus: “Let’s kiss when we’re young / ’Cause I can’t promise I’ll keep my hands to myself.”

“The Beat Goes On” is a plain and simple rock ’n’ roll record, and the results are mostly tonic.

— Micah Mertes

Folk

Isobel Campbell &

Mark Lanegan 

“Sunday at Devil Dirt”

4 stars

For their second collaboration, Scottish singer Campbell, of Belle & Sebastian, and Lanegan, formerly of Screaming Trees, make a strange and beautiful pair.

Their dynamic has been described as “silk on cracked leather,” with Campbell’s sweet hush perfectly complementing Lanegan’s beastly baritone.

Using a spare musical template that dips into alt-country, folk, blues and murky goth rock, the duo finds some effective old world moments. 

Highly recommended to fans of Tom Waits or Leonard Cohen’s darker moments. 

— Micah Mertes