Texas Red Dirt Roads

I was really excited about getting Matt Martindale’s new album, Big Sign. I had heard positive reviews and had enjoyed some of his previous work with Cooder Graw. After listening to the opening track, Ain’t Afraid, I was hopeful that for some reason a Toby Keith song was slipped into the mix. Unfortunately, while the pace of the music changed, the quality did not. I went from being excited about listening to a great CD to being willing to pay 99 cents on iTunes for Rags on a Princess.

Matt Martindale is a talented guy. He just made a bad album. The problem with Big Sign is that it never matches up. There are times that the music will get you hooked into the song, but then the lyrics will kick in and not fit with the song. There are other times that the lyrics are great, but the song is a little too fast for them. Cinderella Time is the essence of a great song that was sped up too much and the words lost their significance. Most of the time in life, and all of the time in music, it is not about what a person says, but how they say it. Matt Martindale fails to say it the right way too often in Big Sign.

A problem embedded in the album that grows with each song is the feeling that Martindale “tried” to make the album sound a certain way. The album tries to have a country party anthem. The album tries to have the schmaltzy love song. The album sounds as if a music executive in Hollywood wanted to make a Texas/ Red Dirt album. The only song that comes across as legitimate and genuine is Rags on a Princess; which also doubles as the best song. Too many of the songs on the album seem to be manufactured and that explains why there is such a problem on the music matching the lyrics.

Save your money on Big Sign. Download Rags on a Princess and move on down the road. Matt Martindale has some good music in him; he just didn’t put enough of it on this album.

~CRISKLEMENT