Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Sonny and the Sunsets Are Your Longtime Companion


Sonny & the Sunsets are a group who sound like they've ridden off into a few sunsets in their day. What does that mean? Well, this rustic group adds a whole bunch of twang, dusty country lyrics and a backwoods feeling to their album Longtime Companion. The result isn't alt-country but pretty much the closest thing to traditional country that you're going to get these days. While I normally can't stand alt-country and the like this thing is so rooted in traditional and classic sounds that you can't help but like it for its retro feel. Put it this way, if Hank Williams Sr. were still around, my hunch is he would be a fan of Sonny.

Well how country is Longtime Companion? Let's just say that this little rural jaunt is far more country than anything that's come out of Nashville in the last five to ten years. Taylor Swift is Disney Pop compared to this stuff. Sonny & the Sunsets are pretty darn authentic and their simplicity to recording, writing, and playing makes Longtime Companion so honest and so good that you'll be screaming, "Yeeee-haw," in no time flat. The songs are downtrodden, broken hearted, and beat up and you can almost hear these guy’s hearts being torn apart on every song. It's depressing as all heck but isn't all good country music?

Twangy, simple, rustic, and lost Longtime Companion serves as just that to Sonny & the Sunsets; a companion. There's nothing complicated about this record, it's pure and honest and that's what makes it good. These guys might be from Detroit for all I know, but judging by Longtime Companion they sound like they were born and raised in the plains of the heartland and left their hearts there eons ago. If you miss the days of leaving tears in your bears and gettin' whooped over love than you need this Longtime Companion in your life because it’ll help you bring those feelings back.

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