Roger Creager - Here It Is (2008)

Honestly, it's a mystery why Roger Creager isn't a bigger star. He's one of the hardest working men in country music, playing over 150 shows a year, and his music straddles the line between mainstream country pumped out of Nashville, and stripped down Texas Country for local purists. It's a winning combination, and one heard on his fourth studio album, "Here It Is."

The songs range from radio-friendly "Driving Home," to the granddaddy of honky-tonk songs "I'm From the Beer Joint." "Cowboys and Sailors" is a great Jimmy Buffet-ish tune, perfect to hear while watching the sun set at the beach with some friends.

Though most songs work, a couple don't. Specifically miserable is "I Loved You When," weak even as sappy ballads go. Also, the graphic analogy of a woman's love to hard-core drug addiction in "Habit (Needle in My Arm)," might have seemed interesting on paper, but never should have been recorded.

Other than those errors in judgment, "Here It Is" provides great music and pure entertainment, much of which should be attributed to the producing team of Radney Foster and Lloyd Maines. Together they shape the balance of pop country with pure country. The former is a country legend from Del Rio, TX who's written songs for the Dixie Chicks, Sara Evans, and Keith Urban. The latter is father of Dixie Chick Natalie Maines, and has emerged as the go-to guy for Texas Country acts looking to break into mainstream after producing successful albums for Charlie Robison, Robert Earl Keen, and Pat Green.

Like Pat Green, who voluntarily abandoned his Texas Country roots in search of total Nashville glory a few years back, Creager seems on the verge of bigger and better things. But, unlike with Green, Nashville glory really should seek out Roger Creager.

Track List:

01 - I Love Being Lonesome
02 - Driving Home
03 - I Loved You When
04 - Tangle Me In You
05 - I'm From The Beer Joint
06 - A Good Day For Sunsets
07 - She Chose You
08 - Let's Run
09 - Habit (Needle In My Arm)
10 - I'm Missing You
11 - The Man I Used To Be
12 - My Ship Goes Down
13 - Cowboys And Sailors

Download includes front cover