Join us Live in Texas this Thursday, we’ll be playing Randy Rogers Band – Live At Billy Bob’s

Live at Billy Bob’s Texas Review

by Stewart Mason
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Released hot on the heels of Randy Rogers’ second album (his first for the Smith label), Live at Billy Bob’s Texas is a curiously subdued live set. Rogers is that rarity, a country singer/songwriter who records with his road band instead of the usual session musicians, which gives his albums a relaxed, rough-edged feel missing from the standard antiseptic Music Row product. But unfortunately, it also means that there’s little difference between these live tracks and Rogers’ studio albums. Only the occasional whoop or slightly ill-timed cymbal crash differentiates some of the songs. More effective are tracks like “Tonight’s Not the Night,” which Rogers and band take a bit faster and with more passion than on the laid-back studio cut, and “Again,” a Rogers co-write originally recorded by his songwriting partner Cody Canada‘s band Cross Canadian Ragweed that Rogers turns into a fuzz-guitar-powered rocker. The set climaxes with an extended workout on “Lost and Found,” from Rogers’ debut, showcasing a series of solos brief enough to keep from devolving into tiresome showboating. Some more moments of spontaneity would make Live at Billy Bob’s Texas a more exciting listen, but fans should appreciate it.

Track Listing

  1. Somebody Take Me Home
  2. Down and Out
  3. Like It Used to Be
  4. Company You Keep
  5. Still Be Losing You
  6. Can’t Slow Down
  7. Love Must Follow You Around
  8. One Thing I Know
  9. Again
  10. I Never Meant to Break Your Heart
  11. Ten Miles Deep
  12. Tonight’s Not the Night (For Goodbye)
  13. They Call It the Hill Country
  14. Lost and Found
  15. This Time Around
  16. An Empty Glass (That’s the way the Day Ends)

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