Kevin Fowler
Beer, Bait, and Ammo
Beer, Bait, and Ammo — you ask me, they’ve got it all. Unreconstructed Austin honky-tonker Kevin Fowler hits all the right chords and twangs on all the right strings on this CD. He even takes on a Western swing groove on “Butterbean” (not written about the king-sized boxer/wrestler, by the way), but make no mistake, most of this is straight-down-the-road honky-tonk. He falls down a bit on the radio-ready ballads “If These Old Walls Could Talk” and “You Could’ve Had It All,” but shines on tongue-in-cheek numbers like “Speak of the Devil.” With weeping steels and plucky Telecasters, Fowler exercises a supple voice and knack for sardonic songwriting. Journeyman pedal steel player Marty Muse contributes his talents on most tracks, while Greg Whitfield and Fowler himself put in the supple lead guitar lines. Fowler’s voice is as nimble as anyone’s, with enough emotion on the slower songs to make you cry in your Bud Light. This is some good, traditional-sounding country music that should be on the radio, if radio programmers had any cojones at all.
This article appears in September 8 • 2000.