Falling somewhere between the ‘70s rockabilly of Dave Edmunds, the ‘80s Britpop of Billy Bragg, and the modern twang rock of Steve Earle, Portland, Oregon’s Scotland Barr & the Slow Drags deliver their sophomore release, All the Great Aviators Agree, in an altogether boring package. With mostly upbeat and half-spirited tales of drinking, drowning, loving and losing, Barr takes us from Duluth (“Fall Hard”) to Rome (“Heart of Rome”) and across his “Mexican Blanket,” where he offers, “What a man will kill for is not always subject to the depth of love he feels for the things that he protects.” Pretty deep, huh? Well, only until he “drank all the wine and killed all the roses” during a “Dirty Old Waltz.” Barr and his Drags have the gruff barroom bravado of Merle Haggard and the early Stones down pat, but as the album wears on, the songs fail to support their many classic influences. It’s not hard to understand why finding any background information on these guys was almost impossible. (LABEL: Monkey Barr Music 2008)
