Succumbing to that old cliche of judging the book by the cover often lands you in trouble, but it's a pit that's easy to fall into should you approach BRAY VISTA'S second album 'Let It Ride' with no prior knowledge of their oeuvre.
Take a look at that rumbledown cover. What does it suggest? Hmm...album by a tight, Roots-rockin' combo perhaps? OK, but where do said band hail from? Well, how about New Mexico, Texas or Southern California? That mysterious landscape and the rundown, Mexican-themed corner cantina. It's got to be one of those, surely.
Wrong on both counts! Yes, 'Let It Ride' IS a fine roots-rock record, but it's been made by a band with (deep breath) nine members, though - in Willard Grant tradition - they also have some talented friends who drop by to add backing vocals, fiddle texture, mandolin and so on. But their hometown? It ain't Noweheresville, New Mexico, it's actually Bray Vista in leafy County Wicklow. Yes, that's right, as in Ireland and the county of wondrous forests, mountains and leafy glens. Not exactly yer blasted desert landscape and adobe housing after all.
Yet you need have no fear here. In the way that you can approach anything from Michael Weston King or Redlands Palomino Company with confidence, so you can lie back and enjoy a smooth and well-crafted, Roots-tinged ride with Bray Vista. They are driven by Neil Tobin's soulful songwriting, proffer a lush, layered sound and impressive co-producers Jim Lauderdale (Lucinda Williams) and Leo Pearson (Elvis Costello, U2, Christy Moore) add those all-important sparkles of Nashville stardust without ever allowing it to sound vaguely mawkish.
Opening track 'Someone To Hold' gives you a good idea of the kind of thing to expect. It's a beautifully-layered, rich and harmonically superior canter with room for warm accordion, gracefully tumbling piano and Tobin and vocal foil Alison Byrne giving it some credible Gram and Emmy Lou.
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From there on, there's scarecely a foot put wrong. They can (roots) rock with conviction as tracks like 'All Comes Down To This' and the swaggering bar room boogie of 'Never Been One' testify, while the lusty honky-tonkin' of 'Love' ("L-O-V-E, love it is and I am D-E-A-D from it!") is fun and light-hearted without plumbing the depths of embarrassment.
All of these make for an enjoyable listen, but it's when they slow it down that Bray Vista really convince, and nowhere more so than on tracks like 'Never Letting Go' and 'Come Back Home'. The former finds tears flowing liberally into beers, while the lump in Tobin's throat makes for a commandingly heartbreaking performance. 'Come Back Home', meanwhile, is the kind of emotionally-scarred beauty Richard and Linda Thompson once did so well and benefits from a gorgeous vocal from Alison Byrne.
There's the odd throwaway moment like the Miller-lite two-step of 'First Impressions', but when there are songs like 'Come Back Home', the supreme, kid glove treatment afforded to 'If You Will' and the resigned, anthemic sway of the closing title track to seal the deal, then there's really precious little reason to cavil.
'Let It Ride', then, is an accomplished record from a talented band we'll no doubt be hearing more from round these parts. It's another of those increasingly regular bulletins informing us that the homegrown roots scene is healthier than ever these days and we really should take heed and listen up accordingly.
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