Soft rock with its eye on the country market is all very well and good but personally I'd prefer something more honest: be raw or go for sub-Led Zep overproduction but don't try and do both on the same track.
The result comes across as James Blunt in spurs and a Stetson and that's so far from being a good thing that you couldn't hit it with a bow and arrow if you tried. The fact that it's being peddled by a bloke from Wolverhampton rather than Alabama somehow makes it even worse.
But the icing of the cake of why this record deserves to die? The press copies have been re-recorded over unsold (the world is full of fools!) copies of the super-fantastic Hedrons' Be My Friend, which is so many times more worthwhile than this. Even though it's not directly his fault, for that alone Scott Matthews deserves to have his guitar strings snipped.
It's a grower, of course, sneaking in there with an evil little nudge that tries to convince you that it's okay really and that if you listen carefully you can hear shades of Nick Drake and Jeff Buckley in there. You can, but there are Nick Drake and Jeff Buckley records for that and, guess what? They're much, much better.
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