Crazy Ex-Girlfriend - Dark Publications

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Editorial Reviews:

Amazon.com
There's no sophomore slump for Miranda Lambert, who follows her chart-topping debut, Kerosene, with a knockout punch. Both the title cut and the album-opening "Gunpowder & Lead" ("what little girls are made of") show that Lambert hasn't lost her edge or her appetite for revenge. Yet the quieter "Desperation," the more tuneful and tender "Love Letters," the wistful "More Like Her," and the primally intense "Down" show her emotional range and maturity. While her songwriting remains a strength, Lambert also displays superb taste in other people's material, with "Dry Town" (by Gillian Welch), "Getting Ready" (a new song from Patty Griffin), and "Easy from Now On" (with the lyric that provided the title to Emmylou Harris's classic Quarter Moon in a Ten-Cent Town) reinforcing the musical quality. There isn't a throwaway cut here. --Don McLeese

Customer Reviews: Read 59 more reviews...

5 out of 5 stars

A superb follow-up record May 1, 2007
29 out of 31 found this review helpful

Miranda Lambert promises to be the next Dolly Parton. Not that Dolly Parton could ever be replaced, but the country music world is in need of a new, feisty blond who can write and sing songs that no one else wants to. Miranda Lambert, with her blunt honesty and pure talent, is capable of doing so, and doing it better than any of her peers.

CRAZY EX-GIRLFRIEND is appropriately named; several of these tunes sizzle with bottled up hatred, from the opener "Gunpowder & Lead" ("his fist is big but my gun's bigger/he'll find out when I pull the trigger"), to the title track, even to the whistful "More Like Her" ("You don't look much like a man from where I'm at," she sings mournfully). Other tunes are simply insights into darker lifestyles; "Down" and "Desperation" will depress the hell out of you, while "Guilty In Here" tackles a woman who uses the men in her life, and can't stop ("Is it guilty in here, or is it just me?"). Other songs are a bit more light-hearted, including Gillian Welch's whimsical "Dry Town" and Lambert's superb "Famous in a Small Town."

This album stands as one of the best yet this year. Miranda Lambert is one of the best songwriters on the scene. She wrote or co-wrote all but three of these tracks, and those she didn't write ("Dry Town" by Welch, "Getting Ready" by Patti Griffin, and "Easy From Now On" by Carlene Carter) fit right into the flow of the album. Her voice can be sharp as a razor or smooth as butter; her delivery is always top-notch. All of these songs shine with personality and grit; it takes pure talent to deliver every one of these songs, and Miranda Lambert is the best woman for the job.

5 out of 5 stars

Gunpowder Lead and TALENT May 7, 2007
14 out of 14 found this review helpful

Listen to the first two tracks on this cd to hear how diverse Miranda can be.
Gunpowder and Lead is leather and electric and the very next track Dry Town is blue jeans and root beer. I love it.
There aren't any throwaways on this cd.
Desperation, a Miranda composition is a fine story song.
Same with Famous In A Small Town, a Miranda/Travis Howard song.
The whole cd has a great cohesive feel to it. Though the songs are all
very different in beat and intensity. Great lyrics throughout.

For the life of me I cannot understand why Miranda is not
everywhere on country radio and why she isn't winning the awards.
She writes her own stuff, she is a musician, she has a very unique vocal style in today's country, and she is naturally gorgeous.
Don't depend on the limited view of country radio play, get this cd for yourself.
You will be doing yourself a great favor.

4 out of 5 stars

GANGSTA TWANG? May 1, 2007
13 out of 22 found this review helpful

I sincerely hope this follow-up to Miranda Lambert's #1 CD "Kerosene" is not autobiographical because the hardcore heroine of "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend" is having a rough time with romance.

Following in the steps of "Kerosene" we get the CD opener which draws its title from the line "I'm gonna show him what little girls are made of - gunpowder and lead" sung by a woman with a shotgun waiting for a cheating man to come home and the title track "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend," with it's excellent arrangement complete with banjo, that country radio found too similar thematically to Carrie Underwood's "Before He Cheats" to put on the air.

Miranda's "Love Letters" are on wet paper and lead the singer to lean on her faith only to "find Jesus and it's too late/he's already closed the front gate/and the sign's flashing NO VACANCY." She gets nice and tender, sounding almost like Dolly Parton, on "More Like Her" which is about an ex-lover returning to his ex-lover. On "Getting Ready (To Let You Go)" she sings "I have lost my self-repect" and on "Guilty In Here" bemoans "I made a point of not placing love and pleasure in my life."

It's unremitting pain and anger everywhere you listen. Based on the stories spun by Ms. Lambert it's easy to understand the anger at men and at herself. It's a tribute to the excellent songwriting and vocals she provides here that the listener actually sticks around to hear what happens.

And that perhaps is the CD's Achilles heel. Even the closer, "Easy From Now On," which, on the surface would seem to be optimistic, is ultimately a down-tempo downer. But if you've ever been thwarted by the search for love this is a victorious venting. Miranda Lambert is a major new female voice in country music. Let's just hope she lightens up a little next time around.

5 out of 5 stars

I'm convinced that May 4, 2007
7 out of 7 found this review helpful

she's one of the greatest talents this country has ever produced. I don't like most of what Nashville, and Sony especially, is presently putting out. Pop country is trite, immature, and targeted at rather low intellects. I buy a lot of country music, 90% indie, but Miranda Lambert is special. Her introductory album was a top 3 best release in the country all year (rivaled only by The Wreckers and The Meat Purveyors) and so far this year she has no equal. Crazy Ex-Girlfriend offers the same, if not better, maturity of writing, versatility, excellence and independence in style and total performance as her first album. She is by far the greatest female country solo artist presently, and perhaps in our nation's history. This album has no rejects, all keepers, and of my more than 600 country albums collected over 50 years, top 10. Stop reading the rants of this old fart and buy the damn album.

5 out of 5 stars

An excellent follow up to Kerosene May 11, 2007
Miranda Lambert's "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend" is an exceptional sophomore release and refreshing change from much of the county music that is on the radio today. Most of the album has the same feel as her debut album, Kerosene and Lambert's vocal range can be described as a female Hank Williams Sr. mixed with some Loretta Lynn. Lambert's voice is very raw and has a feel of "old country," rather than the typical over-produced and mixed recordings of most of the female country artists today. As I had to do with "Kerosene," I listened to this album many times before I could appreciate all of the songs on it. And literally every song is good.

One of the reasons this album is so exceptional, is that Lambert wrote or co-wrote 8 of the 11 songs, and the only thing she does better than singing is songwriting. Perhaps this understanding of the songs is the reason that her singing comes across with so much conviction.

1. Gunpowder and Lead, 4. Crazy Ex-Girlfriend - fast-paced, and the only two songs that deviate slightly from Lambert's "old-country" feel and sound more contemporary. "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend" could almost be called a sequel to "Kerosene." These will likely be the only radio-friendly singles. Given the chorus, they could just as easily have been sung by Gretchen Wilson, however a closer look at the lyrics show that despite the tempo of the music, these songs have a much more serious nature at second glance.

2. Dry Town, 3. Famous in a Small Town - A closer look at Lambert's life growing up in Longview, Texas.

5. Love Letters, 6. Desperation, 7. More Like Her - These are the only three songs written entirely by Lambert, and lyrically, are the best songs on the album. The tone in all three is pretty different, but they all have the quality of exceptional writing, that somehow the producers were able to put to fairly good music. "Love Letters" is a true country ballad, yet retains a modern feel.

8. Down, 9. Guilty in Here - Somewhat forgettable songs, but they grow on you and are still fairly good.

10. Getting Ready, 11. Easy From Now On - Lambert did not co-write either of these songs, which is unfortunate since they are two of the best on the album. "Easy From Now On" is probably my favorite musical track, and I enjoy her version even more than the one originally sung by EmmyLou Harris.

Ultimately, "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend" is a follow up well-worthy of Lambert and showcases some exceptional songwriting and vocal talent. This is not traditional country music filled with ridiculously cheesy lyrics and the same chorus every 30 seconds, but introspective writing and an excellent followup from this rising young artist.

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