This World We Live In

Let’s face it: most great country music is about losing love. Songs about loss and regret tend to be grittier, more potent, and more forceful than tracks about just any other topic. Radney Foster’s great trick is writing songs with all of those strengths, yet often they're about gaining love, not losing it. This World We Live In proves he's not only one of country music’s great romantics but one of its few optimists. The opening track is a drinking song of pure elation: “My brain is actually buzzing with the vertigo I'm feeling/Got nothin' to do with inebriation/That kiss that you just hammered me with, girl/Oh, it's a staggering revelation.” Far from being blind to the world's cruelties, Foster carefully observes the hurt we all endure and still concludes that love conquers all in “I Won’t Lie to You,” “The Kindness of Strangers," and “Big Idea.” His optimism gets its guts from the music, which is always tough and indomitable, even when he’s singing something tender. The album concludes with “Never Gonna Fly,” about the importance of taking chances. It wouldn’t mean as much if it weren't coming from the mouth of a still-thriving Nashville survivor like Radney Foster.