It's All About to Change

If Travis Tritt’s 1990 debut, Country Club, positioned the Georgia-born singer as something of a musical rule-breaker, then the opening song on his sophomore effort aimed to re-establish his down-home credentials: “A woman warm and willin', that's what I'm lookin' for/'Cause the whiskey ain't workin' anymore.” You’d be hard-pressed to find a more classic country song than “The Whiskey Ain’t Workin’,” which also features Marty Stuart (another Nashville rule-breaker who quickly became one of Tritt’s closest collaborators). The material here showed that Tritt was one of country's most adaptable voices, able to bring authenticity to vintage Bakersfield swing (“It’s All About to Change”), line-dancing anthems (“Don’t Give Your Heart to a Rambler”), and straight rock (“Homesick”). The venerable Southern rock band Little Feat backed Tritt on the uproarious “Bible Belt,” which was used to great effect in the film My Cousin Vinny. But Tritt's even more effective when he’s playing it subtle. After listening to “Nothing Short of Dying,” “If Hell Had a Jukebox,” and “Someone for Me,” you can almost begin to picture the R&B shouter as a sensitive folk singer.