Consumer Guide Album

The Robert Cray Band: I Was Warned [Mercury, 1992]
Where the misguided soul strategy of Midnight Stroll emphasized undigested horn arrangements and vocals Cray couldn't handle, this aims for AOR guitar hooks--every solo stings, and with producer Dennis Walker foregrounded again, every song catches. But the biggest difference is that the two have abandoned their evil ways--the part of the mean mistreater is invariably played by one of the women traditionally handed that role in blues culture. There's no point calling this a sexist sellout when it makes sense developmentally--the pain and cruelty of Cray's and Walker's songs always made you fear for their personal lives, and I bet their lovers (and ex-lovers) think it's about time they dealt in straightforward bull like "I'm a Good Man." The mood is penitent, full of pleas for time to work things out and summed up by "A Whole Lotta Pride"'s "Do you have to leave me baby/Just to even up the score?" There's room for Walker's Nashvillian expertise in tragic marriage, too. But connoisseurs may well prefer the perverse kick of the band-written "Our Last Time," in which an impassively disconsolate Cray watches his latest conquest dress after "the sweat begins to dry," certain without a word from her that she'll never come back for seconds. A-