This is an Enhanced CD, which contains both regular audio tracks and multimedia computer files.
Personnel: Jack Ingram (vocals, acoustic guitar); Richard Bennett, Mike McAdam, Jens Pinkernell (guitar); Tommy Hannum (pedal steel guitar); Tony Harrell (keyboards); Scott Esbeck (electric bass, background vocals); Peter Coatney (drums); Todd Snider, Bruce Robison, Kenny Holloway (background vocals).
If you like your country a bit rough around the edges, Jack Ingram's HEY YOU is the ticket. Imagine your typical radio-friendly country CD with chunks of the gloss sandpapered off, and you've got a good idea of Ingram's sound. Like his hero Steve Earle, Ingram's voice is a bit ragged; the guitars are tough, low, and twangy; and the drums get walloped hard. The songs, co-written with the likes of Bruce Robison, Todd Snider, and Jim Lauderdale, are edgy and emotional.
Ingram can deliver a sweet sentiment, as he does in the lovely "I Would" and the title track, but he spends most of HEY YOU working through failing relationships ("Talk About," "How Many Days"), telling a good story ("Biloxi," "Inna from Mexico"), or just rockin' out ("Barbie Doll," "Mustang Burn"). Any doubts about Ingram's hard-country cred are laid to rest in "Anymore Good Loving," as perfect a heartbroke country song as you could imagine. But while HEY YOU makes a fine CD, it really isn't music meant to be listened to on the stereo of an S.U.V. This is music that sounds best late on a Saturday night, blasting live from the beer-slicked stage of a honky-tonk.
