Mojo (Publisher) (p.97) - 3 stars out of 5 - "The solid line-up of original tunes is delivered with copious old school twang and enough polish to draw the country-pop posse. As always, they do a fine job of hitting all the stops on the genre map..."
BR5-49: Chuck Mead, Chris Scruggs (vocals, guitar); Don Herron (Hawaiian guitar, mandolin, electric mandolin, fiddle); Shaw Wilson (vocals, drums); Geoff Firebaugh (bass, electric bass).
Recorded at Big Ears Studio, Inglewood, Tennessee.
A lot changed for country-rockers BR549 between this 2004 release and 2001's THIS IS BR549. They lost a major part of their sound with the departure of singer/songwriter/guitarist Gary Bennett. Fortunately for Nashville's favorite sons, Chuck Mead was an equal part of the singing/writing/picking equation, and multi-instrumentalist Donnie Herron was always the band's ace in the hole. Consequently, the new version of the band is firing on all cylinders on TANGLED IN THE PINES. There's no particular change in direction; the energetic blend of honky-tonk, rock, and rockabilly that made BR549 a big name on the alt-country scene.
This is a band whose sound has been honed by logging long, hard miles of touring, and the organic interplay of the guitars and voices is immediately arresting. The Ernest Tubb-like ballad "She's Talking to Someone" provides one of the few slow tempos on this album full of road-tested, pub-friendly, barn burners--a fine feather in the cap of trad country.