Walking Distance

Walking Distance

After 1997's <I>Picnic</I>, an uneven attempt to cross over to the rock side of the alternative-country divide, this Bandera, Texas, singer-songwriter returns to sounds and themes closer to home. Brimming with fiddle, mandolin, and slinky honky-tonk guitars, Keen's eighth album has the lyrical depth and humor of his best work. At the center is a four-song outlaw suite, beginning with Norman Blake's little-known gem "Billy Gray" and ending with the drifter's lament "Still Without You," in which Keen sings, "I climbed the mountains and I swept the plains / I crossed the border and I broke my chains / I walked the back roads till my shoes wore through / I'm still without you." And while the album closes with the bonus coda "Happy Holidays Y'All" (a hysterical sequel to his classic "Merry Christmas from the Family," presented in two giddy takes), <I>Walking Distance</I> finds Keen rediscovering the intense poetry of his Texas muse. <I>--Roy Kasten</I>