| "Lyle Lovett is many things, but prolific is not one
of them. Yes, at the outset of his career, he released an album every year
or two, but by the time he became a star in the early '90s, he slowed down
quite a bit. Between 1992's Joshua Judges Ruth and 2003's My Baby Don't
Tolerate, his first release on Lost Highway, he only released one album
of new original material: The Road to Ensenada, in 1996, which followed
1994's I Love Everybody, a clearing-house of songs he wrote before his first
album. So, My Baby Don't Tolerate is his first album of new songs in seven
years, and two of its 14 songs — "The Truck Song" and "San
Antonio Girl" — were previously released on 2001's Anthology,
Vol. 1 (which is bound to frustrate fans that bought that uneven collection
just for the new tunes), leaving this as a collection of 12 new songs. Given
the long wait between albums and since the record is so firmly in the tradition
of The Road to Ensenada that it could be branded a sequel, there may be
an initial feeling of anticlimax, since there's not that many songs and
they all feel familiar. Such is the complication of a long wait — it
invariably raises expectations — but judged as a collection of songs
against Lovett's other albums, My Baby Don't Tolerate holds its own very
well. As mentioned above, it is very similar to The Road to Ensenada, sharing
that album's clean, unadorned production, directness, and preponderance
of straight-ahead country songs. And it's not just that the album is country;
it's that many of his eccentricities are toned down, to the point that when
Lovett ends the album with two gospel numbers, they sound like shtick. Even
the handful of ballads are lighter, lacking the somber introspection of
Joshua Judges Ruth or the subtleness of I Love Everybody. Everything here
is out in the open, and it's the better for it; musically, it may offer
no surprises, but its directness is appealing, particularly because Lovett
simply sounds good singing country songs. And that's what My Baby Don't
Tolerate offers — Lovett singing good country songs and sounding good.
It's not a complicated pleasure, but it doesn't need to be, and after a
long dry spell, it sure is nice to have a new collection of songs from this
reliable songwriter." (Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All
Music Guide) |
Plattentipp 
