Halcyon Days

I admit that I have been one of the biggest Bruce Hornsby fans for years. That said, I, like about half of Hornsby fans out there, fell in love with his earlier work and approached his later stuff with trepidation. Simply put, the earlier stuff rang of Americana while the later material seemed a bit too jazzy for my tastes. But as Hornsby told me in an interview, "musical tastes evolve" hence the evolution in his music.

I can start off this CD review by stating that I simply love the new album. It's a perfect marriage of what I loved in his earlier work and some of the newer stuff that I was growing to love. You can hear some material that you'd swear would be on his earlier stuff and some that simply screams his later jazzier work.

Of course most reviewers are going to mention the tracks with Elton John, Sting and Eric Clapton as guests. Well, Bruce has guested nearly everywhere else so isn't it about time that they come back to him? Anyway, yes those tracks are great, but to be honest, they blend so well with the others, it's not as if they stand out in a different direction.

You have faster-moving tracks like, "Gonna Be Some Changes Made" and "Candy Mountain Run" which easily can be hit singles. "Dreamland" and "Halcyon Days" are the heartfelt ballads, with Halycon being the type that you can hear at a wedding. You also have a few tracks that don't fit in either category. For example, "Song F" has been following a solo-piano song theme that Bruce has used for the past few years. "What The Hell Happened" comes across as a perfect Randy Newman song that can fit in any soundtrack.

Overall, this has to be the best Hornsby album that I've heard in years. In each category, Bruce shines to the best of his abilities. In the dramatic songs, he's dramatic, in the moving ones, he's moving, and when he wants to have fun, he has fun.