Gary Allan - Set You Free - Country - CD

Gary Allans SET YOU FREE is a perfectly named, well-conceived album that embodies his own evolution toward personal, creative freedom. The album, sequenced with a storyline in which a man breaks the restraints of a failed relationship and conquers the loneliness of it's aftermath, is the result of Allans own journey as a man and as an artist. SET YOU FREE is at once familiar and enlightening. Fans who have followed Allan throughout his 17-year recording career will recognize the dark crevasses in the project the gnarled anger of "Bones," the honest self-examination of "It Aint the Whiskey," the sinister self-abuse of "Sand in My Soul."

It's hard to call Gary Allan anything other than a journeyman, a singer raised in hard country who has always found his road a little bit hard to travel. Hits have come, but toward the back end of the 2000s, roughly ten years after he had his commercial breakthrough; the hits started to dwindle and he responded by getting a little bit leaner and rocking a little bit harder. All those moves pay off on Set You Free, his ninth album and one where all of his past is present in his assured professionalism. Allan isn't trying much new here, but he whittles away any lingering impressions of confessional songwriting apparent on 2010's Get Off on the Pain and concentrates on the basics: love songs and heartbreak tunes, defiant rockers and good-time anthems. He has a few new wrinkles along the way, notably on the soulful groove of "Hungover Heart" and the lite reggae pulse of "No Worries," but what satisfies here is his clean, no-frills modern country: he puts grit into the boasts of "Bones" and heart into "Every Storm (Runs Out of Rain)" and when all the songs are put together, it adds up to an album that's easy to enjoy. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rovi

Performer	Gary Allan
Music genre	Country
Music subgenre	CD - COUNTRY
Music release type	Release
Media format	CD
Original release date	2013
Edition	Standard
Language	English
Has parental advisory label	N
Number of discs	1
Series title	Gary Allan - Set You Free [COMPACT DISCS]
Track listing	Tough Goodbye, Every Storm (Runs Out of Rain), Bones, It Ain't the Whiskey, Sand in My Soul, You Without Me, One More Time, Hungover Heart, No Worries, Drop, Pieces, Good As New
Record label	MCA Nashville
Songwriter	Gary Allan
Track name	"Every Storm (Runs Out of Rain)", "Pieces", "It Ain't the Whiskey", "Bones", "It Aint the Whiskey", "Sand in My Soul", "Tough Goodbye", "Hungover Heart", "No Worries", "Drop", "You Without Me", "Good As New"
Music media format	CD
Is edited	N
Is enhanced	N