Gord Bamford
Country Junkie
Album · Country · 2013
Gord Bamford’s tunefully down-to-earth brand of country has earned him substantial success in his adoptive home of Canada. His sixth album, Country Junkie, shows off his virtues with its appealing mix of swagger, humor, and romance, served up with plenty of Western twang and a touch of Southern rock. Bamford’s vocal persona carries the same burly gravitas as Toby Keith and Ronnie Dunn. There’s a populist strain running through his music, heard in “Where a Farm Used to Be” (a lament for disappearing wheat fields and dairy cows) and the title track (a rollicking salute to the honky-tonk life, featuring Joe Diffie). Bamford convincingly plays the hard-pressed father on “Daughterville” and pokes fun at a local braggart on “The Truth.” He’s especially skilled at delivering romantic ballads with both strength and vulnerability, whether he’s saluting a good woman (“She Gets Me,” “Unreal”) or longing for a lover far away (“When Your Lips Are So Close”). Cheerfully boozy numbers like “Saturday’s Beer” or “That’s How We Party” are balanced with odes to family values like “I Won’t Regret That.” It makes for a well-rounded collection by this versatile, crowd-pleasing talent.