How great is the new David Adam Byrnes album Neon Town, released earlier this month on October 2nd? The final track on the album is an iconic country cover that we love, yet still had the “lowest” score of any song on the album when we went song-by-song to rate them. Yes, it’s that good from beginning to end. Each track scored better than a classic! We haven’t heard an album that we’ve loved this much since Aaron Watson‘s Red Bandana was released last year. There must be something in the whiskey down there in Texas!
If you’ve listened to any Texas/Red Dirt Country in the past year, you probably are already familiar with several of these songs, as he has released a few of them that have gone on to be hits such as the title track “Neon Town,” “Beer Bucket List,” “I Can Give You One,” and his brand new single “Old School.” Despite already having released several singles from this album, he has at least two more monster hits that he could release with our highest scoring songs “In My Arms” and “I Ain’t Seen It Yet.”
The album credits David Adam Byrnes as a writer on most of the songs, which features a traditional country sound reminiscent of the late 90’s mainstream country music. Speaking of Aaron Watson, rumor is he is the one that gave Byrnes the push to move to Texas to further his music career which had stalled in Nashville.
Overall, we graded the album at a whopping 8.6 out of 10 on our strict scoring scale. Check out our song-by-song scores below, where the consistency was unprecedented in one of our reviews. Even the good albums usually have a stinker song or two. This one? Pure Country Music Gold. We have a front-runner for Album of the Year in 2020.
- Neon Town – 8.7
- I Can Give You One – 8.3
- She Only Wanted Flowers – 8.4
- Old School – 8.5
- Signs – 8.3
- Tequila, Salt & Time – 8.4
- Beer Bucket List – 8.5
- In My Arms – 9.5
- I Ain’t Seen It Yet – 9.0
- Dim Lights, Thick Smoke (and Loud, Loud Music) – 8.1
HCM Scoring Scale:
- 9.0-10 = Great country song/album
- 8.0-8.9 = Very good country song/album
- 7.0-7.9 = Good country song/album
- 6.0-6.9 = Decent country song/album
- 5.0-5.9 = Average country song/album
- 4.0-4.9 = Below average country song/album
- 0-3.9 = Not a good country song/album