Muleskinner Jones Alcohol Tobacco Raygun?

I owe Muleskinner Jones a fairly hefty apology. Six years ago I massacred his debut EP Terrible Stories on this very site stating "[Jones]' vocal is the most annoying I've ever heard" and concluding "I can only hope this is one big piss-take".

Either Muleskinner Jones has seriously upped his game or I was having an off day back in 2001 because Alcohol Tobacco Raygun? is quite simply one big messy slab of twisted country fun. Jones lyrical talents comfortably make up for his vocal limitations and his rough and ready guitar playing provides a lively backdrop to his tales of modern life gone awry.

Mr. Jones' Last Song - in Jones' own words a song about a 'struggling artiste' coming to terms with failure - sets the lyrical standard from the off: "A voice said 'settle down son, stop telling tales / it's time to admit to everybody that you've failed / I know life sucks, I know it's kind of shit / but you won't move on if you don't know where to quit'". It's simple yet in a way, genius.

Death in Dixie is more musically interesting, a dirty, swaggering rocker about a Southern massacre with perverse, gruesome lyrics like "the wounded piled up faster than the medics could carve the buggers out". Drinking to Get Drunk is far more British (and comical) than anything Mike Skinner's ever written. Jones croons "I'm throwing up in a bathroom off the A363 and there's a man who wants to kill me outside the door"; who can't relate to that kind of drunken paranoia?

A triptych of would-be autobiographical numbers about our songwriting hero follow, the best of which has to be the surprisingly tender Mr. Jones Gets Blissed. Who said drunken men couldn't be romantic?

Of course Alcohol Tobacco Raygun? is inevitably not without its more forgettable moments. Satan Is My Bitch is a definite misstep and the ten minute plus Her Desert Yard is swallowed up by its own ambition but ultimately the sheer brilliant far outweighs the mediocre here.

It's not every day I make a complete u-turn over an artist but Muleskinner Jones has not only proved me wrong here; he's also far more importantly produced one of the most idiosyncratic and colourful albums of the year. But don't take my word for it; check him out for yourself.