Rodeo Ruby Love vs the Great American Cities

After one full-length, two EPs, and extensive touring, Rodeo Ruby Love's Vs. the Great American Cities is a clear and coherent effort by a band that has hit its groove. The album mingles the vehement, fist-pumping fervor of an early Weezer with the contemplative desperation of Jason Molina while embracing the vibrant frivolity of finger-snapping rock n' roll all delivered with an unwaveringly pure exuberance. While the use of horn sections, bells, and cutesy female vocalists have become unpleasantly trendy in today's indie rock, here instead we find well-crafted songs tastefully complemented by horns that are punchy and effective without being cheesy or trite, bells that shimmer with the twinkle of a Buddy Holly love song, and the powerful, comforting voice of a woman who actually sounds like a woman in her twenties rather than a woman in her twenties trying to sound like a five-year-old girl. The true strength of this record though is its content. Hailing from Marion IN, Rodeo Ruby Love confronts the allure of the ominously bright and exciting city, both literally and figuratively. The bright lights of America's large metropolises may lure away the ones that you love, but they alone won't provide happiness and fulfillment. These 12 songs celebrate the joys and wrestle with the limitations of living in Indiana with scrupulous candor and unflinching emotional veracity as well as an unashamed pride in the merits of small town Indiana. Sometimes what a man really needs is a moonlit cornfield, a song in his heart, and good friends to sing it with.