Album Review: Brantley Gilbert - Just As I Am

My favourite release of 2014, so far!

Georgia boy Brantley Gilbert may be a country artist in name, but he is far removed from most of the rest of the artists who call Nashville home. Gilbert’s music leans more towards southern rock than traditional country, as is easily and quickly discerned by listening to songs like ‘Kick it in the Sticks’ and his big radio hit, the anthemic ‘Country Must Be Country Wide’ from his major label debut, Halfway to Heaven.

Just As I Am, Gilbert’s first release since 2010, is more of the same, and why not, with Halfway to Heaven becoming a resounding commercial success? The bad boy outlaw personality isn’t just a commercial act, but a reality, and it comes to the fore on many songs, especially on the opener ‘If You Want A Bad Boy’ and the testosterone-fuelled ‘Ready Me My Rights’, which appears on the Deluxe edition. It’s awesome beyond words.

The album’s second single, “Small Town Throwdown” features label mates Thomas Rhett and Justin Moore sharing verses, and is definitely an anthem of Friday or Saturday nights in Small Town USA, and as great as the song itself is, there’s something cool about hearing the three artists riffing off of one another between verses. It’s a heavy track that’s already making inroads on the Billboard charts in America as the album’s second single. Handily, it’s one of the best songs on the album.

It was the first single, ‘Bottoms Up’ that really launched Gilbert’s second major label release, and the tune with a slight rap touch to it, a song about getting drunk and, if the awesome gangster-style video clip – see below – is anything to go by, about running from the law and there’s nothing country audiences like more than an outlaw singing about getting tanked. It’s a song that’ll get into your head and stay there.

In keeping with heavily-tattooed Gilbert calls his bipolar self, there’s also plenty of mid-tempo ballads, the sort of stuff that wouldn’t be out of place on a mainstream rock release. In fact, Gilbert tends that way on most songs, with more crunching guitar riffs than there are slide guitar parts. It’s a niche that he just commands nicely, and although the music is heavy, there are many nods to Gilbert’s life.

As Gilbert always says, he doesn’t sing what he doesn’t write, and he doesn’t write what he hasn’t lived. You can definitely see the young Brantley Gilbert in ‘17 Again’, an ode to his middle teenage years, reliving the life he led and the girls he was with – you know, sneak into her bedroom and take her out in his truck – and in a small Georgia town before fame, fortune and Music City USA beckoned. It’s a wonderfully nostalgic tune, for those of us who left childhood long behind, but remember it fondly.

‘Lights Of My Hometown’ is another epic song, presumably about his hometown, Jefferson, Georgia, at more than 5:00 (a rarity in modern music these days) and sits nicely on an album which is interspersed with hard-rockin’ songs and heartfelt ballads. Gilbert’s bipolar self, remember?

‘My Baby’s Guns N Roses’ is a not-so-veiled tribute to the great 90’s rock band, and could well be a follow up to Gilbert’s own hit single, ‘She’s My Kind Of Crazy’ from Halfway to Heaven, such are it’s references to a girl being a rock star. Any song that name checks ‘Paradise City’, among others, is okay with me, too.

Many predict that Gilbert is going to be country’s next big thing – this album, which nicely mixes hard rock and a few good rock ballads (whilst giving many nods, of course, to country life and winning country song-type formulas) might be the first step towards domination. 

Just As I Am debuted at second on the Billboard 200, behind only the Coldplay juggernaut, and, thanks to it’s cranking rock riffs, has incredible crossover potential.

Let’s hope BG doesn’t wait another four years to release some new stuff!