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Review: 'WESTIES, THE'
'Six On The Out'   

-  Label: 'Pauper Sky Records'
-  Genre: 'Rock' -  Release Date: '3rd June 2016'

Our Rating:
Built around husband/wife duo Michael McDermott and Heather Horton, this Chicago-based folk/rock/Americana band's second album centres on story songs and inner city landscapes.

The promise (threat?) is that the album will "leave the listener haunted by its honesty and brutality".

After the 2015 debut, West Side Stories, McDermott set upon writing a second installment to follow the same characters getting older in the urban wilderness.

Although he draws on his own experience of doing time and spending his adult years in what he calls "a haze of booze and drugs", this set of songs are less personal narratives than those on his solo work.

McDermott is more inclined to put his experiences into a broader perspective, comparing his life to other lost souls and frustrated dreamers.

On Henry McCarty, he steps back in time to retell the legend of Billy The Kid during which he sees fit to remind us that "He was an Irish-American" (No prizes for guessing that McDermott is also of Irish descent).

Most of songs are of people in need of a safety net. McDermott says that after getting clean and sober, he was full of insights into others who lost direction the way he did: "My brain became like a Vonnegut book - once I opened that door, there was just an avalanche that came pouring out.”.

The wisdom he learned from the lean years is summed up on The Gang's All Here when he sings. "It's surviving the struggle that give our lives meaning and worth".

McDermott is the dominant voice so his wife only gets to sing lead vocals on Like You Used To a sultry love song in the Emmylou Harris tradition. This is a pity since a couple more songs like this would have given the album more balance and variety.

Standard rock backing is augmented by steel guitar, mandolin, fiddle and stand-up bass and at its best the gritty yet hopeful songs draw positive comparisons with 'Born To Run' era Springsteen. At its worst it may make you think of Dire Straits!

The Westies' website
  author: Martin Raybould

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WESTIES, THE - Six On The Out