Reviewed by Ian Phillips.
By Morgan Evans, Warner Brothers Nashville 2018.
Morgan Evans is the latest Australian hot sensation to emerge onto the country scene via Nashville.
Things That We Drink To is his debut album and he’s already achieved his first US #1 with the initial single, Kiss Somebody, lifted from the disc.
Evans co-wrote every song on the album alongside the album’s producer, Chris DeStefano, and the two played every instrument heard on the disc.
This is an impressive feat.
Kiss Somebody has achieved Platinum sales and amassed over 65 million global streams and the follow up single, Day Drunk, has been dubbed a “slam-dunk” and one of the “10 Best Country and American Songs of the Week by Rolling Stone.”
I have no doubt that Morgan Evans is on his way to country music super-stardom.
He has been named as one to watch by a broad cross-section of the music press including Rolling Stone, CMT, SiriusXM, Pandora, Bobby Bones, the Tennessean and more.
Not bad for a first album release.
Morgan and songwriting partner DeStefano have cleverly crafted an album that ticks all the boxes for commercial success.
The songs are catchy country rock numbers that contain all the requisite musical and lyric hooks to grab the attention of the radio listener.
If I wasn’t told that Morgan was originally from Australia I would never have guessed it. He sings in the universal American accent.
He’s by no way a maverick in adopting the idioms and accent of his adopted country. \
I don’t know how long he’s been over in the USA but it’s long enough to have married and created a new life there so that might account for his American twang.
While the album is not necessarily my cup of tea I know that country music fans will love it.
Things That We Drink To fits perfectly into the modern country/rock sound and it does it better than most similar albums that I’ve heard recently.
