Review Summary: Another mediocre bro-country attempt...
Sam Hunt, a former college quarterback, is now one of the newest individuals attempting to climb the ladder of country music stardom. Montevallo is Hunt’s debut album, exploring the current, highly criticized, and over-saturated sub-genre of bro-country.
What actually constitutes as country music has grown increasingly fuzzy, especially in recent years. Hunt reaches to combines hip-hop verses, dubstep backdrops, rock choruses, while keeping subtle elements of strummed guitars and fiddled banjos to keep it marketable to a country artist. If can’t excel in any genre of music, why not to try to throw a bunch of styles you’re mediocre at in a musical melting pot and sell it? When this record finds it’s way into identifiable country territory, these instrumentals are so hopelessly weak and generic, I almost rather listen to the humorous rap attempts. Often, I will praise artists for taking creative risks if they are executed well. In this case, these are not risks, but embarrassingly cheap gimmicks.
Vocally, Hunt is virtually lifeless. Let’s try to forget the times he tries to rap/spoken word? (Honestly, I have no idea what he is trying to do with these parts.) When he sings, there is no personality. The track entitled “Raised on It” is a great example of how bland his performance can be. Under squeaky-clean production, we find an emotionless character with absolutely nothing to say.
The lyrics on this album do nothing to save it. “Blame it on the bikinis, party girls, and martinis and the sunshine,” proclaims Hunt on the track “Single for the Summer”. Sam Hunt doesn’t even attempt to break the stereotype as he writes about attractive women and drinking, without any substance to warrant these nuances. Nothing here transcends the shallowness associated with bro-country. There are tracks where Hunt portrays himself as an arrogant alpha-male such as “Ex to See” and “Break Up in a Small Town.” In other tracks such as Speakers, he tries to show his sensitive side. There is no cohesiveness at all. I never find myself believing Hunt, he is not writing from the heart, but from his bank account. Sam Hunt is opening his mouth, words are coming out, but no message is being heard.
All in all, Montevallo is a disaster. It’s a somewhat pop-country experiment with absolutely no direction or identity. Last year when Zac Brown said he was ashamed to be considered in the same genre as other country artists, it was music like this he was referring to. Sam Hunt has succeeded in creating an album completely void of intelligence, personality, and soul.
