Anything But Country: Hen Party Pink Vinyl LP

Label: Talk About Country
Release Date: 28th October

Legends' do country self-depreciation in the most British way, it's not American BIG DREAMING 'I'm gonna be a BIG STAR, mama' it's more 'it'd be nice to win the lottery this week, I'll just google some yachts I'd like to buy', you know it's a long shot but you're still a little bitter when some other twerp wins your Euro-millions and then you just head to the pub and forget about it. Here's Jof in grey-skied England dreaming of donning a stiffly starched Garth Brooks tassel shirt with one of those round-your-head mini microphones and playing the Protein-Shake Powder Enormodome but he's saving up for a trip to Nashville that'll send his credit cards spinning. Personally, I don't know how your country bros could resist this twangy, country shuffling and AOR synth pop/rock.

For those who dig: the drizzly American country of Dire Straits and the 80s/90s country pop/rock stars who straddled the country and pop billboards.

Legends of Country’s second album, produced by Rob Jones (Pictish Trail, Meilyr Jones, Rozi Plain), Anything But Country, sees the band add eighties synths to their neo-traditionalist country sound. They’ve doubled down on their love of Dire Straits/nineties influence and recorded ten blistering cuts of “Drivetime” country, hi-NRG country- pop with a powerful eighties heartland influence pulsing through the middle of it. “If That's What It Takes”, the first single set for release ahead of the album, will give listeners a taste of the album. “It used to be so much easier being a pop star, but it feels like it’s all so different now. This song’s about getting to that point where you will literally do anything to be famous!" says the bands Jof Owen, also of The Boy Least Likely to. Jof grew up in Wendover, a small market town nestled in the Chiltern Hills, and his ironically understated and reflective lyrics have taken on an almost Larkinesque quality on this new record, writing about the absurdities of modern life, dysfunctional masculinity, and the depressing reality of ageing.