Texas singer-songwriter Hayes Carll makes nouveau-outlaw country, poetic
diction delivered with a rasp (a lover who ''likes to lay naked and be
gazed upon,'' indeed) on Trouble in Mind. His best melodies are honky-tonk lamentations,
with detours into banjo-plunking balladry (''Girl Downtown'') and Stones-y
rock (''Bad Liver and a Broken Heart''). The creator of one of the year's
best country albums thus far, Carll also covers Tom Waits (''I Don't
Wanna Grow Up''), but his own irreligious doggerel — ''She Left Me for
Jesus,'' sure to get him shunned in Nashville — beats Waits by a mile. A-
DOWNLOAD THIS: Preview ''She Left Me for Jesus'' on Amazon.com
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