25 Country Albums You Need to Hear (Even If You Hate Country Music)

7. MODERN DAY DRIFTER
Dierks Bentley
For contemporary country fans who revere what was great about the past but don't want to live in it, Bentley is like an answered prayer. He hangs out with bluegrass dudes and knows his classic country 45s like nobody's business, but he can also play a college gig (or, say, the upcoming Bonnaroo Festival) and make a crowd of young 'uns feel like they've just seen a rock & roll show. He got things seriously right on his sophomore album, the one he'll probably forever be trying to live up to. The opening ''I've Still Got a Lot of Leavin' Left to Do'' is as good a rogue's anthem as anything Waylon Jennings ever recorded. But Bentley is willing to play the loser in love, too, as he does in ''Settle for a Slowdown,'' which we suspect has been the haunting theme to about a hundred thousand recent breakups.