Album Review: "Emotional Traffic" - Tim McGraw

"Emotional Traffic": B+. In 2010 Mary and I journeyed to Milwaukee with our friends, Bob and Sue Cipolle, to attend a couple of baseball games featuring the Twins and the Brewers. We also purchased tickets to see a Summerfest concert featuring Tim McGraw and Lady Antebellum. In order to familiarize myself with McGraw's body of work before the concert, I listened to several of his albums and made a mix of my favorite nineteen McGraw songs, which were all that would fit on a burned CD, to enjoy en route from the Twin Cities. Before then I had admired his talent, but that weekend I actually became what could fairly be labeled a fan.

Two weeks ago, McGraw released his first album, "Emotional Traffic," since the four of us went on that Sudsville trip. "Emotional Traffic" is his eleventh studio album of original material. I will admit up front that I have not perfected a grading system to use for music like I have for movies. (See my January 12, 2012 post, "Prelude To 2011 Movie Ratings Recap.") Yes, I know that it is presumptuous of me to think that I've created a perfected system for anything, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and on this blog, yours truly is the beholder. The way I see it, a movie can't be saved, or conversely deemed to be excellent, based on a few scenes, whereas if an album has a few superb ditties sprinkled in among the rest of the set list, it can at least be labeled above average if not higher. Another way to put it is this: A movie must be rated based on its entirety, whereas an album has the capacity to enable a few terrific songs to weigh more than an equal number of clunkers. As for rating "Emotional Traffic," the challenge was a little easier than normal, as my question was this: How many of its twelve songs were good enough to be included on that 2010 mix I made if I could expand the capacity beyond nineteen songs? My answer is two for sure, maybe as many as four.

"Emotional Traffic" has been marketed with McGraw proclaiming, "This is my best ever album," but my reaction after my initial listening to the first five tracks was, "Meh." (I have always wanted to use the word "meh" in a sentence ever since discovering it several months ago. What you just read was my big opportunity!) Then I played Track # 6, "Better Than I Used To Be," and recalled the new Budweiser Light tag line, "Here we go." That song is vintage baritone McGraw, admitting past indiscretions but promising to get better. He tells the listener, "I ain't as good as I'm gonna get, but I'm better than I used to be." For some reason it called to mind Toby Keith's 2005 hit, "As Good As I Once Was," when he sang, "I ain't as good as I once was, but I'm as good once as I ever was."

The other song on "Emotional Traffic" that I'd rate top notch is Track # 11, his duet with Ne-Yo titled "Only Human," which is about having lofty aspirations that sometimes must be trimmed back to something more realistic. To be honest, I did not know Ne-Yo from J Lo, other than I once heard his singing style referred to as "whine-hop" (as opposed to hip-hop, I guess), but he sings great on this duet and I'm going to check out some of his other, solo work. The album title "Emotional Traffic" comes from one of the early lines of this song.

The four songs between "Better Than I Used To Be" and "Only Human" are all worthy too, including a song about unexpected miracles (Track # 7, "Touchdown Jesus"), a story about a singer who had to leave her hometown to be appreciated as a star (Track # 8, "The One That Got Away"), and two upbeat story songs about meeting someone new in a bar toward the end of the evening ("Felt Good On My Lips" and "Hey Now," Tracks # 9 and 10, respectively). The set closes with "Die By My Own Hand," a deep reflective song reminiscent of Journey's "Faithfully" and Kenny Roger's "She Believes In Me." It's not easy for a woman to be in love with a music man.

Does "Emotional Traffic" live up to Tim McGraw's proclamation as his best work? I am going to say "no." I still think his 1995 album "All I Want" remains his best. However, as you have seen from my grade of B+, I do highly recommend "Emotional Traffic." But start with Track # 6.