accessAtlanta

Toby Keith's 13th album has one of the ugliest covers in recent memory. The silhouette of a cheerleader in a cowboy hat is backed by shades of gray overlaid with lettering in a rusty red. It looks like second-rate clip art.

The music inside isn't that dismal, though it does seem that his mood is at least partly cloudy. But there are enough spots of sunshine to keep things from withering in the gloom.

(ENLARGE)
Toby Keith
EMAIL THIS PRINT THIS MOST POPULAR
COUNTRY Toby Keith "Honkytonk University." DreamWorks. 12 tracks. Grade: B-

"Honkytonk U," the first single, gets the party started in an upbeat fashion, with Keith giving his school-of-hard-knocks tale all the Waylon Jennings he can muster. It's not among his best songwriting efforts, but he makes it work by the sheer force of his personality.

Things turn a little blue with "She Ain't Hooked on Me No More," a lovely duet with the estimable Merle Haggard. And despite the rocking up-tempo music, there's nothing happy going down in "She Left Me." She's gone again in the bouncy "Big Blue Note," too, leaving behind a scribbled goodbye on the colorful title item.

The album's best track pelts all the sadness with a batch of rotten tomatoes. "You Ain't Leavin' (Thank God Are Ya)" starts out as an old style weeper before kicking up the tempo and revealing that the departing wife "can't be gone fast enough" and that "this'll make my girlfriend happy." It's a Keith classic — and a welcome relief from all the seriousness that surrounds it.

Keith is, at the very least, a capable and assured singer and songwriter. He's penned some pretty ballads, but he's at his best when things get rowdy and rude. A few more tracks like "You Ain't Leavin' " and "Just the Guy to Do It" — with its snarky opening line "Do blondes really have more fun/Or are they just easier to spot in the dark?" — and this might've made the dean's list. As it stands, "Honkytonk University" is still an above-average performer.

— Shane Harrison