STARLITE WALKER

Carefully sidestepping the maudlin cliches of most modern country music, Silver Jews' appeal is unselfconsciously American, eg. all-embracing. Poetic without pretention, Starlite Walker is like walking into a bar somewhere in the midwest and having the luck to sit down next to the most eloquently miserable man in the western hemisphere. By the time he's ended his woeful tale, you'll have been completely won over.