The Tractors - Fast Girl (CD)

All Music Guide

A fine slab of NRBQ/Dave Edmunds-style country-inflected rock roll, 2001's Fast Girl is another typically enjoyable album from the Tractors. Like their namesake farm equipment, the Tractors are never flashy, and they're built more for comfort than speed. Goofy rockers like "Babalou" (nothing to do with Desi Arnaz, of course), two-step ballads like "It's a Beautiful Thing," and honky tonk covers like the Tractors' version of Moon Mullican's classic "Don't Ever Take My Picture Down" blend into an eclectic but never scattershot blend of country, RB, and early rock influences. In these surroundings, even stylistic experiments like the extended jam that closes the otherwise ultra-poppy "Ready to Cry" make perfect sense. Fast Girl is not the Tractors' best album, but coming as it did after a nearly four-year layoff, it shows that the group hadn't lost anything in its downtime.

- Stewart Mason, All Music Guide