P.W. Long's Reelfoot: We Didn't See You On Sunday

The Detroit band Mule made some of the meanest whiskey-soaked cowpunk around before breaking up a year or two ago. Emerging from the wreckage is former frontman Preston Long, who quickly formed a new group (P.W. Long's Reelfoot) that admirably carries on Mule's dark vision. We Didn't See You On Sunday, Reelfoot's first recording, addresses such well-worn topics as drinking, doomed romance and redemption, with songs that fall into two distinct categories: About half feature fleshed-out arrangements with a full band, while the remaining tracks are stripped down to just Long and a beat-up acoustic guitar. Just about everything here works, thanks to Long's raggedly harrowing voice, but the best material on Sunday happens when the bandleader plays solo: The bare-knuckled intensity of "My Name" and "Jelly" makes the tracks hard to forget, while "Aw Bruiser" and "Jack Of Diamonds" are infused with tender melancholy that helps give the record further depth. Not that the full-band work doesn't occasionally reach similar heights: Songs like "The Shakin' Fears" recall a more melancholy Mule, and that can't be a bad thing.