★★★★★
Even though he's put his own twisted twist on themes like the war in Afghanistan and religious devotion - the latter serving as grist for the irreverent mill in "She Left Me For Jesus," the funniest number on 2008's Trouble In Mind - he's not a topical songwriter so much as a character-driven one. The characters - who can't always be told apart from Carll's rambling, guitar-toting, barroom poet persona - tend to be blue collar slouches or spitfires, self-deprecating, brokenhearted boozers and...
- www.americansongwriter.com
2013-04-25
★★★★★
Hayes Carll is a Texas singer/songwriter who describes himself as a "twisted folk singer." I don't find him particularly perplexing because his songs reveal a fair amount about his life, friends, and wry wit. The places he's lived over the years are mentioned in the opener, "Wish I Hadn't Stayed So Long." He wonders about some of his closest high school buds in "Good Friends...
- rootsmusicreport.com
2013-04-02
★★★★★
A little too decisively to instill much hope for his love life, the rowdy songs are deeper than the thoughtful ones, especially the duet with Young Republican Cary Ann Hearst, who thinks she might screw him even though he can't afford to tip the stripper. But he does rowdy real good. And the filial "Grateful for Christmas" enters the canon of alt-country unholiday songs well ahead of the Drive-Bys' competing entry--maybe even on a level with James McMurtry's and Robert Earl Keen's.
- www.robertchristgau.com
2011-03-14
★★★★★
Judging by his last couple of albums, Hayes Carll would make the ideal drinking buddy; a guy whose combined wit and soul increases exponentially with each round. KMAG YOYO ("kiss my ass guys, you're on your own" in military slang) is the sound of Carll at closing time...
- www.exclaim.ca
2011-02-28
★★★★★
You canâ??t listen to this freewheeling Texas singer and songwriter long without becoming thoroughly convinced that heâ??s a full-blooded relative of Hank Williams, Ernest Tubb and Merle Haggard. Waylon Jenningsâ?? famous observation about Grand Ole Opry standard-bearer Porter Wagoner -- â??he couldnâ??t go pop with a mouthful of firecrackers" -- is equally true of Hayes Carll. Thereâ??s an unself-conscious commitment to his rural Southern heritage in everything he sings...
- latimesblogs.latimes.com
2011-02-20
★★★★★
Click to Listen to Hayes Carll's "Kmag Yoyo" and "Another Like You" Texas troubadour Hayes Carll turned heads in 2008 with a pledge to kick the Messiah's ass ("She Left Me for Jesus"). The title track on his latest is a soldier's lament involving heroin, space travel and David Bowie. Now that's country music...
- www.rollingstone.com
2011-02-20
★★★★★
& The title track on Hayes Carll's fourth album, KMAG YOYO, is based on the acronym "Kiss My Ass Guys, You're On Your Own," and it follows a second-generation soldier who gets recruited for black-ops medical experiments after one too many fuck-ups in the field...
- www.avclub.com
2011-02-15
★★★★★
"I'm Like James Brown only white and taller All I wanna do is stomp and holler."--Hayes Carll, "Stomp And Holler" Only a dedicated acronym enthusiast--acronymophile?--or a military vet would know what KMAG YOYO stands for ("Kiss My Ass Guys, You're On Your Own"), but it's now also the title of Hayes Carll's best album yet. Like many of the great country wordsmiths that came before, Carll delivers simple songs that are simply grand...
- www.pastemagazine.com
2011-02-14
★★★★★
If you want to know what Americana in general, and Texas music specifically, sounds like, take a listen to Hayes Carll. He is a nearly perfect amalgamation of most of the best artists the genre has to offer. He has the easy, guy-next-door, drunken storytelling of Robert Earl Keen. His sense of the sardonic speaks to his time spent writing with Ray Wiley Hubbard. He has a gonzo view of life and politics that comes straight out of Blaze Foley's brain...
- roughstock.com
2011-02-14
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