★★★★★
Robert Earl Keen would be the Godfather of Texas country, were it not for the two generations of country singers from Texas which pre-date him. As it is, Keen is the forefront for much of the best music coming out of the Lone Star state today. While legends like Willie Nelson remain omnipresent, Robert Earl Keen makes up an increasing part of the backbone of the sound...
- www.roughstock.com
2011-09-22
★★★★★
Robert Earl Keen is a creature of habit, retreating to his private cabin (somewhat pretentiously dubbed "The Scriptorium") every couple of years to crank out a new album's worth of sturdy Americana songs that draw the same set of comparisons to other acclaimed singer-songwriters like Townes Van Zandt and Guy Clark. Keen's a fine songwriter (those comparisons to Van Zandt may be rote by now, but he's most certainly earned them), but perhaps too predictable as a recording artist...
- www.slantmagazine.com
2011-09-19
★★★★★
Robert Earl Keen is a one of the quintessential voices of central Texas. Not as a singer--though his delivery has some magic to it--but as a songwriter and a storyteller. He's what a country artist should be and nothing it's not: clever, but not contrived; wise, but not intellectual; tough, but not macho; and, above all, honest. His lyrics are cerebral--that will never change, but his tone will. On Ready for Confetti, Keen's 16th release, he opts for a happy-go-lucky mood on most songs...
- www.popmatters.com
2011-09-12
★★★★★
Somewhere in the gulf between Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt, Rodney Crowell and Lyle Lovett and next wave Lone Stars Pat Green, Jack Ingram, Stoney LaRue, Randy Rogers and Hayes Carll, Robert Earl Keen put down roots--and was slightly less visible for the lack of a scene. But the journeyman troubadour, a Lone Star fixture for more than three decades, took his energy and applied it to his craft...
- www.pastemagazine.com
2011-09-12
★★★★★
Above all else, Robert Earl Keen made his name as a songwriter by telling memorable stories. Take his classic "The Road Goes on Forever", for example. A young-wild-and-on-the-run tale, it's easily his most often covered song. Joe Ely, the Highwaymen, Jack Ingram, and countless lesser-known folk/country musicians have made it practically a standard of the genre. It's so universal that Keen is working on a documentary about the song and its impact on people...
- www.popmatters.com
2011-01-20
★★★★★
Robert Earl Keen said that the wanted to make his first album in four years to sound rich and robust. He succeeds in an album which feels like a night of Texas style story telling, set to music. If you have never been to a Texas style story telling session, or if you have never read Mary Karr's The Liar's Club, you know there is only one rule. The story has to be good, it doesn't have to be true, but it has to be good...
- roughstock.com
2010-12-07
★★★★★
Singer-songwriter Robert Earl Keen is a gifted wordsmith, an indifferent melodist, and a flat-out non-singer. When he works up enough narrative juice, as on the ambitious four-song cycle that climaxes Walking Distance, he triumphs over his limitations. Otherwise, they triumph over him.
- ew.com
2010-08-27
★★★★★
The Texas troubadour waxes sentimental ("Rollin' By") and goofy ("Five Pound Bass") with charming flair on this '95 live album. While his western-swing grooves and scraggly singing hold no surprises, his genuine affection for slobs and losers is striking.
- www.blender.com
2010-08-22
★★★★★
Robert Earl Keen practices two very different kinds of Texas music. On one hand, he has a gift for the kind of understated, skeptical, literary songwriting pursued by his mentors Townes Van Zandt and Guy Clark, and friend and neighbor Lyle Lovett. On the other, Keen has become a hero to Lone Star State fratboys who sing along lustily to Keen choruses celebrating guns, alcohol and squandered hours. As a result, some folks blame him for Pat Green...
- www.pastemagazine.com
2010-03-05
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