The DuShane Band “Alabama Rain b/w Stay The Night”

You surely do hear the Toby Keith influence in The DuShane Band’s single “Alabama Rain b/w Stay The Night”. Their urban country style of music is full of the red, white and blue pride that became a Toby Keith trademark over the past two decades. The A side is full of the tales of hard times, love of family, patriotism and country pride. In other words, those standards that have formed the foundation the C&W genre was built upon from its inception and into the present. Kind of like the plate the apple pie is served on. Hmm, hmm good and pass me a fork, my friend. 

Shane, the leader of The DuShane Band, was signed to MCA records back in the day as part of a group of rocker outlaws called Law And Order. He decided to break out on his own to explore a more acoustic/electric vein of music where he could showcase pedal steel and fiddle players along side electric guitars and electric keyboards and the results of his experiment are what you hear on this single. To my ears it sounds like small town southern rock combined with big city New York sophistication. It rumbles with the power of a trusty dusty four-wheeler pickup truck and handles like a polished classic Cadillac Coupe De Ville on the highway.

A simple explanation for this already mentioned hybrid phenomena is it appears that the members of The DuShane Band live in and perform around the New York City area. When you’re more than a crow’s fly away from the roadhouses and honkytonks, and instead playing the night clubs and hipster venues, well you’re bound to pick up some of the local flavor and color and put it on in your music. But the guys and gals who work in The DuShane Band never let you forget that deep down they’re all a bunch of good old country boys and country girls even if they have traded their horses and saddles for seats on the Manhattan subway. That’s just the way it goes sometimes and nobody should hold that against them, because that just wouldn’t be right.

Not quite sure who in The DuShane Band wrote these tracks but the composer or composers certainly have earned a tip of my hat for their efforts. They’re constructed in a very Hank Williams fashion: simple and direct with a lot of honest heart and soul in both the melodies and lyrics. Kudos to DuShane (aka Shane) the lead singer for the way he works that microphone when he’s wailing on it. That boy has a nice tenor voice and can croon with the best of them. He doesn’t just sing these songs, he leaves you believing he lived them.

I, for one, am hoping to hear more DuShane Band releases before too much more time goes by. This single is a nice taste, but it has me hungry to hear a bit more before I, as a record reviewer, return a final verdict on just how good these urban cowpokes really are. So, now that you’ve got our attention and interest you best bring some more tunes to the table before that meal that you’ve just served turns cold.

www.dushaneband.com