Emerson Drive, a band of Canadian transplants, eases right into the Music Row pocket with its first effort, a collection of amiable tunes delivered with polish and some degree of drama. What's most refreshing is that the band wrote hardly any of it; with so many non-performing writers in Nashville, it's a blessing to find a self-contained group that doesn't have to inflict its own mediocre material on the world. On the other hand, the gloss and lyrical predictability of these songs doesn't prove that the non-performing writers are necessarily that much more gifted. On balance, with its ebullient spirit, agreeably rough-edged vocal harmonies, and fluid fiddle fills from Pat Allingham,
Emerson Drive is about as strong a debut as one can expect, given the narrow stylistic rules imposed on the genre. ~ Robert L. Doerschuk