Review – Miranda Lambert ‘Four The Record’

It is hard to believe that we haven’t had a new album from Miranda Lambert in two years, but all that comes to an end on Tuesday when Ran releases her much talked about album Four The Record. Miranda has promised this album has so many musical influences on it from rock to jazz to blues to bluegrass and it certainly delivers all of the above.

This new venture from Miranda Lambert landed on my desk and as I literally had to beat Lynn off with a stick when she found out it was here. The first track on the album is All Kinds of Kinds - a great little diddy that shows us that it truly does take all kinds of people to make the world go round. This song has a great bluegrass feel to it.

Next we get a bluesy feeling funky song called Fine Tune. Miranda’s voice has been altered a bit on this one. It sounds like she is singing through an old radio. I have a feeling this song could be a play by play of Miranda’s honeymoon night – and I’ll leave it at that. I do find the voice altering to be a bit distracting, but it certainly adds to the notion of being “fine tuned”.

As track number 3, Fastest Girl In Town, begins, we realize we are going on a ride in this track. Co-written by Miranda and a great 80s rock feel to it, this song is surely in Miranda’s standard collection of bad-girl songs.

Safe is another song written by Miranda and is a great love song. Feeling safe in someone else’s arms is something all of us long for and this is the perfect song to tell someone just how much you love them.

Miranda is great at picking songs for her albums that really resonate with you and could possibly cause some people to feel a little uncomfortable with the material being discussed. Mama’s Broken Heart is one of those songs. Of course, in true southern fashion, mama is always saying keep your appearance and save face, no matter what happens in life. Growing up, we were always told to keep what happens at home at home and don’t let anyone know about it. Sometimes when you take revenge on someone, word gets around town.

Dear Diamond appears sixth on the album and another song written by Miranda. I can’t help but wonder if she wrote this song the night Blake proposed to her. It is the struggle of deciding to tell the one you love of all your past, or keep it to yourself and lie about it all.

Sometimes in life, relationships can become same ole’, same ole’. Same Old You is about a lady breaking it off with a guy that can’t get out of the same rut and be the man she expects instead of being the meek man that can’t stop her from leaving.

Track 8 is the first release we had from the new album Baggage Claim. I still really love this song because all of us have baggage; it’s just what we do with it that can make all the difference.

Easy Living is co-written by Lambert and has a great old-style country feel to it. It reminds me of a song you would hear on an episode of the Lone Ranger. This is another great love song with a unique a twist on it.

Miranda and Blake co-wrote Over You. This is a song that everyone can relate to. We have all lost someone before we felt it was their time. Blake Shelton lost his brother way before he should have had to and Miranda wanted to get this song out in honor of Blake’s brother. This is a beautiful song that will certainly bring a tear to your eye. I can only hope that Miranda releases this one as her next single to radio.

Look at Miss Ohio is the eleventh track on the album and boy can we relate to this song. All of our parents have a vision of who we should be and we all had to sow our wild oats and do our running around before finally settling down. Even Miss Ohio needs to be able to live her own life and make her own mistakes.

One thing I truly love about Miranda is the ability for her to sing songs about being in love, living your life and breaking up all on the same album and it sounds fantastic. So many times we get an album from an artist that every song is a love song, or every song is a break up song because that’s what they were going through in their life. Better In The Long Run is a perfect example of a break up song and just trying to move on. Blake Shelton joins Miranda on this song and they both do an excellent job belting it out with pure emotion.

Do you remember the Sylvia song Nobody from the 80s? She asked who was on the phone and he said “nobody”. The song goes on to say that nobody called again and it became the other woman’s name. Nobody’s Fool reminds me of that. Trying to play off that you don’t know someone and deep down, you are the fool and the other person is Nobody.

The final cut on Four The Record is Oklahoma Sky. This is a beautiful, sweet song from Miranda that reminds me of The House That Built Me. Not in the lyrics, the way she sings it – very tenderly.

Overall I give this album a huge thumbs-up. The various types of musical influences all blend together to create an incredible album full of feelings and emotions. I predict this album will go straight to number one next week and stay there for multiple weeks. Great job Miranda and you will definitely want to add this one to your collection!

You can hear the album for yourself this Sunday afternoon at 5pm with Bob Kingsley. He’ll sit down with Miranda and premiere the album cut by cut.