Rodeo Queen

On their third album, JinJa Davis and Grant Birkenbeuel, who make up the duo Utah Carol, turn in another collection of light country-folk-pop, harmonizing sweetly over tracks of melodic music taken at strolling tempos. Their consistently calm approach recalls some elements of late-'60s/early-'70s country-rock as played by Poco and Neil Young at their more sedate and more recently by Cowboy Junkies. Lyrically, there is some of those artists' occasional wistfulness as well, as Davis and Birkenbeuel sing song after song in the first person with the "I" character expressing regret and longing for a significant other who has gone away. "I was a young girl, I was pretty, I was sweet," goes a passage in the typical "Come Back Baby," "then like a cowboy you walked right out on me, I'm waiting, come back baby, don't say maybe 'cause I'm still waiting." But while the words tend to be forlorn, the music just keeps ambling along, and the voices expressing the sentiments continue to sound untroubled. It's as if the recordings themselves are providing comfort to the lonely narrators of the songs.