McBride delivers 'Timeless' classics, pop-flavored hits

02/21/2006 8:30 PM, Reuters


Martina McBride hit it right on the nose.

"Anyone who's a new fan cause of the 'Timeless' album must be wondering what the hell happened," the country singer joked shortly into the second half of her Radio City show.

Inadvertently encapsulating the not-so-favorable changes in country music over the years, McBride's concert, which was divided into two halves, demonstrated the gap between the elegantly simple classics she grew up on and the overproduced, pop-flavored product that has become so successful today.

The first one-hour segment, devoted to the hugely successful covers album "Timeless," found the singer performing one great song after another, written by the likes of Hank Williams, Loretta Lynn, Tammy Wynette, Hank Snow and Ray Price. The songs, which included such classics as "I Can't Stop Loving You," "You Ain't Woman Enough," "Make the World Go Away" and "I Still Miss Someone," were delivered in traditional-sounding arrangements that featured plenty of fiddle and steel guitar. Displaying superb taste and restraint, McBride made no attempts to update the songs or put an idiosyncratic, forced stamp on them. Rather, she just sang the hell out of the material, and the audience ate it up.

Although she doesn't have a particularly wide-ranging voice, she does have a highly strong and beautiful one. And her ability to traverse diverse emotional territory was well demonstrated in her excellent handling of such tonally disparate numbers as Williams' "You Win Again" and the Lynn Anderson hit "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden." The segment, performed on a Grand Ole Opry-style set and featuring video tributes to various country legends, was a triumph.

The second half found the performer reprising the bombastic, pop-flavored hits that have made her one of the genre's biggest sellers. And indeed, such songs as "Independence Day," "Wild Angels" and particularly "This One's for the Girls," while not exactly subtle, are slick and hook-laden enough to justify their popularity.

She delivered all the crowd-pleasers, as well as such relative obscurities as "God's Will" and her cover of Pat Benatar's "Hit Me With Your Best Shot," both of which were requested by randomly selected audience members, in an effective gimmick.

McBride seemed genuinely thrilled to be playing her first show at the art deco landmark hall. "Tonight I finally feel that I reached the top," she proclaimed. And if her soaring delivery of her trademark ballad, "Broken Wings," which brought the crowd to its feet, was any indication, she'll soon be back.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter