Album Notes

The X-Rated Cowboys have returned with their second full-length album, Saddest Day of the Year. This time around the band brought Dan Baird (Georgia Satellites, Yayhoos) up from Nashville to help with production duties. His presence, along with a more streamlined songwriting approach, resulted in an album that was a bit more rock, without completely abandoning the hints of alt-country twang that fans have come to expect from the X-Rated Cowboys.

The X-Rated Cowboys are Quinn Fallon (acoustic guitars / vocals), Andy Harrison (ex-Howlin' Maggie on electric guitars, lap steel, additional keys, backing vocals), Bob Hite (B3, piano, wurlitzer, accordion), Ben Lamb (bass), and C. Douglas Wells (drums). Guest appearances are made by Baird (who performs a dueling guitar solo with Harrison on the rocking "Saddest Day"), Watershed's Joe Oestreich and Colin Gawel, Jerry DePizzo (O.A.R.) on sax, and a spoken word interlude by John Schwab on "Drinkin' For Two."

Already receiving radio airplay are the tracks "Whoever You Are" and "Just Can't Wait." Other tracks sure to garner attention are "Saddest Day," "High & Lonesome," and "Evicted."

The X-Rated Cowboys plan to tour regionally this summer, through the fall, and onward.

REVIEWS
The X-Rated Cowboys' Saddest Day of the Year could be a candidate for the greatest lost pub-rock album, if it weren't created in 2003. Together, they rock and give you the feeling that they are having the greatest time ever in the process. All of the elements are here: great, loose country-, roots- and blues-rock playing, choruses that force you to sing along, and songs you can care about even if the subject matter won't force Stephen Hawkins to lose one bit of sleep. - Miles of Music

The group plays fetching pop music with hints of country twang that recalls Elvis Costello on "King of America." But while Costello was only able to approximate scenes of Americana, the Cowboys naturally depict middle America as only real inhabitants can. - The Big Takeover