Listening to “Next To You”, the opening ballad of Little Big Town’s latest Nightfall album, and if you aren’t impressed anything, you aren’t a true music fan.

Of course, it’s a way exaggeration, and people have different preferences. Especially, Little Big Town is a country music band, the genre that has relatively limited popularity worldwide (even in the U.S. alone). But the beauty and elegance of “Next To You” simply exceeds the boundary of country music or any type of music. The intro with simple yet addictive acoustic guitar, dramatic climax during the break, harmony, vocal, lyric, everything is perfect. A new Little Big Town’s masterpiece. The song beautifully expresses the embrace of love after taking a distance, that is necessary for every relationship.

Little Big Town didn’t fit in the narrow definition of country music even before. Their broad range of music tastes, including the influence from Fleetwood Mac, has created their originality besides their trademark of quadruple vocals and beautiful harmony. With Nightfall album and “Next To You”, Little Big Town entered to a new level of music unlike the last The Breaker album, their first boring album.

Nightfall boosts the first half with superior songs after “Next To You”. The title track is moody country-pop that artistically expresses nightfall under the moon shadow and stars. “Forever And A Night” is a dark and heavy song that chorus gets dramatic (I first felt mismatch about the position of this depressive song between two catchy songs, but if I think about the album theme and the connection between the catchy songs, it’s right there). “Throw Your Love Away” is the light country song that has good chemistry with Kimberly Schlapman’s soft candy voice. The second single “Over Drinking” is an orthodox country song that heavily effected honky-tonk guitar sound is stickily vivid. “Wine, Beer, Whiskey” is their new concert anthem with comical wild western melodies. In addition to Little Big Town’s signature vocals by four members, the band’s performance is remarkable, especially Evan Weatherford’s guitar. The band’s high skills are important elements to make Little Big Town more solid like they did at their concert.

The problem is after this.

The second half. Comparing to the picturesque first half, the remaining 7 songs are weak. Songs are never bad but less impressive. Honestly, I was hooked up with the whole album first, then started getting bored with only the second half while the first half is still heavy rotation even after 2 months. One of the reasons is not-that-good track order that gives a flat impression, unlike the first half. More than the track order, the major reason is the second half has less variety than the first half. The songs from the second half have a similar dark tone without hooks. To make the impression stronger, the lead vocal is all Karen Fairchild on the second half expect “Problem Child” by Jimi Westbrook and the duet of Karen and Jimi on “River of Stars”. Even the band has 4 lead vocalists! Little Big Town’s big advantage is not properly enlightened on the second half after different vocals entertain the first half. If Kimberly and Philip Sweet took lead on at least one more song each, the impression would be different.

Yes. Kimberly and Philip sang only 1 song each on this album (Jimi sang 2 and a half). What is the reason their task on lead vocal is getting lesser and lesser by each album though it is obvious that Karen is the primal lead singer? Don’t get me wrong. I like Karen a lot. Her impressive voice is a nice sales point of the band, and probably that’s why the majority of their singles are sung by Karen. But other member’s voices are characteristic as much as Karen (indeed, I equality like each member’s voice). Nightfall album contains the songs that other members would be a better fit. An example is “Questions” that Karen faints at the high key. My opinion is Philip would perform better with his stronger throat and a wider range (maybe my opinion is a question to some people, but think about “Kiss Goodbye” that Philip sang without problem). “Blue Bird” is a more Kimberly type of song but it would be more interesting if she sang “Sugar Coat”. There are more possibilities to enhance the second half with the different vocal variations.

Another con is that the finale of this album doesn’t have an equivalent impact with the first song, which results in a weak ending. “Next To You” is the song that receives standing ovation at their concert. Another dramatic song on the last would be ideal to make the album tighter.

Still, Nightfall is Little Big Town’s important evolutional footstep that blossoms themselves from the boundary of a single genre. This time, they added elegance to mature their music. Little Big Town still has full potentials for its future.

RELEASE DATE (US): 01/17/2020

OVERALL POINTS: 82/100

Songs: ★★★★+1/2
Originality: ★★★★+3/4
Thrills: ★★★★
Song orders: ★★
Vocal: ★★★★+1/2
Background: ★★★★★
Sound: ★★★★★
Production: ★★★
Strong songs: “Next To You”, “Nightfall”, “Throw Your Love Away”, “Over Drinking”, “Wine, Beer, Whiskey”

EXTRA (NOT COUNTED TOWARD THE OVERALL POINTS)

Title: A
Album cover: A+

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LITTLE BIG TOWN, “NIGHTFALL”, ALBUM REVIEW. Beyond Country Music

Listening to “Next To You”, the opening ballad of Little Big Town’s latest Nightfall album, and if you aren’t impressed anything, you aren’t a true music fan.

The problem is after this.

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