Freedy Johnston – Right Between the Promises

Pop tunesmith Freedy Johnston breaks little new ground on his sixth studio album, which comes across as an “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” kind of record. Most everything here would fit comfortably among the highlights of Johnston’s 1990s catalog — which is a positive thing when your catalog is as strong as the one he has compiled.

Johnston’s only fault, and one for which he can hardly be blamed, is timing. He’s a keen melodic craftsman stuck in an generation where such talent goes largely ignored, save for a loyal underground. “Pop” used to mean “popular,” and in the early 1970s, Johnston’s music would have been precisely that, all over the AM airwaves of Top-40 stations with songs such as the pace-setting opener “Broken Mirror”, the immediately catchy “Waste Your Time”, and the effortlessly rolling “Anyone”.

Johnston hinted at his connection to that era in the early ’90s by covering Jimmy Webb’s “Wichita Lineman” on an EP, but he really drives it home on Right Between The Promises with a spot-on cover of the Edison Lighthouse one-hit-wonder smash from 1970, “Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)”.

Occasionally he varies the pace a bit, stripping things down to bare acoustics on “Radio Heartache” while taking unexpected rhythmic and melodic twists and turns on “Back To My Machine”. But he fares best when he sticks with his bread-and-butter of power-pop punch.