This album is an interesting step in Peck's career. It is a duet album, which is much like a covers album, and tends something artists fall upon when writer's block settles in, as they typically are not sprung from creative high points in anyone's career. Three albums into his career it's a little soon for Peck to fall back on something like this. The first song is both "Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other" is a cover of Ned Sublette's 1981 song. Willie Nelson at 91 sounds like he should have retired ten years ago. It generated a bit of internet buzz before the album's release but doesn't hold up to Peck's previous work.
Peck then teams up with Midland for the pretty forgettable "The Hurtin Kind" which does nothing to hook me in though it's better than the Willie Nelson duet. The duet with Elton John on "Saturday Night's Alright" shows Elton can still belt it out, but Peck really only helps out with the high notes and feels awkward on the rock verses. "Back at Your Door" is the first song that measures up to what he normally delivers. He is joined by Debbii Dawson for this one. There is more of a boozy New Orleans feel to "Chemical Sunset". Canadian singer Allison Russell lends her voice to it.
He is a little more energized when joining forces with Beck for "Death Valley High" This one sounds like Beck had the heaviest hand in the writing. It is almost disco. Noah Cyrus continues to set herself apart from her sister when she joins Peck on "How Far Will We Take it?" which makes this one of the album's best songs. Their voices work really well together. He covers the Magnetic Fields with Molly Tuttle. It works well enough. "Midnight Ride" is not as an unexpected turn as it sounds on paper when Kylie Minogue and Diplo collaborate with him. It does get dancey but disco and country music have coexisted in 70s.
YouTuber Teddy Swims does a guest spot on "Ever You're Gone". They do not have a ton of chemistry together and things go in a gospel direction that he would have done better to have enlisted Christ Stapleton for. But even the Temu version of Christ Stapleton can work. The argument for this kind of album can be made in the fact that Peck can hold his own with most singers, Elton John being the notable exception to this rule. Margo Price is a singer who makes more sense for this album, and she works well with him on "You're An Asshole".
Peck takes the reins on the songwriting to "Where Are We Now", though Mickey Guyton is pretty mediocre, she wants to be Shania Twain, and there are more interesting singers that would have been a better fit. Nathaniel Rateliff showed up with his own song that Pedk is just along for the ride for. But it goes back to my point that this is Peck showing he can hang with different kinds of singers. This is also another one of the album's strongest songs. When comes to a classic like Glen Campbell's "Rhinestone Cowboy" Peck would have been better off tackling this one on his own. TJ Osborne can sing, but Waylon Payne and Fancy Hagood, should not have been invited. Peck could have knocked it out of the park on his own, but some of the other voices falter. I will give this one an 8.5, while this is better than most of the pop country collabs that are coming out this year, it's really the Noah Cyrus song and "Back at Your Door" that makes it better than Yung Gravy's country album, which is a little disappointing for Peck whose work has been stellar up to this point.
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