I’m admittedly not a fan of the last Sonny & The Sunsets album. I’ve followed, with baited breath, each evolution of Mr. Smith’s musical incarnation and the latest step down the path of my beloved country music just seems ill-fitting boring even. That said, Smith is an extremely talented, even prolific, musician and his, now, three volumes of made up bands doing made up songs is, even if you don’t like every single thing that’s on every single album, a pretty fantastic project. Vol. 3 brings back a lot of the old favorites (Earth Girl Helen Brown, The Fuckaroos, etc.) but the single is from Don Adora’e, a sort of twangy take on Creedence Clearwater Revival’s political rock ‘n’ roll. It’s low key and up beat and a great reminder if everything good that Sonny Smith is capable of.

100 Records : Volume 3 will be out on Polyvinyl, January 29th.