Good songs that needed Rick Rubin 3 Out of 5 Stars
I really enjoyed Jakob Dylan's initial solo album, "Seeing Things." It was a stripped down affair, mostly Jakob with an acoustic guitar turning phrases with cutting skill and bolstered by Rick Rubin's usual zen master of a spartan production job. It was a perfect match. So it would seem that matching Jakob to another American Folk production master, T-Bone Burnett (who also produced The Wallflowers' breakthrough "Bringing Down The Horse") would be a good choice?
Women And Country
...Well, not so much. Where Rubin kept the proceedings airy and open, Burnett drenches good songs with thudding bass drums and the kind of mix he gave to "Raising Sand," an album I thought to be overrated. It makes "WnC" an album that could have been great, but now just sounds average. Given the talent on this disc, that's a major waste. Great songs like "We Don't Live Here Anymore," "They've Trapped Us Boys" and "Standing Eight Count" are buried under a sludge that just shouldn't be there. 
Don't get me wrong. There are some sublime songs on "Women and Country," and Neko Case is always welcome on anyone's album. She sounds great with Jakob on "Truth for a Truth." But where "Seeing Things
" was focused and direct, this album is ambient and meandering. I was hoping for more.
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