Songs: Under The Influence Of Love, Ramblin' On My Mind, Way Back In The Hills, Fergus County Jail, He's Everywhere, The Lantern, Jenny Dear, You're Only Lonely, Willoughby Gap, Home In San Antone, With Body And Soul, Kissing The Blues Goodbye Personnel: Bob Amos -- guitar and lead vocals; Mike Lantz -- mandolin and tenor vocals; Ron Lynam -- banjo and lead vocal on Home In San Antone; Bob Dick -- bass and baritone vocals

From Colorado comes a hot bluegrass band that features four fine musicians, a talented guitar player who sings most of the leads and also writes a lot of their songs, tight harmonies, and a good mix of new and traditional bluegrass styles. For the uninitiated, the band described herein does not call themselves Hot Rize (though the adjective hot could easily describe them), they are called Front Range. And they recently released their fourth CD in five years which is titled Ramblin' On My Mind.

And ramble they do, in the positive sense of the word. They tour constantly, they won an IBMA award in 1995 for Best Gospel Recording for their CD called One Beautiful Day, they play all of the instruments on their recording, and this new CD was produced by leader Bob Amos. How and when he finds time to continue to compose some real nice new material (seven of the twelve songs on Ramblin' are his) is a mystery to this writer.

The first song on Ramblin' is an Amos tune called Under The Influence Of Love, and it describes the powerful addiction of that crazy little thing called love, something that most of us have been smitten by at one time or another. The second song is the title cut, and it was written by legendary bluesman Robert Johnson. It starts out bluesy though then it becomes a real hot bluegrass song (though it is interesting why Amos didn't choose one of his own songs as the title track). Way Back In The Hills is a very pretty Amos song about young love, followed by a sad song about a man's one fatal mistake called Fergus County Jail. Airtight Front Range a capella four-part harmonies abound on He's Everywhere, an Amos gospel offering. Jenny Dear is a love song featuring fabulous harmonies, and You're Only Lonely is a kick-butt bluegrass tune written by banjoman Ron Lynam and sung by Amos. Willoughby Gap is a Celtic-influenced instrumental with an eerie mood that was written by Amos, and it is the only non-vocal song on the CD. Then the band changes gears a bit with the Bob Wills western swing song Home In San Antone, sung by banjo player Lynam, followed by the Bill Monroe classic With Body And Soul, which displays the bluesy side of bluegrass. And finally there is Kissing The Blues Goodbye, a fast Amos number with more stellar harmonies that is an appropriate antidote to both the title track and the previous song, and which easily could have been the title of this recording.

Ramblin' On My Mind puts Front Range out front ahead of the pack when it comes to creating the right mix of new and original material. If they're not coming to a festival near you anytime soon you should ramble on over to your local bluegrass megastore and pick up a copy of Ramblin' On My Mind quick before they come out with another CD.