Jamie O'Neal

Further proof that the success of Gretchen Wilson's debut is pulling more country out of yesterday's country-pop merchants. Aside from the cinematic ballad that's the title track, O'Neal's third album finds her surrounded by plentiful fiddles, pedal steel licks and an overall roadhouse appeal not on her previous recordings.

Middle America tells itself stories about normal life. The flourishes are too big and the musical colors too bright, the teller of tales a blonde looker who reaches out to heroic mommies and slaves of data entry and praises the company of girlfriends without abandoning her search for the perfect man. It's "like trying to find Atlantis," but somewhere in there she does. "I Love My Life," she concludes, and you can almost see how some normal person might. Not the truth--far from it. But not quite a lie. Probably because she's not middle-American at all. Australia--the promised land. (Grade - B+)