music

Eli Young Band

Jet Black & Jealous

There’s lately been such a glut of practically interchangeable hard-rocking country bands from the Texas-Oklahoma area that it’s getting difficult to tell them apart. But before you consign the Denton, Texas-based Eli Young Band (named for frontmen Mike Eli and James Young) to the pile, give Jet Black & Jealous a fair listen. You’ll find a group that works from a broader emotional and musical palette than most of its brethren, and one that knows its wily way around a hook—just check out “When It Rains,” one of the most irresistibly catchy singles to inexplicably stall outside the Top 30 lately.

• October 6, 2008
• by Chris Neal