(Twangtone Records) The projects of inner city South Boston sounds like the least likely place from where you'd expect to find a honky tonk hero emerge, but that's exactly where Stan Martin is indeed from. You can check all pre-conceived notions at the door, because due partly to his mother's musical background and partly to her love of the music of Merle Haggard, Buck Owens and The Stanley Brothers, which nurtured her son's love of the music, Stan Martin and Cigarettes & Cheap Whiskey sound like they were lifted straight out of Bakersfield. Think the rockin' honky tonk side of Dwight Yoakam or Merle Haggard.

Stan also plays a pretty mean Tele, and has received raves from such Texas guitar slingers as Jesse Taylor and the late Eddy Shaver. He's far more subdued on it in the studio though, than he is live where he really cuts it loose. He's also a strong songwriter who really knows his way around a great honky tonker, and penned all 12 songs on Cigarettes & Cheap Whiskey.

Stan is joined in the studio by Tom Miller and Charlie Irwin on bass, Ducky Carlisle on drums, Tom Belliveau on pedal steel, Tom West on piano and 3B, Michael Peipman on trumpet, Amber Casares on harmony vocals...and speaking of Bakersfield and Dwight Yoakam, Dwight's longtime sideman, fiddle player Scott Joss shows up for 7 of the disc's tracks. And though Pete Anderson isn't credited with anything directly, he is thanked for his "generosity, studio time and inspiration."

Cigarettes & Cheap Whiskey blasts out of the gate with twangy Tele in the opening track, the rocking honky tonker "(Walking On) The Wild Side Of Life."  Actually, "Honky Tonk Fever" (another of the disc's tracks) dominates the album, with the shuffling Bakersfield sound of "Maybe Someday," "Thinking You're Wrong," "Because Of You," the outstanding high octane "I'm Leaving Town" and the bluesy grit of  "I Got The Roadhouse Blues." "Baby I'm Fine" is the marriage of Bakersfield honky tonk with some kitchy surfer rock

Stan slows things down in a few spots, though not by much, when he tackles songs of lost love. "Crying Over You," though slower, still shuffles. The outstanding "Don't Tell Me It's Over" has a haunting and soaring melody that sounds a bit retro, where Stan uses subtle tempo changes, and adds a touch of Mexican mariachi-like trumpet. "Forever Ended With You" is a shuffling waltz, and the only bona fide barroom weeper on the disc would be the emotionally aching, "Not On Me."

Stan has shared the stage with a long list of artists including Shaver, Jim Lauderdale, George Jones, Patty Loveless, Ricky Skaggs, Michael Nesmith, Wayne Hancock, Mojo Nixon, Little Jimmy Dickens, Charlie Pride, Loretta Lynn, Travis Tritt and Marty Stuart to name a few. Cigarettes & Whiskey is technically Stan Martin's second official release. His first was 2001's 5 song EP, Wicked Heart, that showed Stan to be more than ready to take the stage, front and center, on his own. Cigarettes & Cheap Whiskey more than proves it, and Stan Martin has delivered one of the most solid albums of well written and excellently performed honky tonk, this side of Bakersfield (and quite possibly even within Bakersfield itself).

www.stanmartin.net