Music of the West
By Hugh McLennan
Oct-Nov 2009
 Alone Under the Stars
Mike Blair
Hosting moonlight rides at Miracle Ranch near Oakbank, Manitoba, inspires Mike’s songwriting. His influences range from cowboy singers such as Corb Lund and Michael Martin Murphey to traditional pop country kings such as Garth Brooks and Alan Jackson. Several songs stood out as I dropped this one in the CD player. The Land That I Love, Part 1 and 2, bring to mind the vistas of the horizon-wide vast prairies with lines like: “Not a hill for miles, big manure piles, this is the land that I love.”
The arrangements feature Mike on acoustic guitar and bass, Carl Strempler on acoustic and electric guitar, mandolin, bass and drums. Not all the songs are western-flavoured. There are up-tempo tracks including Ride This Train, a couple about lost love and a few romantic ballads. If I had to pick a favourite track it would be Quin McAdam. As Mike writes: “He learned to ride before he learned to walk, and you’d sit there for hours just to listen to him talk.”
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