Gretchen Wilson

All the guys will love Gretchen Wilson and all the gals will worship her -- or be jealous as hell. Her debut is amazing in that she could very well be one of a handful of women ever to tackle outlaw country music. With gritty, hardcore redneck pride in her songs, Wilson would make Waylon Jennings and Johnny Cash proud.

"I'm an eight-ball-shooting, double-fisted-drinking son-of-a-gun," brags Illinois' Wilson. On
this debut, her vocals are just as brassy as her attitude, but she also proves you can be
sandpaper-raw and still be complicated. There isn't a wasted song on Here for the Party,
and there's no country persona she can't inhabit: Her hot-rod mama ("Chariot") and woman
scorned ("What Happened") are just as impassioned as her turns as moral arbiter (... More >

If not a true redneck woman, then an incredible simulation ("The Bed," "Homewrecker"). (Grade - **)