Coming two years after her smash The Way That I Am and her mind-bogglingly successful single, Independence Day, Martina McBride had nothing to prove -- except to the folks in accounting at her record company. Wild Angels continues her exploration of melding classic country influences and modern pop -- long before Shania Twain dreamed it -- in the same way (albeit in a radically different time and context) that Patsy Cline did 30 years earlier. Using the same production team of Ed Seay, Paul Worley, and herself -- with a literal boatload of engineers -- McBride and company assembled a fine collection of songs and performers, including the Band's Levon Helm and Ashley Cleveland on backing vocals, to deliver a powerful set that is her most consistent yet despite not having a single as memorable as Independence Day (but you only get those once or twice in a lifetime anyway, right?). Here there are many standout tracks, not the least among them being a rocking & rolling country version of Delbert McClinton's classic Two More Bottles of Wine that blows away Emmylou Harris' version and rivals McClinton's. In addition, there are a couple of Matraca Berg cuts, including the modern country title track and the soulful weeper Cry on the Shoulder of the Road. The Bunch/Stinson-penned You've Been Driving All the Time has that irresistible lead-in of acoustic guitars that gives way to compressed ringing electrics that underscore her voice so well and make the track a winner. But there aren't any weak moments here, and McBride proves for the third time that she not only is for real, but that she has the ability a lot of her peers don't to make consistently engaging, moving, and memorable music from album to album. That's an achievement. ~ Thom Jurek, Rovi

1		Wild Angels
2		Safe in the Arms of Love
3		Phones Are Ringin' All over Town
4		A Great Disguise
5		Swingin' Doors
6		All the Things We've Never Done
7		Two More Bottles of Wine
8		Cry on the Shoulder of the Road
9		You've Been Driving All the Time
10		Born to Give My Love to You
11		Beyond the Blue