One Step at a Time

by Thom Owens One Step at a Time continues the hot streak George Strait began with Blue Clear Sky. It's not on par with that latter-day masterpiece, yet equals its follow-up, Carrying Your Love with Me, by offering a uniformly excellent set of songs that are all delivered with conviction from Strait. If anything, Strait is getting better with age, as he's able to give even mediocre material nuanced, impassioned performances, which is a trick younger country artists need to learn if they're ever going to have a catalog as rich and consistently rewarding as his.