With his Mark Knophler style smoky baritone voice with a cool, mellow delivery, Chris Rea puts together a dark semi-concept album with "The Road To Hell" that flows very smoothly with some of his best material of his career. Hard to believe this is the same artist that did the 1978 hit "Fool (If You Think It's Over)" as most of his career has taken place in the U.K. with very little exposure here in the U.S. Rea's tight band cooks very well with a bluesy assault throughout "The Road To Hell".

Though each song is enjoyable with the usual Rea wistful sentimentality, one song that stands out for all-time for me is the fantastic, smooth "Texas". This classic track starts out with Rea's mellow voice and dialog accompanied with a very enjoyable, keen vibe-keyboard rhythm groove backdrop as he "talks" to his wife to consider moving the family to Texas. The song eventually smoothly energizes with a tight Joe Walsh-like sounding/style bluesy guitar that again flows so smooth and is absolutely awesome. The state of Texas should be proud of "Texas"!!! You will enjoy this album!!!

I'm glad someone pointed out that this is a concept album with all the songs integrated as part of the same story. I hadn't really thought about that before. I know this was a darker Chris Rea album, especially after the celebratory Dancing With Strangers. But I enjoyed the difference. There is still a lot of musical diversity on this album, which was to be diminished with later, more heavily blues albums.
From the moody intro and brooding blues-rock of the title track, to the gentle appeal for a brighter day (Tell Me There's a Heaven), this is a strong, musically infectious album. In fact, both the opening and closing songs were included on Rea's "Best of," but there were other singles from Road inexplicably left off greatest hits compilations. Both Daytona and That's What They Always Say were released as singles in South Africa with some success.

I have been a CR fan for quite a few years. However, I found that many of his earlier works seemed to lack continuity. Even the so called 'BEST OF' compilations did not do much for me. This, however, could easily be described as a true best of CD. Every song is tight, and the songs all seem to flow into each other. I have played this CD over and over, since receiving it. 'Road To Hell' will be in my rotation for a long, long time to come. Attaboy Chris!!!

For me, this album marks the big watershed in Chris Rea's career. Everything he did beforehand seems to be leading up to this, and everything since seems to be falling gradually away (not without some merit, it might be said). In many ways, this album reminds me of a 'concept' album - the tracks all revolve around the same idea - basically the social decline in the UK in the late 1980s. Chris Rea takes up his theme with enthusiasm - there are songs about the M25 (London Orbital Motorway) being clogged with traffic (the title track), the TV news (You Must Be Evil) and the political and social scene generally (Looking for a Rainbow). Two song deal with escapism - 'Texas' - the idea of getting away from all the troubles, and 'Daytona' - more cars.

Musically, this album is excellent. True, the backing may sometimes leave a little to be desired, but Chris is a vituoso Slide Guitar player, and this album doesn't dissapoint. Also, very typically Chris Rea, the guitar is well integrated into the music - long introverted solos are not his scene.

The closing track deserves a special mention. 'Tell Me Theres a Heaven' is a totally over the top attempt to make sense of it all. In any other setting it would probably sound plain silly, but after all this seriousness it just about works, especially if you're a lover of happy endings.

Overall, this album is not without it's flaws - but that probably goes for most albums ever made. Ultimately, the positive things contained here more than make up for the flaws; I highly recommend this work.

I first heard the song "Tell me there's a heaven" and knew instantly that I had to have the CD. At that time, I had not ever heard of Chris Rea, and it was his voice alone, that first intrigued me to buy this CD. Chris's voice is chilling and the lyrics to this song and others have such content and speak volumes... If you are looking for music that is soft, soothing and also a little bit of rock & roll, I highly recommend this CD which is well worth the money.