WE CAN BE THANKFUL that Meat Loaf lookalike Travis Tritt didn't enter stage left in his motorcycle - his drivin' Country Rock was enough to carry the capacity crowd to its logical conclusion of veering close to the edge. Not over, mind, but close enough to count...

Dressed in biker skin tight leathers, Tritt is hard he man Country with a soft heart for romance. Both he and his music fight the old C & W - battle of fake showmanship versus genuine sincerity but it would be fair to say that Tritt's honest honky tonk laments and bar room anthems sway the jury in his favour.

It's all down to approach, really. While he is in danger of losing his rootsiness for the cosyness of the Garth Brooks glitz, it's obvious that Tritt - despite the apparently unnecessary cover of The Eagles' Take It Easy and the unrehearsed embarrassment of Forty Shades Of Green - remains absolutely true to his rural, middle class, mid Seventies upbringing.

The slow songs are truly aching acoustic reveries that would haunt a ghost. The fast - songs are brawling pub shouts - that pack a residual punch. The youngest member of the Grand Ole Opry (Tritt was inducted in 1992) is also a clever, commercial tyke - he appeals to the crossover brigade as much as to the true blue C & W fan. A classic Country performer, in fact. Stetson hats off, then, to Travis Tritt.