Diamond Mine | ||||
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Studio album by | ||||
Released | March 20, 1989 | |||
Recorded | 1989 | |||
Studio | Donlands Theatre Kingsway Studio | |||
Genre | Country rock | |||
Length | 60:35 | |||
Label | Risque Disque | |||
Producer | Malcolm Burn and Blue Rodeo | |||
Blue Rodeo chronology | ||||
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Review scores | |
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Source | Rating |
Allmusic | link |
Hi-Fi News & Record Review | A:1/1*[1] |
Diamond Mine is the second album by Blue Rodeo, released in 1989. It was recorded in 1989 at the Donlands Theatre in Toronto and mixed at the Kingsway Studio in New Orleans.[2]: 13 [3]: 560 It is the last Blue Rodeo album to feature original drummer Cleave Anderson and includes several instrumental interludes by Bob Wiseman on the majority of versions. Diamond Mine was the second best-selling Cancon album in Canada in 1989.[4]
The band had decided to work with Malcolm Burn on the album after hearing the album Red Earth by Crash Vegas, which had been formed a year earlier by singer-songwriter Michelle McAdorey and Blue Rodeo member Greg Keelor.[3]: 326, 558 They hired Burn in December 1988, and set up a temporary recording studio at the abandoned Donlands Theatre in the east end of Toronto for its "roomy acoustics", in part inspired by the acoustics of The Trinity Session by the Cowboy Junkies.[3]: 558–559 The recording was then mixed at the New Orleans studio of Daniel Lanois.[3]: 560
While touring to support the album in 1989, the band's manager John Caton quit abruptly as a result of a heart condition, effectively ending the label Risque Disque as well.[3]: 560 The band hired Danny Goldberg as their new manager.[3]: 561
Jim Cuddy states that of all the Blue Rodeo albums, Diamond Mine has the "most honest expression of musical interest".[3]: 559 Keelor has stated that in retrospect, the album has a "muddy, confused" sound.[3]: 559