“Cobirds sees him augmenting his songwriting with roots touches, completely on his own terms. The pedal steel guitar, cello, violin, and vibraphone sprinkled throughout lend a cinematic cast to the proceedings--as though Lee Hazlewood wrestled George Martin from the Beatles' production chair. And the intertwining of Wiloughby's boyish croon with Flotard's duskily angelic siren song of a voice casts an intoxicating spell...”

“You guys got somethin' goin' on.”

“I've been a Rusty Willoughby fan for a long time, from his mid-'80s power pop outfit Pure Joy to his most successful band, ironically named Flop, through to his most recent ensemble, Llama. Cobirds Unite is Willoughby's third solo album but in many ways it is unlike anything we've heard from him before. Press play and your reward is an hour of lush, reserved, alt-country dreamscapes, with languid waltzes, subtle bossanovas and pared-down ballads sweetened up with cello, vibraphone and pedal steel flourishes in all the right places...”

“Rusty Willoughby offers up a dozen superbly written, subtle-emotive lonely journeys on his new album Cobirds Unite. It is probably the best sounding roots-oriented album I have heard in some time, and that means a lot when you have a voice as sweet and true as Willoughby's, backing vocals from Rachel Flotard, cello from Barb Antonio, a bunch of great picking and playing on various instruments by (producer) Johnny Sangster, and Tilman Herb on violin, among others. If you listen to this without ever checking out the CV of the man in charge, you won't necessarily miss anything that's great about it, as these songs seem as crisp and forlorn as any put to post since the glory days of crossover. But Willoughby has earned his solid reputation regionally ever since he fronted Pure Joy in the mid-80s, and proves on the terse and tender "Crown Of Thorns," "Where are The Knives," and the title track on Cobirds Unite that he's not just hustling faux hillbilly hoodoo.”