Shooting Straight in the Dark is Mary Chapin Carpenter

Mary Chapin Carpenter

Mary Chapin Carpenter is an American folk and country music artist. Carpenter spent several years singing in Washington, D.C. clubs before signing in the late 1980s with Columbia Records, who marketed her as a country singer...

's third studio album. It was a #11 Country Album on the Billboard

Billboard (magazine)

Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...

 Country Albums chart. Four of its tracks became Billboard Hot Country Songs

Hot Country Songs

Hot Country Songs is a chart published weekly by Billboard magazine in the United States.This 60-position chart lists the most popular country music songs, calculated weekly mostly by airplay and occasionally commercial sales...

 hits: "You Win Again" at #16, "Right Now" at #15, "Down at the Twist and Shout" at #2, and "Going Out Tonight" at #14. Members of the Cajun band BeauSoleil

Beausoleil

BeauSoleil is an American musical group specializing in Cajun music. Based in Lafayette, Louisiana, the group members are brothers Michael Doucet and David Doucet , Jimmy Breaux , Billy Ware , Tommy Alesi , and Mitchell Reed .-Band history:Founded in 1975, BeauSoleil BeauSoleil (French, beautiful...

 provide guest instrumentation on "Down at the Twist and Shout".

Track listing

All songs written by Mary Chapin Carpenter; except where indicated

1. "Going Out Tonight" (Carpenter, John Jennings
   John Jennings (musician)
   John Jennings is an American musician: a guitarist, multi-instrumentalist, and music producer.Among his producer work are 8 albums by Mary Chapin Carpenter, as well as releases by Beausoleil, John Gorka, and Janis Ian...
   
   ) - 3:16
2. "Right Now" (Al Lewis, Sylvester Bradford) - 2:36
3. "The More Things Change" - 3:56
4. "When She's Gone" - 5:05
5. "Middle Ground" - 3:51
6. "Can't Take Love for Granted" - 4:01
7. "Down at the Twist and Shout
   Down at the Twist and Shout
   "Down at the Twist and Shout" is a single written and recorded by American country music artist Mary Chapin Carpenter. Released in June 1991, it was the third single from the album Shooting Straight in the Dark...
   
   " - 3:21
8. "Halley Came to Jackson" - 3:10
9. "What You Didn't Say" - 4:36
10. "You Win Again
    You Win Again (Mary Chapin Carpenter song)
    "You Win Again" is the title of a song written and recorded by American country music artist Mary Chapin Carpenter. It was released in 1990 as the first single from the album Shooting Straight in the Dark. The song reached number 16 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart and number 6...
    
    " - 3:59
11. "The Moon and St. Christopher" - 4:21
    • duet with Shawn Colvin
      Shawn Colvin
      Shawn Colvin is an American singer-songwriter and musician.-Childhood and early career:Colvin was born in Vermillion, South Dakota. Her formative years were spent in the town of Carbondale, Illinois, where she attended Southern Illinois University Carbondale. She learned to play guitar at the age...
      
      

Personnel

As listed in liner notes.

• Peter Bonta – keyboards
  Keyboard instrument
  A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument which is played using a musical keyboard. The most common of these is the piano. Other widely used keyboard instruments include organs of various types as well as other mechanical, electromechanical and electronic instruments...
  
  , piano
  Piano
  The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
  
  , acoustic guitar
  Acoustic guitar
  An acoustic guitar is a guitar that uses only an acoustic sound board. The air in this cavity resonates with the vibrational modes of the string and at low frequencies, which depend on the size of the box, the chamber acts like a Helmholtz resonator, increasing or decreasing the volume of the sound...
  
  , bass guitar
  Bass guitar
  The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....
  
  
• Jimmy Breaux – Accadian accordion
  Accordion
  The accordion is a box-shaped musical instrument of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone family, sometimes referred to as a squeezebox. A person who plays the accordion is called an accordionist....
  
  , Cajun yells
• Mary Chapin Carpenter – lead vocals, acoustic guitar
• Jon Carroll – piano, acoustic guitar
• Shawn Colvin
  Shawn Colvin
  Shawn Colvin is an American singer-songwriter and musician.-Childhood and early career:Colvin was born in Vermillion, South Dakota. Her formative years were spent in the town of Carbondale, Illinois, where she attended Southern Illinois University Carbondale. She learned to play guitar at the age...
  
   – background vocals
  Backing vocalist
  A backing vocalist or backing singer is a singer who provides vocal harmony with the lead vocalist or other backing vocalists...
  
  
• Mike Cotter – background vocals
• Don Dixon – bass guitar, background vocals
• Michael Doucet – fiddle
  Fiddle
  The term fiddle may refer to any bowed string musical instrument, most often the violin. It is also a colloquial term for the instrument used by players in all genres, including classical music...
  
  , Cajun yells
• John Jennings – electric guitar
  Electric guitar
  An electric guitar is a guitar that uses the principle of direct electromagnetic induction to convert vibrations of its metal strings into electric audio signals. The signal generated by an electric guitar is too weak to drive a loudspeaker, so it is amplified before sending it to a loudspeaker...
  
  , acoustic guitar
  Acoustic guitar
  An acoustic guitar is a guitar that uses only an acoustic sound board. The air in this cavity resonates with the vibrational modes of the string and at low frequencies, which depend on the size of the box, the chamber acts like a Helmholtz resonator, increasing or decreasing the volume of the sound...
  
  , bass guitar, synthesizer
  Synthesizer
  A synthesizer is an electronic instrument capable of producing sounds by generating electrical signals of different frequencies. These electrical signals are played through a loudspeaker or set of headphones...
  
  , background vocals, Cajun yells
• Marti Jones – background vocals
• Robbie Magruder – drums
  Drum kit
  A drum kit is a collection of drums, cymbals and often other percussion instruments, such as cowbells, wood blocks, triangles, chimes, or tambourines, arranged for convenient playing by a single person ....
  
  
• John McCutcheson – hammer dulcimer
• Mark O'Connor
  Mark O'Connor
  Mark O'Connor is an American bluegrass, jazz, country and classical violinist fiddler, composer and music teacher. O'Connor's music is wide-ranging, critically acclaimed, and he has received numerous awards for both his playing and his composition...
  
   – fiddle
• Dave Palamar – drums
• Herb Pedersen
  Herb Pedersen
  Herb Pedersen is an American musician, guitarist, banjo player, and singer-songwriter who has played a variety of musical styles over the past forty years including country, bluegrass, progressive bluegrass, folk, folk rock, country rock, and has worked with numerous musicians in many different...
  
   – background vocals
• Rico Petruccelli – bass guitar
• Matt Rollings
  Matt Rollings
  Matt Rollings is an American composer, musician and record producer. He plays piano, organ, and keyboards.Known mainly for playing in Lyle Lovett's Large Band, he has worked with many artists, not all country...
  
   – piano
• Vince Santoro – drums
• Billy Ware – percussion
  Percussion instrument
  A percussion instrument is any object which produces a sound when hit with an implement or when it is shaken, rubbed, scraped, or otherwise acted upon in a way that sets the object into vibration...
  
  , Cajun yells

Production

• Mary Chapin Carpenter, John Jennings - production
• Bob Dawson, Jim DeMain - engineering

Chart performance

Chart (1990)	Peak position
U.S. Billboard Top Country Albums	11
U.S. Billboard 200	70