Steve Earle Albums (19)
What The Critics Say
In his brief liner sketch on this album of Townes Van Zandt covers, songwriter Steve Earle writes: "I always read everything Townes told me to read. All of us did; we who followed him around, or simply bided our time in places along his migratory path, for we were indeed a cult, in the strictest sense of the word, with Townes at its ever shifting center." While what it was he read isn't worth spoiling here, it's the last part of that long sentence that really matters. Van Zandt inspired a cult, and an even bigger list of pale imitators. Earle may lionize the man and the artist (hence the tribute record), and may have even begun as an imitator, but he became something else entirely -- an iconoclastic (and iconic) artist and producer in his own right who can interpret these songs as such. Van Zandt may have indeed been Earle's "schoolmaster," but it's Earle who does Van Zandt's artistic legend justice in these 15 diverse, yet stripped down performances of his songs. Many of the choices are obvious: "Pancho and Lefty," "To Live Is to Fly," "White Freightliner Blues," "Delta Momma Blues,"and "Don't Take It Too Bad" among them. Some would be less so, save for an artist of Earle's particular vision and world bent: "Mr. Mudd and Mr. Gold," "Rake," "Marie," "Colorado Girl," and "(Quicksilver Daydreams Of) Maria." That said, none of these arrangements are predictable, and yet all of them work. Earle's approach is very basic with some interesting twists and turns. Acoustic guitars, upright basses, mandolin, Dobro, banjo, fiddle, and mandola sit alongside electric guitars (thanks to Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello) and basses, harmonium, and effects. The distorted blues harp and hand percussion on "Where I Lead Me," is an excellent touch, but the megaphone vocals, ambient and feedback noise, and drum loops and electric guitar crunch on "Lungs" make it sound more like Black 47 covering Van Zandt. The reverb and loops on "Loretta" juxtapose beautifully against the acoustic guitars and the fiddle. The version of "Marie" is less harrowing than its author's; it feels more third-person narrative than first-person horror story -- thank goodness. "White Freightliner Blues" captures the free-in-the-wind bluegrass nature Van Zandt intended, perhaps more so than his own world-weary delivery, thanks in large part to Tim O'Brien's mandolin, Darrell Scott's banjo, and Shad Cobb's fiddle. Earle would have had a hard time blowing this record. Certainly, he's closer than most to the material as he was to the man, but more than that he's a great songwriter and an avid folk music enthusiast. He understands lineages and the way the tales get told matter in order for them to live on. That's the easy part; the more mercurial thing is how well he succeeded. Earle made Townes' songs seem like an extension of his own last album, 2007's Washington Square Serenade. The same anything-goes-attitude, the adherence to all kinds of folk music, whether it's from across oceans, terrains, or alleyways, whether its roots are rural or urban, permeates this recording, making it an Earle record most of all; and that is about as fitting a tribute as there is to Van Zandt. ~ Thom Jurek, All Music Guide
'Washington Square Serenade'
Release Date 9/25/2007
Tracks 12
Label New West
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What The Critics Say
New York City has long been more than America's biggest and most fabled city -- it's a place that symbolizes fresh starts and new opportunities, and there are scores of songs and stories about folks pulling up roots and heading to the Big Apple in search of a better and more exciting life. Steve Earle wrote one such song on his 1997 album El Corazón, "NYC," in which a nervy kid from Tennessee hitchhikes to Manhattan because "there must be something happening, it's just too big a town," and a decade later Earle followed him, moving to New York to escape Red State malaise. Washington Square Serenade, Earle's 12th studio album and first in three years, deals in part with the sights and sounds of his new hometown, from the red-tailed hawk that lives in Central Park ("Down Here Below") to the multilingual chatter of the streets ("City of Immigrants"), while also taking a look back at the home he left behind on tunes like "Oxycontin Blues," "Red Is the Color," and "Jericho Road." While there's a strength in the familiar textures of the songs where Earle remembers Tennessee, there's a welcome sense of rejuvenation in the album's first half as he shares the details of his adventures in New York (which also includes a new bride, Allison Moorer, who lends lovely backing vocals to these sessions and is the presumable inspiration for "Sparkle and Shine" and "Days Aren't Long Enough"), and the expressionistic imagery of "Down Here Below" and "Satellite Radio" works beautifully in this context. After producing his last few album himself, Earle turned those chores over to Dust Brother John King for Washington Square Serenade, and King brings a welcome collision of the traditional and the contemporary to the music, facing scratchy drum loops against mandolins and dobros while letting a folky simplicity carry the day when it best suits the song, and the sound is crisp and forceful throughout. Washington Square Serenade ultimately sounds a bit less focused than its immediate predecessors, the politically minded Jerusalem and The Revolution Starts...Now (despite the presence of "Red Is the Color" and "Steve's Hammer"), but it also finds Earle trying out some new tricks both as a performer and a songwriter, and it's exciting and encouraging to hear him exploring fresh turf after two decades of record-making, and there's lots of fine music to be had on this set. ~ Mark Deming, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Steve Earle delivers a solo acoustic set on this live disc, recorded during an appearance at the 2005 Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland. There are already a handful of Steve Earle live albums on the market (most notably 2003's Just an American Boy), and Live at Montreux 2005 doesn't add much to his repertoire; while Earle is a captivating live performer on a good night, he works best with a band behind him, and the "one guy with his guitar" format of this recording doesn't show the man to his best advantage. Earle doesn't do himself any favors in this regard with his set list, playing several songs that don't fare especially well with only an acoustic guitar to prop them up, in particular "Condi Condi," "What's a Simple Man to Do," and "The Revolution Starts Now." Perhaps aware that he was performing for an audience not fluent in English, Earle holds back on the between-song stories that add so much to the flavor of his live shows (or perhaps they were just edited out for CD release), and though Earle is in good voice on these songs, he doesn't seem to hit fifth gear on this set -- this doesn't catch fire the way a good Steve Earle show does. Still, the man is one of America's best living songwriters, and the high points here not only show how great his work can be but the care and intelligence with which Earle can tell his stories, and hearing him sing "Ellis Unit One," "The Devil's Right Hand," and "Jerusalem" is a treat. Royal fans will enjoy Live at Montreux 2005, but other folks interested in a Steve Earle live set would do better to try Just an American Boy instead. ~ Mark Deming, All Music Guide
'Live From Austin TX'
Release Date 11/2/2004
Tracks 17
Label New West
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What The Critics Say
Steve Earle wasn't yet one of the most respected, intelligent, and controversial voices in Nashville when he stepped on-stage for a taping of the long-running public television series Austin City Limits in the fall of 1986 -- back then, he was a promising newcomer who was touring behind his well-received debut album, Guitar Town, and was recording the follow-up in fits and starts when he had downtime from the road. Live from Austin TX, part of a series of CD and DVD releases from the rich Austin City Limits archive, captures Earle when his confidence and stage smarts were not quite what they would be later on, and though there are more than a few great songs in this set, many of the tunes that would become cornerstones of his later live show (especially the mature work from his post-"vacation in the ghetto" period) haven't been written yet, and frankly this edition of the Dukes wasn't the strongest he would ever have. But Earle's energy and enthusiasm is well in evidence on this set, his voice is in solid shape, and the performance builds up a solid head of steam as it chugs through a solid 17-song set. Live from Austin TX is hardly the definitive Steve Earle live album, but it's a fine snapshot of a major artist as he was first getting accustomed to the spotlight, and the talent, swagger, and conscience that would mark his best known work are all in evidence here, even if they haven't yet reached sharp focus. ~ Mark Deming, All Music Guide
'The Revolution Starts...Now'
Release Date 8/23/2004
Tracks 11
Label Rykodisc
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What The Critics Say
Nine years after he returned to active duty in music following a four-year "lost weekend" brought on by drugs and a stay in jail, Steve Earle is not only a stronger and more prolific artist than ever, but he's become nearly as well known for his outspoken political activism as he is for his music. Given this, it's appropriate that The Revolution Starts...Now sounds like a sequel to his previous studio album, 2002's Jerusalem. While Jerusalem explicitly dealt with the fear, paranoia, and political malaise that gripped America after September 11, 2001, The Revolution Starts...Now picks up as America finds itself stuck in an ill-conceived war in Iraq, with a presidential election looming on the horizon. The songs that explicitly deal with the Iraq war are the album's highlights, especially the high-spirited "Home to Houston" (which manages to find a glimmer of humor in its tale of a Texas boy driving a truck on the front lines) and "Rich Man's War" (which speaks of soldiers who find themselves holding the short end of the stick on both sides of the national divide); Earle's storytelling sense meshes well with the chaos and futility of battle, and he shows a genuine compassion for the regular guys who do the work for the power brokers who set up the war. Somewhat less effective is his (apparently) facetious proclamation of lust for Condoleeza Rice ("Condi, Condi," which goes on longer than it needs to and proves reggae isn't Earle's strong suit) and "F the CC," a solid bit of hard rock ranting that somehow seems to lose its point along the way. But the title tune (which bookends the album in two versions) is a loud-and-proud anthem of hope and change that's powerful election year listening, and Earle and his band -- Eric "Roscoe" Ambel on guitar, Will Rigby on drums, and Kelly Looney on bass -- tear into these songs with the enthusiasm and aggression of a hungry man attacking his breakfast. And while Earle likes to joke that he's put a moratorium on songs about girls, "I Thought You Should Know" is a lean and powerful meditation on jealousy and love gone bad that's a welcome change of pace in this context. The Revolution Starts...Now isn't up to the standards of the less theme-specific I Feel Alright or El Corazón, but Earle's polemics are much stronger than the work of your typical "protest" songwriter, and this is a better focused and more passionate work than Jerusalem, though one somehow doubts that the man who needs to hear this the most, George W. Bush, will be putting this on his stereo anytime soon. ~ Mark Deming, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Steve Earle subtitled his 2003 live album Just an American Boy an "Audio Documentary," which may be a bit more grand than it deserves, though in all fairness an awful lot had happened with Earle in the 12 years since his last live album, Shut Up and Die Like an Aviator (recorded shortly before Earle's drug habit bottomed out both his career and his personal life for several years), and a lot was going on with him at the time this show was recorded. Always free with his opinions, Earle's 2002 album Jerusalem, which was written and recorded in the wake of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on America, featured a song about "American Taliban" John Walker Lindh, and soon Earle was being denounced as a traitor by right-wing commentators faster than you could say "Dixie Chicks." As Earle himself puts it on this album, recorded on the tour supporting Jerusalem, "Things have been really f*cking weird down South, and they're gonna get even weirder," and he uses much of Just an American Boy to spotlight the progressive political slant that has long been a part of his songwriting, ranging from his moving anti-death penalty ballad "Billy Austin," the labor anthem "Harlan Man," and his call for new people's heroes in "Christmas in Washington" to a venomous screed against "compassionate conservatism," "Amerika V. 6.0 (The Best We Can Do)." While Earle mounts a soapbox through much of this set, his political views fortunately don't take a back seat to his skill as a songwriter, which remains razor sharp, or his vocals, which are craggy but emphatic on these recordings, with Earle and his band (including Eric "Roscoe" Ambel and Will Rigby) revving up a potent head of steam throughout. And Earle still knows a good song and a good laugh on the apolitical side of things, as witnessed by "I Remember You," "Ft. Worth Blues," and his stories about encountering square-headed cowboys named Otto in Schertz, TX. The last time Earle recorded a live double, his voice was about to give up on him and he was running on fumes; Just an American Boy finds him strong, defiant, eager to take a stand, and playing like a man half his age. Maybe that doesn't merit an "Audio Documentary," but it's pretty inspiring, and makes for good listening, too. ~ Mark Deming, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Say what you will about him, but Steve Earle has never been afraid of getting people mad at him if he thought it was the right thing to do, and since his mid-'90s career rebirth after overcoming multiple drug addictions, Earle seems far more interested in stirring people up with a productive purpose in mind rather than cheesing folks off just for the hell of it. Like nearly everyone in the United States, Earle was struck with anger and confusion following the events of September 11, 2001, and his thoughts on the subject form the backbone of his album Jerusalem. But instead of an appeal to patriotism or a tribute to the fallen, Earle has crafted a vision of America thrown into chaos, where the falling of the World Trade Center towers is just another symbol of a larger malaise which surrounds us. Before its release, Jerusalem already generated no small controversy over the song "John Walker's Blues," which tells the tale of "American Taliban" John Walker Lindh as seen through his own eyes. While "John Walker's Blues" is no more an endorsement of Lindh's actions than Bruce Springsteen's "Nebraska" was a tribute to mass-murderer Charles Starkweather, even though it's one of the album's strongest songs, if anything, it doesn't go quite far enough. While Earle's thumbnail sketch of how an American boy could find a truth in the words of Mohammad rings true, it never quite explains making the leap from studying Islam to taking up arms thousands of miles from home. Still, it's makes the point that the issues of our new "war on terrorism" are as relevant to our own backyards as the Middle East. As Earle tries to sort out the hows and whys of our news fears in "Ashes to Ashes" and "Conspiracy Theory," he can't help but think of other evidence of the erosion of the American dreams -- the growing gulf between the rich and the poor ("Amerika V. 6.0 (The Best We Can Do)"), the flaws of our judicial system ("The Truth"), illegal aliens chasing their own bit of an increasing elusive prosperity ("What's A Simple Man to Do"). Earle asks a lot of questions on Jerusalem for which no one has the answers, but for all the rage, puzzlement, and remorse of these songs, the title track closes the album with a message of fervent hope -- that the answers can't be found in hate or violence, but peace and forgiveness. Jerusalem is the work of a thinking troublemaker with a loving heart, and while more than a few people will be angered by some of his views, Earle asks too many important questions to ignore, and the album is a brave and thought-provoking work of political art. ~ Mark Deming, All Music Guide
'Together at the Bluebird Cafe'
Release Date 10/9/2001
Tracks 20
Label American Originals
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What The Critics Say
Steve Earle, Townes Van Zandt, and Guy Clark had a lot in common as revered Nashville singer/songwriters on the fringes of the country music industry, which made this gig at the famed Bluebird Café in Nashville, a benefit for the Interfaith Dental Clinic, an impressive lineup. Recorded September 13, 1995, it was an old-fashioned guitar pull, with each performer alternating as his fellows pitched in with a little guitar playing and encouragement. That's as much as they got together, however; there are no actual duos or trios on the disc. It does seem that Clark is singing along a little bit on Earle's "Mercenary Song," though, and an unidentified voice that sounds a lot like Emmylou Harris applies some harmony on Clark's "Immigrant Song" and Earle's "Copperhead Road." The performances are off the cuff to the point of being more like a casual get-together than an actual concert. Van Zandt, whose songs are the most depressing (and that's saying a lot), is the funniest, especially discussing his own dental needs in the light of losing a tooth in a dice game. He also goes up on the lyrics to "Pancho and Lefty," which doesn't keep it from being as amazing a song as ever. In fact, the songs just seem to get better and better as these three rough-hewn craftsmen demonstrate their remarkable abilities. Those who know their work will delight in hearing favorite songs in an intimate live setting; those who do not may be introduced to a world of great songwriting. ~ William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Steve Earle is a rebel. Not in the Hollywood/James Dean/Easy Rider/rebel-against-society sense, but rather in a real and personal way. Throughout his life and career he has rebelled against the very industry that surrounded him and did not find the freedom he sought until he started his own label, E-Squared. He rebelled against his common sense and his health in search of true American artistry and did not find the freedom he sought until he hit the bottom of addiction, and he continues to rebel against mainstream American culture and politics with his attitudes and songs; Transcendental Blues is no exception. Transcendental Blues walks the line between Steve Earle the country-rock rebel who gave the world Copperhead Road and Guitar Town and Steve Earle the traditionalist who opened a new chapter in bluegrass with his last release, The Mountain. This album rocks with songs like "Everyone's in Love with You" and "All My Life." It soothes with "The Boy Who Never Cried" and "Lonelier Than This," and it two-steps with new country like "The Galway Girl" and "Until the Day I Die." Fans of alternative country music sing the praises of artists like Charlie Robison, Jack Ingram, and Robert Earl Keen, Jr., but Earle proves again and again that he is the original alternative to the glossy side of Nashville. Earle cut the path that all his followers thankfully hike along, avoiding the weeds and branches that made him what he is today. ~ Michael Cusanelli, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
On The Mountain, Steve Earle has teamed up with one of the very finest bluegrass ensembles around, the Del McCoury Band. All 14 of the songs here were written by Earle, who confesses in the liner notes that his dream is to create a timeless bluegrass classic that will live on like Bill Monroe's "Uncle Pen." Well, he might very well have attained his dream. Each of the songs on The Mountain holds its own particular charm, and there isn't a loser in the bunch. "Carrie Brown" could have come from the very pen of "the father of bluegrass" himself, Monroe, and "Connemara Breakdown" has plenty enough fury to carve its own niche in the bluegrass tree. Outstanding performances from talented artists abound: there are the vocals of Emmylou Harris and Iris DeMent, the Dobro of Jerry Douglas and Gene Wooten, some smoking Sam Bush mandolin, and the fiddle fire of Stuart Duncan, all wrapped around these instant classics and played straight from the heart. Marty Stuart, Gillian Welch, and John Hartford all drop in to embellish the sound as well. Anyone who saw Earle perform with the McCoury Band was anxiously awaiting a CD, and with The Mountain, the wait is over. The smooth strains of "Pilgrim," with its unparalleled roster of guest artists, fills the room, and everything in the world seems just a little bit happier. Steve Earle has truly gone to the mountain and had his vision quest answered in the unmistakable tones of a Dobro, a banjo, and a guitar. Some good ol' American music, right from the peak of the mountain. ~ Michael B. Smith, All Music Guide
