Day 37: Willie Nelson - Red Headed Stranger

And now for something completely different...

I bought this classic album when I was in Texas (it seemed like it would make more sense listening to it there) after reading a history of the album in a Rolling Stone article.

A concept album about a roaming preacher who had done a bad thing (he killed his wife and her lover) and has gone on the lam, Red Headed Stranger is perhaps the strangest country western album ever. But man o man is it great.

Done in the form of a musical, Nelson wrote the whole thing (according to the lore in the article) on a road trip from California to Texas. The storyline, the songs, everything was recorded by his wife on a pad of paper as they drove through the night.

That's the way to write. The only song Nelson didn't write was the hit "Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain" which is a cowboy classic from the 1940's. It's a tremendous addition here. Willie Nelson sings it with soul and though it's just over two minutes long, leaves a lasting impression.

The story is great, the piano (by Nelson's sister Bobby) is a central instrument and you can smell the bar rooms where that kind of soulful piano is played. "Just As I Am" (the hymn) shows up a couple of times and fits right in.

The whole album was recorded in just under two days and helped start the outlaw country movement, which gives a little legitimacy to what is otherwise a bankrupt genre.

A classic with soul and a bit of dust on it.

5 stars

Day 36: Gin Blossoms - New Miserable Experience

The Gin Blossoms' first and finest album New Miserable Experience is almost the perfect college rock record. It played in dorm rooms for most of the 90's, no doubt in the late hours of the night and early hours of the morning as kids came back from the bars and concerts, or maybe that part-time job at Sears, the one they took to buy books or make that car payment.

It just rings with what it's like to be young and un-tethered. The introspection, the loneliness, the exhaustion of trying to figure it all out while still studying and working and trying to make sense of that relationship that is just not working out at all.

I know I felt it in college. It might have been the consistent lack of sleep or the classes telling me to question everything, but I was in a pretty good existential funk for four years and song like "Found Out About You" with it's ringing lead guitar figure and pleading vocals hit me in the sweet spot of the soul. This album sounds best with the lights off and the headphones on.

"Hey Jealousy" was the big hit and it really captures the vibe of not having anything else to do but drive around your small town all night and let the "cops chase you around". Robin Wilson has the perfect rock and roll voice and it fits the chime of this album perfectly. The jangle is present on the Byrds-like "Until I Fall Away" and the R.E.M. is fully embraced on "Alison Road", which is my favorite Blossoms song.

The Gin Blossoms captured something in Experience that they never were able to come close to again. Perhaps it was because so much of the album was written by Doug Hopkins, who struggled with alcoholism and who's tunes leak with a beautiful pathos. Hopkins died shortly after Experience hit big and the band has never really recovered; sort of like what happened to R.E.M. after Bill the drummer left. The chemistry just wasn't there anymore.

This albums still sounds sweet to me today, though I'm happy to be in a much better place in my head now. The last semester of college was the best one. But listening back on this makes me what to go order a pizza at two a.m. and put on my headphones.

5 stars

Day 35: Bruce Springsteen - Wrecking Ball

On the eve of the 2012 presidential election I wanted to go political to keep in the spirit of the times.

And those times are tired. 

This cycle of presidential politics has been brutal. It's not necessarily because the campaigns have been more negative than in the past (they really haven't, 2008 was insane), but because it has been inescapable. Social medial has come into it's own, and every other posting on Facebook is an election quip or snarky comment. You can't get away from it (unless of course you kill your television or your Internet, which might be the best idea I've had all day).

But then I see Bruce Springsteen out there and I know it's going to be okay. The Boss' music hits me right between the eyes, and I love it when he's fighting mad, like he is on Wrecking Ball. He admits to doing his best work when he's torqued off at some injustice, and boy is he ever on this album (which I think will be go down as being my favorite of the year).

"We Take Care Of Our Own" says it all and was born to be a theme song for the Obama campaign.
"Shackled And Drawn" is the best ho-down, accordion jamboree song about being "skint" since I don't know when. When a piece of art captures it's time that is a fantastic moment, and when Springsteen says "It's still fat and easy up on banker's hill, but down here in the lowlands we're shackled and drawn" you know that he has just summed up the second Great Depression with ease. Wall street gambles and Bill down at the factory gets canned. I think of my dad when I hear "Jack Of All Trades" and I sometimes have to hit the skip button. "Death To My Hometown" rocks like 1875 with Rage Against The Machine's Tom Morrello on crazy guitar and "Wrecking Ball" is a surprisingly poignant song about age considering it was written to commemorate the end of Giants Stadium in New Jersey.

A brilliant topical album that also rocks and catches a snapshot of our times.

What more can you ask?

5 stars



Day 34: Downhere - On The Altar Or Love

Canada's Downhere continue to prove themselves the "A" students of Christian Music, consistently turning in interesting yet accessible records year after year. Their new project, On The Altar Of Love, continues this streak. The album offers a musical stew that mixes the bombast of Queen and the driving rhythms of The Police and U2 with a few left field choices. Songs like the chirpy, 60's British pop of "Living The Dream" and the French Canadian folk music of the epic title track gives On The Altar Of Love a satisfyingly unique sound that is held together by the terrific voices and harmonies of lead singers Marc Martel and Jason Germain.

But it's the lyrics that earn this band its top grade. The album artfully examines the question of why believers do what they do, and that although we may not always understand God's ways, we can step out in faith because His love is always there "like the sun through shut eyes."

The combination of clever musical choices and deeply poetic and thoughtful lyrics makes On The Altar Of Love one of the best releases of the year and earns Downhere another "A" on their report card.

4.5 stars

Day 33: Bodeans - Go Down Slow

The Bodeans got their moment in the sun in 1995 when the prime time tv soap "Party Of Five" (starring a pre-LOST Matthew Fox) used "Closer To Free" as the shows theme song.

"Closer To Free" opens up the rootsy Go Down Slow and features a wonderful melody and a groovy accordion solo. This bouncy, catchy tune brought the Bodeans new notoriety and most likely a few new fans to their show.

The reality is that the Bodeans had been making fantastic roots rock and roll for almost 15 years at that point, and had even opened for U2 on the Joshua Tree tour, perhaps the most enviable opening gig ever.

But their follow up album to the U2 tour didn't set the world on fire and the boys  went back to selling out clubs and harmonizing in fantastic ways like "Idaho" and "The Other Side". These were both tunes that T Bone Burnett (The Counting Crows, Natalie Merchant, The Wallflowers) shined up and made ready for the radio.

The Bodeans are as true to the Midwest as John Mellencamp, but with a much better vocabulary and a higher sight than the former "Johnny Cougar". They consistently turned out great records, played inspirational live shows and sang their hearts out on every tune.

"Feed The Fire" is one of my favorites here and sounds like U2 circa Rattle And Hum.

I listened to the Bodeans all summer and their song "Only Love" and "That's What They Say About Love" were theme songs for me. It is all about love.

4.5 stars

Day 32: The Black Keys - El Camino

I drive a mini-van. It's not as old and beat up as the one on the cover of The Black Keys' fantastic album El Camino, but it will be someday, and I'll probably still be driving it.

They Keys, a two man band (augmented these days by a few more players) now regularly sell out places like Madison Square Garden, but years ago they traveled around in a mini-van, guitar and drums in the back and played any place they could.

Their sound (scruffy blues rock that sounds like it comes from a different era) has remained the same since those humble days, it's just the ampage has been turned up a bit. The songs have always been great.

"Lonely Boy" opens up the album in fifth gear and is as tuneful as anything the Rolling Stones did at their peak. Likewise "Gold On The Ceiling", which has a black gospel soul singer in the background that burns the house down. "Black Submarine" builds like "Stairway To Heaven", and in someways mimics that tune a little too much. But that is a minor complaint. Mostly this album rocks in my mini-van's stereo.

4.5 stars

Dau 31: Christ Tomlin - Arriving

We sing at least one Chris Tomlin song at our church every week. He has written so many great worship songs now that it's almost hard to keep track of them.

And that kind of the point with Tomlin. He doesn't want the credit. He is a humble guy and loves the Lord and just want to offer up songs for the church to sing.

It all sort of started with Arriving. "Holy Is The Lord" is a great song that I played two weeks ago with my church worship band on a Sunday morning. "How Great Is Our God" is the most sung worship song in the United States and possibly the world, and it will never get old. Time magazine said it's like "sticky white rice in your brain."

But my favorite song here is "Your Grace Is Enough". It's fun to play with a band, but the message cuts right through me. There is so much I think I really need down here; approval of men, a big bank account, accomplishments etc. But what I really need and crave for is God's love. All mankind does, we just don't know it. It's the "God shaped hole" that Pascal the mathematician talked about. We can try to fill the hole with all kinds of junk, but it is really the love and grace of God that fill us up and give us peace.

God's grace (shown best in His Son Jesus' death for us on the cross and subsequent resurrection) is enough for all of us. If we could just see this then we would stop striving and start both resting in God's love and loving our neighbor as ourselves.

Great batch of songs I know we'll be singing in Heaven someday.