I finally reached one of my goals for this website and got my first batch of free CDs for review, thanks to the good people at Bloodshot Records. Don’t think any less of my journalistic integrity if I wind up only writing positive reviews. I’ve long been a fan of the record label and its stable of clever and nervy alt.country artists.
Perhaps the best record that I missed in 2004, “From the End of Your Leash” features the outsized sounds and ambitions of Bobby Bare Jr.’s Young Criminals’ Starvation League. A smart-ass songwriter in the finest Nashville tradition (his pop has dozens of Top 40 country hits to his credit), Bare Jr. is not afraid to let his masterful arrangements – complete with Stax horns and lovely harmony from Carey Kotsionis – compete with his frequently witty lyrics.
“Hey, brother, could I borrow your girlfriend?” he asks in the album’s opening line. “I promise not to ask her to stay.” Elsewhere, he tips his hat to his hometown, where “You don’t even have to sing on key / Producers with computers can fix it all in Nashville, Tennessee,” and plays at puppy love on the title track: “I look cute at the end of your leash / Your adorable beast / As I salivate on your shoes.”
I had the pleasure of seeing him live at Bloodshot’s BBQ at the Union Pool in Willamsburg, during the last CMJ. With his shock of curly hair and large rockstar sunglasses, he cuts a figure not unlike a young Bob Dylan. His warm personality, good humor and unique voice (the prettiest steel-wool-on-chalkboard you’ve ever heard) easily distracted the audience from free hot dogs and Rheingold for 50 minutes.
Bobby Bare Jr. will return to NYC on June 9, when he opens for alt.country’s ultimate smart-asses, the Old 97’s, at Irving Plaza. That’ll be the hot ticket for smart new music.
The good folks at Bloodshot also provided me with an advance copy of the newest Waco Brothers’ disc, “Freedom and Weep,” due out in August. It’s a much more straight-ahead rock-n-roll sound than their last disc, and it’s something to look forward to.