XL CD REVIEWS

Bruce Springsteen, Drive-By Truckers, Bruce Robison

Boss' folkie turn can't overcome Dylan complex

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Bruce Springsteen

'We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions' (Columbia)

For all his hits, his legions of fans, his status as a live performer, some of the best-regarded albums in rock history and a career that's made him that rarest of animals, a rocker aging with dignity, Bruce Springsteen never quite got over Bob Dylan. (Literary critics call this "anxiety of influence.")

After all, Dylan's a fellow who knows something about futzing around with folk standards, which is what this odd little album does, with emphasis on the "futz." "Overcome" takes 13 such tunes, so standard as to be common coin by grade school, all of which have been sung by legendary folkie Pete Seeger, and gives them an acoustic big-band makeover. (What, he couldn't use the Asylum Street Spankers?)

Of course, Dylan had his own dad issues with Seeger, whose alleged involvement with trying to end Dylan's electric debut at the '65 Newport Folk Festival has been debated ever since. So think of "Overcome" as a earnest tribute to a distant, important granddad.

The sound is as shambolic as Springsteen gets: not an E Streeter in sight, live-in-the-studio, arranged on the fly and rehearsal-free. Songs such as "Old Dan Tucker," "Mary Don't You Weep" and "John Henry" — fleshed-out with banjo, organ, fiddle bass and way more — sound ready for Old Settler's Fest, or maybe over the end credits on "Deadwood." Nobody ever needs to hear the title track ever again, and Dylan's "Froggie Went a Courtin' " is still way weirder than the ramble here. Sorry, Boss.

--Joe Gross

---

Bruce Robison

'Eleven Stories' (Sustain)

It's tough to imagine that there are songwriters in Austin who would not want to be Bruce Robison, or at least a shorter facsimile thereof. Dude has it all: A songwriter's songwriter, he has earned commercial success putting tunes in the mouths of others, such as the Dixie Chicks' "Travelin' Soldier," a singer-songwriter wife (Kelly Willis, for you cave-dwellers) with her own loyal cult, the respect of his peers as a hitmaker and an artist and an ad for Claritin. Check and mate.

Memory and loss are the big themes here, with eight of the gentle "Eleven Stories" Robison originals. There's a reel called "Virginia" (no kidding) while likely-emphasis-track "All Over But the Cryin' " pairs Bruce 'n' Kelly against a relationship falling to pieces. A cover of the Grateful Dead's "Tennessee Jed" turns into a mellow jam, just as St. Jerry intended. Two of the strongest were written with Fastballer Miles Zuniga: The hero in the lead-off "Every Once in A While" thinks about an old flame without ever doing anything rash, the way most adults do, while "Days Gone By" is a detailed ode to bottoming out on the street. The latter is Bruce (and Miles) in full John-Prine mode. It's a good look. As Prine himself once noted, "Hung up on a sweet memory/I'm lost and I wish I were found." Bruce understands.

(Bruce Robison plays Saturday at the Broken Spoke.)

— J.G.

---

Drive-By Truckers

'A Blessing and a Curse' (New West)

One can sum up the Truckers' seventh album with the immortal words of Archie Bell: "This is the music we tighten up with." The band's previous hat trick — the career-defining "Southern Rock Opera," (2001), "Decoration Day" (2003) and "The Dirty South" (2004) — were Southern fictions equal parts Skynyrd and those Williams boys, Hank and Tennessee.

Now, gone are Patterson Hood's rambling story-songs about the trials of growin' up Southern. Indeed, there isn't much immediately Southern about these taut hunks of power pop and crunchy rock, mostly about good love, bad love and mad love. Hood's "Feb. 14" cranks like a long-lost Replacements demo, while "Aftermath U.S.A." staggers and reels like the Stones at their most decadent.

Sadly, there aren't enough songs from guitarists Jason Isbell and Mike Cooley, who have been writing at a peak for a few years. (Isbell might be the most egregiously slept-on rock songwriter in America; we await his long-promised solo album.) Isbell's thudding "Easy On Yourself" and soaring "Daylight" are highlights, as is Cooley's heartbreaking widower's lament "Space City." The three guitarists have never sounded better together; Cooley's craggy leads, Hood's chunky rhythms and Isbell's lyrical flourishes lock in perfectly. And no question "Blessing" is their most consistent album, but is consistency what we go to rock 'n' roll for?

— J.G.