NO. 2 LIVE DINNER
(Sugar Hill)
A gift for storytelling runs through
Keen's
tragedies and comedies -- with both boasting
delicious undercurrents of danger. His keenest tales involve desperados without
all their marbles. Dead men walking are a recurring theme, from the
drug-and-dream-driven slayer in "Sonora's Death Row" to the dimwitted
chair-bound outlaw covering for his girlfriend in "The Road Goes On Forever"
(which Joe Ely and the
Highwaymen
have recorded). Opening the song is
Keen's
hilariously pitiful rap about actually meeting
Willie Nelson on
Keen's "first
date ever." Fondly looking at his own dysfunctional relatives, "Merry Christmas
from the Family" has become a holiday song for any and all seasons with its
sing-along hook. Like fellow Texans
Butch Hancock
and Jo Carol Pierce, Keen
writes far better than he sings. Bouncing from ballads to jaunty Western swing
to sizzling blues-guitar riffs, this colorful concert CD tastes like Texas
barbecue all the way.
-- Bruce Sylvester
(Robert Earl Keen plays
Johnny D's
next Thursday, May 16.)
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