Home for Texas Country

Within the song cycle of innocence and experience that is Childish Things, James McMurtry continues to explore musical territory between rock and a hard place. The social commentary of the relentlessly bleak "We Can't Make It Here" and "Six-Year Drought" is more pointed than ever, while the arrangements throughout are as taut, muscular and slap-in-the-face direct as the songs. While the opening "See the Elephant," the title cut, and "Memorial Day" evoke a younger person's sense of wonder, the mortal lessons have plainly taken their toll by the closing "Holiday." Along the way, highlights range from the accordion-laced yearning of "Charlemagne's Home Town" to the Chuck Berry-style, guitar-driven rock of "The Old Part of Town" to a stirring duet with Joe Ely on "Old Slew Foot." With his terse, cut-to-the-bone artistry, McMurtry never wastes a word or a note. --Don McLeese

While Childish Things isn't an overtly political record, the centerpiece has to be "We Can't Make It Here," McMurtry's commentary on the current state of the union. "I've always been a little put off by activists. So you know it's a dire situation when I have to become one myself," he explains. McMurtry made the song available as a free download on his website during the 2004 election. The response to the track was immediate and overwhelming and the song continues to be one of the most requested on stations across the country. Stephen King described the song as "stark and wrenchingly direct, this may be the best American protest song since (Bob Dylan's) 'Masters of War.'" Childish Things marks the first time the track will be available on disc without FCC-sensitive words censored.

Traсklist:

1. See The Elephant

2. Childish Things

3. We Can't Make It Here

4. Ole Slew Foot

5. Bad Enough

6. Restless

7. Memorial Day

8. Six-Year Drought

9. The Old Part Of Town

10. Charlemagne's Home Town

11. Pocatello