Easy Tiger
RYAN ADAMS
(Lost Highway)
One of the most prolific songwriters of his generation, alt-country golden boy Ryan Adams has been a source of frustration for many fans. Come on, dude, who wants to buy three bloated albums by anyone in the same year? And then there were those silly forays into hip-hop posted on your website. What was up with that?
Adams established himself as the next Neil Young with his evocative 2000 solo debut Heartbreaker. And then he betrayed his talent by releasing what seemed to be every scrap of material that popped into his head. (Come to think of it, Young has pulled similar stunts over the years.)
Now, finally, a deserving follow-up to Heartbreaker. After years of stretching himself too thin, Adams has settled down and made a gorgeous, filler-free, country-rock album that ranks closely with such sublime fare as After the Gold Rush.
Whether rocking out or emoting over weeping pedal steel, Easy Tiger crackles with poignancy from start to finish. Women ease in and out of the singer's life, leaving their impression, leaving him with heartache and songs. A sadness courses through much of the material, but rays of hope peek out of the gray skies before the scene gets too bleak. "Let go of the worry," Adams sings. "There's so much nobody understands."
The CD clocks in at less than 40 minutes, and that's just fine. Like those classic country-rock albums of the late 1960s and early 1970s, one can actually listen to Easy Tiger in its entirety without ever once feeling the need to hit the skip button. Pressed for standout tracks, I'll go with the twangy album opener "Goodnight Rose" (which is quoted above), the pop beauty "Two Hearts" and "Halloweenhead," a tortured, crushing rocker about learning the hard way how to just say no. 4 stars —Wade Tatangelo
The Essential Jaco Pastorius
JACO PASTORIUS
(Epic/Legacy)
There's a short list of musicians who effectively rewrote how their instrument was played — Louis Armstrong, Gene Krupa, Charlie Parker, Jimi Hendrix, (feel free to argue over others) — and the late electric bassist Jaco Pastorius is most certainly in their number. He turned the Fender Jazz bass into an amazing machine, wrenching rich and gorgeous sounds from it, dancing fingers over the frets with the dexterity of a lead guitarist. His gurgling tone — aping an upright but with more bite — became one of the most recognizable sounds in all of jazz. More than anything, Jaco made you sit up and take notice of the bass. This two-disc set is the best-ever retrospective of the enigmatic and troubled artist, whose increasingly erratic behavior (blamed on bipolar disorder) led to him being beaten to death by a bouncer in a South Florida after-hours club in 1987. Essential begins with a generous seven-song helping from Jaco's eclectic 1976 solo debut, kicked off by a version of Parker's "Donna Lee" (backed only by conga player Don Alias) that will certainly make the uninitiated go, "What the…?" The comp goes along to include material by Pat Metheny ("Bright Size Life"), Herbie Hancock ("4 a.m."), three tunes with Joni Mitchell and a few tunes from Jaco's somewhat ill-fated big-band phase toward the end. Best of all, Essential contains 10 Jaco-centric tunes from his tenure with Weather Report ("River People," "Punk Jazz" and "Teen Town" among them), where he made his strongest musical mark. 4.5 stars —Eric Snider
Big Dog Daddy
TOBY KEITH
(Show Dog Records)
The richest faux outlaw in country music seems to be riding on cruise control — not that album sales would indicate as much. The second Keith CD to be released on his own Show Dog Records, Big Dog Daddy immediately hit No. 1 on the country surveys and debuted atop the Billboard overall album chart — a rare feat for even Nashville's elite. But the record lacks anything that's either boot-in-your-ass controversial or let's-have-another-round pleasing. A cover of Fred Eaglesmith's "White Rose," which is about the full-service filling stations the songwriter recalls from growing up in Canada, does tug at the heartstrings. And to Keith's credit, he gives the song a sensitive reading. Perhaps being one of the rare country music stars who writes the vast majority of his own material is taking its toll. Big Dog Daddy lacks any Keith originals that come close to matching such memorable hits as "How Do You Like Me Now?" "As Good As I Once Was" or that politically incorrect hoot "Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American)." 2 stars —WT
This article appears in Jul 18-24, 2007.