| With Jerusalem, Steve Earle stops pining for ghosts and gruffly makes his own claim to the agit-folk crown. (Remember how on 1997's El Corazón, he wished for the return of Woody Guthrie to a world sorely lacking voices of righteous dissent?) The controversial "John Walker's Blues" drew attention to Jerusalem and provoked the ire of many who misunderstood it, but it's only one of many topical tunes on a disc that issues a kind of call to arms: over the distorted guitars and garbage-bin drums of "Amerika v. 6.0" and in the spare and creepy satire "Conspiracy Theory", Earle rallies listeners to resist the corrosion of culture by consumerism, xenophobia and apathy. And as often with Earle's songs, several tracks offer sympathetic portrayals of folks on the margins: a Mexican migrant writes a letter home as organ chirps and guitars blaze through "What's a Simple Man to Do?" and in "The Truth" Earle's fuzzed-out drawl depicts life behind bars. Although nearly every moment of this ambitious album is laden with meaning, there's room enough for simple beauty--like the velvet voice of Emmylou Harris on "I Remember You"--and, more importantly, hope. "I believe there'll come a day," Earle affirms in the closing track, "when the lion and the lamb will lie down in peace together in Jerusalem." --Anders Smith Lindall |
