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Trouble In Mind: Roadhouse Americana
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Hayes Carll’s voice is a scraped-up Texas rasp. The music on his third album, “Trouble in Mind” (Lost Highway), has cleaned up a little — it’s his move to a major label — yet still sounds like roadhouse Americana: plinking banjo in some songs, honky-tonk piano or rangy Rolling Stones guitars in others. And his songs are full of hard-drinking, hard-loving, hard-luck characters. But he’s no stumblebum in his songwriting. Behind the bleary delivery is someone who comes up with opening lines like “Arkansas, my head hurts/I’d love to stick around and maybe make it worse.” Although Mr. Carll is fond of self-destructive narrators, a few songs are kindly enough to be redone by slick Nashville types. But cautious country stars would never touch “She Left Me for Jesus,” a barroom shuffle carrying a jealous guy’s lament that “Last time we made love, she even called out his name.”
4/22/2008
