Friday Five: Steve Earle

I was listening to some Townes Van Zandt this week, which usually leads to listening to Steve Earle.  As I did, I discovered Earle’s most recent album, So You Wannabe An Outlaw, released last summer.  I fell in love with a couple of the songs and thought he deserved a little spotlight here.

5. “Copperhead Road” (1988)
His most well-known song, so to speak, this single was the title track off his third album, a critically-acclaimed fusion of rock and bluegrass.

4. “The Devil’s Right Hand” (1988)
My favorite song off Copperhead Road, and the first song I ever heard by Steve Earle. The version below is a touch different than the album version, but it really captures the Van Zandt influence in him.

3. “Sometime She Forgets” (1995)
Earle is a drug addict, and this song is from his first album after getting clean, Train A Commin’. It’s folk, bluegrass, country goodness, made all the better by the inclusion of Emmylou Harris and a few other folks who joined him for the album.

2. “This City” (2011)
Earle played a role in David Simon’s short-lived HBO series Tremé. This song closed out the first season. Earle tells the story a bit in the below performance.

1. “Goodbye Michaelangelo” (2017)
This is the song I couldn’t get enough of this week. It’s from the album So You Wannabe An Outlaw, which is billed to Steve Earle & the Dukes. The album harkens back to the Highwaymen and the kind of post-60s music made by Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, and others. This song is beautifully recorded on a 1939 Martin D-28 guitar, something Earle explains in this other video.