James McMurtry is “Irate In Aught-Eight”

On “Just Us Kids” ( Lightning Rod Records 2008) James McMurtry sets his lyrical sights on George W. Bush and the war in Iraq and “Cheney’s Toy” is a direct hit. There’s only one way to interpret these lines:

“You’re the man
Show’em what you’re made of
You’re no longer daddy’s boy
You’re the man
That they’re all afraid of
But you’re only Cheney’s toy”

Other references to the “little cowboy” (“Ruins of the Realm”) and the “little President” (“God Bless America”) are only slightly more subtle jabs at Bush and his increasingly unpopular foreign and domestic policies. It isn’t all politics as James summarizes getting old in the title track “Just Us Kids” with the perfect lyrics: “It’s a damn short movie, How’d we ever get here” and relationships in the story-song “Ruby and Carlos.”
Ian McLagen on “Freeway View” (the best rock piano I’ve heard this year) and Jon Dee Graham’s hot guitar on “Fire Line Road” are two nice touches added by McMurtry on this self-produced disc.

I’m gonna miss No Depression magazine (R.I.P.) and no disrespect to their nominee for artist of the decade Buddy Miller but I’ll take James McMurtry as my artist/chronicler (St. Mary of the Woods/Live in Aught-Three/Childish Things and Just Us Kids) of the last eight troubled years .

01/20/09