BTW, one of the cooler things I brought back from SXSW was a copy of
the new compilation of Charlie Burton's work, "One Man's Trash: The
Charlie Burton Story" (Bulldog Records).
The folks at Bulldog have done the service of collecting a lot of
very hard-to-find early Charlie singles (e.g., "Breathe for
Me, Presley!!") and other tracks (like the excellent honky-tonker,
"Spare Me the Details") and some older songs rerecorded recently etc.
For those of you who aren't familiar with him, Charlie is a
Nebraska native who for a few years now has been based in Austin.
His live shows are a lot of fun and he always has first-rate players
as his band. This comp. is a good intro to his older work (more pop
and garage elements than the current Charlie) and gives you a good
survey of his rootsy-yet-quirky-and-always-smartass style. If you
like that aspect of Robbie or Tim Carroll, you'd probably dig Charlie
too. Charlie, btw, is a master of the "endearing" smartass school of
songwriting, as opposed to the "irritating" smartass school, <g>. He
should really be much better known than he is, I've always thought,
and this little anthology is a pretty good place to start.
His recent "Rustic Fixer-Upper" album is more twangy overall, and
probably in the long run I'll listen to it more, but this compilation
is a nice look back at Charlie's early years.
--junior
