The Musical Box

Enforcing the fact that Just Us Kids is not kids stuff, singer/scribe James McMurtry sings an unendingly bleak story about crackheads living figuratively and literally in the middle of nowhere. Titled Fire Line Road, it’s sung from a female’s perspective - a neat trick since McMurtry’s clenched mumble sounds like a Texan version of Lou Reed. But there is such a sad, universal strain to the song that gender isn’t at all an issue. In the end, one of the addicts (”she ain’t as big as a minute, just skin on bone”) is numb to everything, even to the pain that has engulfed her.

As usual, McMurtry is among the keenest of literary songsmiths. For all the human detail of his songs, he doesn’t sentimentalize. The stories spiral down dark and often rural paths without coercion. Sometimes there’s a sense of black whimsy to his songs, as in the solitude that sweeps in like storm clouds on Hurricane Party (”there’s no one to talk to when the lines go down”). In other instances, like the roadhouse savvy Freeway View, desperation and lingering desire cloud a loner’s past and future (”I ain’t ever coming back to you; or then again, I might”).

McMurtry is on a roll with these songs. Aided by brisk electric support and some especially cool guests - like guitarist Jon Dee Graham, who fans the flames on Fire Line Road - Just Us Kids has more the feel of a rock ‘n’ roll record than the sort of folkie requiem one might expect from its heavily narrative song structures and thoroughly human storylines.

All told, though, you would have look back at the records John Prine cut in the ‘70s to find a songwriter who could pen tunes of such great emotive clarity and economy. The language McMurtry employs is detailed but simple. The music he draws upon is lean but arresting. McMurtry also doesn’t wring undue drama out of these songs as he sings them. His delivery, as usual, is understated. Almost distant.

That, of course, only enhances the smalltown restlessness that mutates into a lifelong dream of escape in Just Us Kids‘ title tune. First, the youthful protagonist says all he needs is a driver’s license to ”color me gone.” Years later, he promises he will bolt as soon as his divorce is finalized. In the last verse, escape is at hand once his own kid graduates (from what, we aren’t told). In the end, the pipedreams pile up as the “kids” spend life “watching their long hair turning grey.”

But then escape isn’t any prettier when it’s actually seized upon. In Ruby and Carlos, a romance is viewed fully in the past tense. Ruby works in a sheep camp with a busted hip, Carlos is a Gulf War vet (”the first Gulf War,” McMurtry specifies) playing dead end gigs as a Nashville drummer while a mystery sickness takes hold. “They don’t know why or they just won’t say,” McMurtry sings. “They don’t talk much down at the VA.”

Just Us Kids takes a political turn on God Bless America, a rockish, Warren Zevon-like requiem that reminds Green-thinking optimists of what it takes to fuel war, industry and modern life: “That thing don’t run on French fry grease. That thing don’t run on love and peace.” Cheney’s Toy is even grimier in the war report it issues: “We don’t need to know the answers. Long as we’re safe, just hit your marks and say your lines.”

With that kind of power in charge, life in a sheep camp almost sounds charming.

James McMurtry and Justin Townes Earle perform at 7 p.m. April 28 for the WoodSongs Old-Time Radio Hour at the Kentucky Theatre. Tickets are $10. Call (859) 252-8888.