Billy Joe Shaver: Freedom's Child : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

When Billy Joe Shaver sings "What I'd give for a slice of yesterday!," you better believe he means it. But as much as Shaver might like to go back to the days of his small town Texas childhood for another taste of his grandma's apple pie, as fondly remembered in "Corsicana Daily Sun," or even just back to more recent times before he lost his grown son, wife and mother (all three passed away in the last two years), Freedom's Child is more about moving on than looking back. Though it lacks the roadhouse-shaking, rock & roll fire of the albums he recorded with his guitar hero son Eddy (like last year's epic The Earth Rolls On), Freedom's Child is full of life, spirit, hope and humor, not to mention some of the most moving songs this veteran honky-tonk poet has ever written. The beautiful, reflective opener "Hold On to Yours (And I'll Hold On to Mine)" is the obvious standout, but the similarly themed "We," the galloping title track (a poetic hymn to an unknown solider) and the rousing, fiddle-fried country romp "Wild Cow Gravy" are all worthy additions to the canon of one of America's best, albeit woefully under-recognized, songwriters.

RICHARD SKANSE
(November 19, 2002)