Jay Farrar: Stone, Steel & Bright Lights : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

As a founding member of Uncle Tupelo in the late-Eighties, Jay Farrar helped define a new genre of American roots music that borrowed as much from rock & roll as traditional country. But in the time since dissolving the group, Farrar has become a folk troubadour whose songs are meant for the road -- full of post-modern poetry that reveal truths about the shape our lives have taken in an increasingly complex world -- and best suited for boozy late-night sessions on small stages off the beaten path. His first live disc, recorded at small venues across the south and midwest, is made up almost exclusively of songs from his solo releases and sounds as clean and warm as the original studio recordings. Among the nineteen tracks on the disc (which also features a live set on DVD from San Francisco), "No Rolling Back" and "California" get lush enhancement from Brandon Butler's melodic guitar licks. The poignant political insurrection of opener "Doesn't Have to Be This Way" dovetails nicely with the album-closing cover of "Like a Hurricane." And throughout, Farrar's recognizable, adenoidal alto burns brightly.