For my birthday, Karen gave me three Kevin Johnson and the Linemen CD's (Memphis for Breakfast, Parole Music, and The Rest of Your Life). It should tell you something that this is the first time I've been motivated to actually write something on this blog even though I've had the opportunity to since the very beginning.
All morning I've been listening to these CDs and I just want to cry. Partially because some of these songs are just achingly beautiful, but primarily because the only chance I'll get to hear these songs live is if Scott McKnight or the boys of Last Train Home perform covers. And that is a crying shame.
I'm not sure if it's my mistaken impression, born of Eric, Scott and Bill being Linemen before moving on to the incarnations we know and love them in now, but I feel like Kevin Johnson is the grand-daddy of all the music Karen and I have come to love over the past ...what is it three years now? (My lord, that was a long sentence.) And these albums totally live up to that impression.
Parole Music is one of the best albums I've ever heard. It's beautiful and heartbreaking and brilliant. This album is everything that all of these other musicians we listen to are aspiring to be. The song The Killer Pillow could easily be a Karl Straub tune (this may be the highest compliment I could pay a songwriter). Stay in Trouble is an absolutely beautiful song, totally heartbreaking. The arrangements on all the songs are great. His lyrics are great. This album rules.
I feel like I did when I discovered Karl's music...totally awed and delighted and desperate for more. I wish I'd known when I saw Kevin at the Americana Motel release show at the Birchmere what a rare treat I was experiencing. Kevin -- please come back! I want to hear these songs live! You're breaking my heart!!!
Get your own copy: sam records