James McMurtry:  "We Can't Make It Here"

New Song about the Status Quo in Everyman's America.

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Rock & Roots or Roots & Roll, whatever you want to call it we challenge you to find a description that fits other than good music you can count on when you thought maybe you just couldn't count on music anymore!

With "We Can't Make it Here', James McMurtry touches a homegrown nerve especially to all those veterans who are coming back to jobs that are just not there for them.  

"Vietnam Vet with a cardboard sign, Sitting there by the left turn line, Flag on the wheelchair, flapping in the breeze, One leg missing, both hands free, No one's paying much mind to him. The V.A. budget's stretched so thin, And there's more comin' home from the Mideast war We can't make it here anymore"

James McMurtry is one artist who has earned his solid singer/songwriter/guitarist reputation. Critics, peers and music aficionados have long praised him as being among the strongest songwriters of his generation. His works, which range from atmospheric ballads to no-holds-barred rockers, are populated by world-weary souls often longing for something different, if no better, than what they're now enduring. Perhaps in part because of his powerful reputation as a lyricist, coupled with his stirring vocal style, McMurtry is often not given his due as a guitarist.

Though not one to stoop to flash just for the sake of effect, he can rip forth with a flurry of fat-toned notes when the material demands it. In the next breath, he'll frame a tender composition with poignant lead lines. He tends to travel with half a dozen or so guitars, which offers him a wide palate of tones and tunings from which to choose.

The Heartless Bastards (not to be confused with the Ohio-based Fat Possum recording artists of the same name) are McMurtry's rhythm section of nearly a decade. McMurtry's Bastards include bassist/harmony vocalist Ronnie Johnson and drummer Daren Hess. The trio's sets have been honed to Bowie-blade sharpness by their demanding touring schedule and their steady hometown gigs in Austin, Texas. Johnson and Hess are journeymen musicians in their own rights, sharing decades of solid band time between them.

James Lawrence McMurtry was born in Fort Worth, Texas on March 18, 1962. He grew up primarily in Leesburg, Virginia, a place he describes as being neither truly northern nor southern in nature. He was still a child when he saw revelatory concerts courtesy of Johnny Cash and Kris Kristofferson. McMurtry also cites Little Feat and The Band as being among his early influences.

To read more about the author's Texas music based literature, visit www.lebrady.com. Read Brady's recent interview with McMurtry. 

Given his first guitar at the age of seven, McMurtry soon dedicated himself to mastering the instrument. He was writing song fragments by his mid-teens. While studying English and Spanish at University of Arizona in the '80s, he began his songwriting in earnest. In Tucson, he played with a loose affiliation of musicians and started his performance career as a soloist at the Sawmill Café, an Old Pueblo beer garden. After traveling a spell and earning his keep painting houses, tending bar and dabbling in acting, McMurtry found himself back in Texas, working in San Antonio's entertainment district. His first national recognition came in 1987 when he garnered an award in the New Folk songwriting category at the Kerrville Folk Festival.
McMurtry's novelist/screenwriter father, Larry, passed his son's demo tape to Indiana rocker John Mellencamp when the two were working together on the film "Falling From Grace." McMurtry had hopes that Mellencamp might record one of his tunes. Instead, Mellencamp ended up producing McMurtry's strong Columbia Records debut, Too Long the Wasteland (1989). Later, McMurtry was asked to play alongside Mellencamp, John Prine, Dwight Yoakam and Joe Ely in a one-off band for the Falling From Grace soundtrack, which also produced the single, Sweet Suzanne. The Buzzin' Cousins, as the band was later christened, was nominated in 1992 by the Country Music Asscociation in the vocal event of the year category.

McMurtry made two more albums for Columbia, Candyland (1992) and Where'd You Hide the Body (1995). In 1996 he left Columbia and joined Sugar Hill Records, where he made a trio of albums. The American Indie Award-winning album it had to happen arrived in 1997. Walk Between the Raindrops came in 1998, followed in 2002 by his hardest rocking studio effort to date, St. Mary of the Woods.

In spring 2004, McMurtry joined Compadre Records for the release of Live in Aught-Three. The album was recorded in the spring of 2003 at the Zephyr Club in Salt Lake City, Utah, the Orange Peel in Asheville, North Carolina, 12th and Porter in Nashville, Tennessee and John Barleycorn's in Wichita, Kansas. Capturing McMurtry, Johnson and Hess at the top of their game, the album was widely praised as being one of the best live releases in years.

McMurtry's long-anticipated seventh studio album, Childish Things, is out in the fall of 2005. The album has the usual tasty mix of McMurtry compositions, seasoned with a hard-scrapple southern classic, "Slew Foot" (performed here with help from former Buzzin' Cousins partner, Joe Ely), and the rollicking "The Old Part of Town," originally recorded for a Peter Case tribute album to benefit the Hungry for Music charity. McMurtry's production is crisp and warm, as are his lead and harmony vocal turns. Alongside his tasteful guitar work, McMurtry can also be heard on harmonica, organ, piano, and maybe a mandolin woven into the layered mix of six-strings on "Bad Enough."

McMurtry's son Curtis makes his saxophone debut on the loose and rootsy "See the Elephant," and the road-tripping twanger "Pocatello." McMurtry's longtime collaborator, guitarist David Grissom, delivers on "Pocatello," "Bad Enough" and the sensuous "Restless." Also contributing are McMurtry's soundman and sometimes supporting guitarist, Tim Holt, and Randy Garibay Jr., who played bass in McMurtry's first touring band and provides backup vocals here as well as on previous McMurtry sessions. Keyboardist Bukka Allen, fiddler Warren Hood, trombonist John Blondell and bassist Chris Maresh round out the list of Childish Things contributors.

In the past, McMurtry's songs have frequently examined the U.S.A.'s social fabric, but he has said that he purposefully hadn't waded far into political waters. On Childish Things, he makes reference to middle-age guardsmen returning to duty in "Holiday" and boy soldiers leaving home for the first time in "See the Elephant." The album also includes McMurtry's statement on American decline - "We Can't Make it Here" - his most unabashedly political number yet. The song was originally released as a free download, complete with two radio-friendly bleeps of expletives, in the week prior to the 2004 presidential election. The song is included sans bleeps on Childish Things.

When not on the road, James McMurtry and the Heartless Bastards can usually be found playing the Wednesday night/Thursday morning late show at the Continental Club, Austin's historic south side bar. Whether playing a wee-hours gig for the faithful or a heat-of-the-day festival slot for thousands, McMurtry and his band can be relied upon to deliver a powerful, no-nonsense set of roots rock 'n' roll.

The above text was provided by L.E.Brady.  You can read more about James McMurty at his web site at http://www.jamesmcmurtry.com/

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"We Can't Make it Here" By James McMurtry Download Song LYRICS Vietnam Vet with a cardboard sign Sitting there by the left turn line Flag on the wheelchair flapping in the breeze One leg missing, both hands free No one's paying much mind to him The V.A. budget's stretched so thin And there's more comin' home from the Mideast war We can't make it here anymore That big ol' building was the textile mill It fed our kids and it paid our bills But they turned us out and they closed the doors We can't make it here anymore See all those pallets piled up on the loading dock They're just gonna set there till they rot 'Cause there's nothing to ship, nothing to pack Just busted concrete and rusted tracks Empty storefronts around the square There's a needle in the gutter and glass everywhere You don't come down here 'less you're looking to score We can't make it here anymore The bar's still open but man it's slow The tip jar's light and the register's low The bartender don't have much to say The regular crowd gets thinner each day Some have maxed out all their credit cards Some are working two jobs and living in cars Minimum wage won't pay for a roof, won't pay for a drink If you gotta have proof just try it yourself Mr. CEO See how far 5.15 an hour will go Take a part time job at one of your stores Bet you can't make it here anymore High school girl with a bourgeois dream Just like the pictures in the magazine She found on the floor of the laundromat A woman with kids can forget all that If she comes up pregnant what'll she do Forget the career, forget about school Can she live on faith? live on hope? High on Jesus or hooked on dope When it's way too late to just say no You can't make it here anymore Now I'm stocking shirts in the Wal-Mart store Just like the ones we made before 'Cept this one came from Singapore I guess we can't make it here anymore Should I hate a people for the shade of their skin Or the shape of their eyes or the shape I'm in Should I hate 'em for having our jobs today No I hate the men sent the jobs away I can see them all now, they haunt my dreams All lily white and squeaky clean They've never known want, they'll never know need Their sh@# don't stink and their kids won't bleed Their kids won't bleed in the da$% little war And we can't make it here anymore Will work for food Will die for oil Will kill for power and to us the spoils The billionaires get to pay less tax The working poor get to fall through the cracks Let 'em eat jellybeans let 'em eat cake Let 'em eat sh$%, whatever it takes They can join the Air Force, or join the Corps If they can't make it here anymore And that's how it is That's what we got If the president wants to admit it or not You can read it in the paper Read it on the wall Hear it on the wind If you're listening at all Get out of that limo Look us in the eye Call us on the cell phone Tell us all why In Dayton, Ohio Or Portland, Maine Or a cotton gin out on the great high plains That's done closed down along with the school And the hospital and the swimming pool Dust devils dance in the noonday heat There's rats in the alley And trash in the street Gang graffiti on a boxcar door We can't make it here anymore