Justin Townes Earle died last week at age 38 in Nashville, apparently of a drug overdose, cutting short a promising career conducted in the shadow of his famously hell-raising father, outlaw-country rocker Steve Earle. Steve wanted to name him after his old running buddy Townes van Zandt, but his mother vetoed that idea because she considered van Zandt a bad influence. The name proved not to be the problem; Justin began using heroin by age 14.
Most critics called Justin’s music Americana, which nowadays is usually conflated with the ’90s alt-country movement. Justin was a throwback to that No Depression era, setting emotional, sometimes confessional lyrics to an old-timey vibe that drew on roots music of all sorts, from country to folk to soul. His breakthrough composition was “Harlem River Blues,” a sprightly major-key suicide note. It got him a slot on Letterman in 2011, where Paul Shaffer contributed an organ solo the album version lacks. (The still showing on your screen isn’t Earle, it’s his guitar player at the time, Jason Isbell, who nails a solo of his own).
Most recently I had Earle’s stark reading of Paul Simon’s “Graceland” in high rotation on Spotify. It was recorded for a German TV show that plays perfectly in these pandemic times — musicians perform sitting in a kitchen. It’s not faithful to the original either musically or lyrically, but where Simon’s version feels melancholy, Earle’s is emotionally wrenching.
