Land of the Free

In the spirit of Dylan, Phil Ochs, Joan Baez this is traditional political folk transformed to todays important issues. About 500 crappy “protest” cds have crossed the music office door since the “election” of 2000 and especially 9/11, but this one stands so far head and shoulders above the rest its altogether chilling and a huge relief. Simple male/female duo, the latter with crystalline voice a la Joan /Joni, the man holding it like the best, with only simple acoustic guitar accompaniment a la Woody Guthrie or early Dylan. A good chunk of these are in fact Ochs, Dylan classics with the lyrics very craftily edited to apply to todays messed up world. “13 songs of of fire, humor, tenderness and poignancy…humor insight, compassion and community—with powerful effect” this is great stuff, really great. Excellent liner notes/booklet. At least play track 11, Dylan’s “Masters of War”.

1) Excellent a cappella duet, goes melodically through the alphabet with each letter standing for yet another atrocity, sung for children’s curriculum
2) Phil Ochs beauty “days of destruction” with lyrics changed to “days of decision”
3) lyrics changed, hilarious poke at Cheny’s potty mouth
4) “fixin to die rag”, you know the Woodstock classic that follows the fish cheer “what are we fighting for?” but words changed to Iraq issues
5) the lies leading up to war on Iraq, a tad mushy but great
6) written assuming kerry won and has appointed lefties to the cabinet, this goes through the list of republican criminals and what they’ll do when “unemployed”
7) “electile dysfunction”, this is hilarious “they got new ones, with computers!!!”
8) anti ashcroft, pro-free speech, dissent
9) goddamn Phil Ochs was great…one of his greatest anti-war songs ever, this is almost 100% Ochs lyrics only one additional verse added for Iraq
10) great, witty, melodic
11) jesus Christ: untouched cover of Dylan’s Masters of War…holy shit! Nuff sed!!
12) wow, another untouched cover, this one a beauty from “St Phil”
13) pretty traditional folk feel, inspirational and beautiful, goosebumps all around