Shut Up And Die Like An Aviator

Easily his best since his stunning debut Guitar Town. Steve Earle’s shredded voice adds a desperate quality to the proceedings.

Maybe it was that off-duty Texas cop working as a security guard who grabbed him by the throat choking his vocal cords, or maybe it’s that he’s decided to look like Lemmy of Motorhead, or insists on living a good-ole-boy gone lifestyle, but there’s no doubt that Steve Earle’s voice is totally ravaged on his new, live Shut Up And Die Like An Aviator, recorded last year in Canada with his band The Dukes. Sometimes the last word of a line isn’t there at all.

But that doesn’t stop this from being a good album. In fact, it’s easily his best since his stunning debut Guitar Town. Earle’s shredded voice adds a desperate quality to the proceedings and the Dukes, while much more rock than country play fierce and hard, revving up each song Springsteen style.

Shut Up And Die... is pretty much a live “best of” and the versions of such songs as “West Nashville Boogie” or “The Other Kind” are just as good if not superior to the studio versions. Other songs included are “Devil’s Right Hand,” “The Rain Came Down,” “Copperhead Road” and the best song from his last album, the anti-capital punishment ballad, “Billy Austin,” as well as several from Guitar Town. Only the songs from that album don’t hold a candle to the originals. The best thing about this live retrospective is that you can now trade in every album Earle’s made since Guitar Town and not miss a thing.