Anthony DeCurtis on Steve Earle

"'It is a form of channeling at its best,' said Mr. Earle, who recorded most of the album in his Greenwich Village apartment. 'What I tried to do is sit in a room by myself for 12 of the 15 tracks and play them as close to the way I remember [Townes Van Zandt] playing them.' Van Zandt classics like 'Pancho and Lefty,' 'To Live Is to Fly' and 'No Place to Fall' sit comfortably next to worthy, if lesser known, songs like '(Quicksilver Dreams of) Maria' and 'Where I Lead Me.' Completing a generational journey, Mr. Earle and his son Justin duet on “Mr. Mudd and Mr. Gold,' the dense, troubled gambling story-song that Mr. Earle performed nearly 30 years ago to impress Van Zandt the first time he saw Mr. Earle perform. Like the album itself, it’s a tribute that demands respect from its subject. 'Townes’s inability to promote himself and put his dukes up for his own art failed him over and over again,' Mr. Earle said. 'But none of us is whole. We all do some things better than others. As a songwriter, you won’t find anybody better. I hope this record will make it a little more apparent just how good these songs are'" ("Freeing a Mentor from His Mythology," New York Times, 5/10/09).