Playlist. Listen.

PHOTOS

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TRACKLIST

  1. Last Fair Deal Gone Down [MP3]
  2. Constanz
  3. Sputnik 57
  4. The Country is Young
  5. Hard Times
  6. The Fame of Lofty Deeds
  7. Nashville Radio [fast version]
  8. Living A Lie [MP3]
  9. Homburg (Procul Harem cover)
  10. Over the Cliff (covered by Old 97's)
  11. Trouble in Mind (Bob Wills cover)

"Success on someone else's terms, don't mean a fuckin thing" —from "Over The Cliff"


"These mini-country-rock masterpieces, which masquerade as minimalist sketches, attack cutthroat capitalism's notion of achievement. Langford's half-croon, half-snarl fills the rough-hewn, fast-shuffling numbers with rude, waggish poetics." —Blender

"He mixes the slightly ragged, rockin' urgency of Highway 61-era Dylan with Merle Haggard's workingman's blues twang. If Hank Williams were alive today (and a member of the Green or Socialist parties), he'd quite likely record an album that sounds as tart, cool, and wild as this one." —New Times

Jon Langford All the Fame of Lofty Deeds

BS 108 2004 $8.95
CD$8.95BUY
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Jon's second solo CD is the cautionary tale of a singer who rises from obscurity to opulence only to gulp heartily from the poison cup of compromise and betrayal to sink back into the dirt and darkness from whence he came. It’s a thinly veiled damning of a culture that trades in optimism, grandeur and glitz, but ultimately depends on sucking people dry.

Lofty Deeds shows Langford’s immense and varied talents in a sharp new light. Yes, his fondness for blurring the irrelevent line between punk and country is here in spades, and the wit that marries the personal with the political is not lost. But, with concise writing and stripped down arrangements, this CD nudges his powerful voice (full of bluster and rolling rrr’s) and lyrics front and center like he’s ready to burst out of your hi-fi and chew on your ear.

"A sampling of his signature blend of traditional guitar pluckings and off-the-wall wit... they coelesce with the charm of an old yarn told well." —San Francisco Chronicle

"A worthy addition to his musical catalog, [it] features some of his sharpest, most biting lyrics, with his impassioned vocals at the top of the mix... [He has] found a way to take a classic, traditional idiom and invest it with his own personality." —PopMatters.com

"All told, it's tough to resist calling Langford's latest his best yet. Ambitious and smart, All the Fame of Lofty Deeds is an affectionate critique of America sung from the point of view of one seriously bemused expatriate." —Washington Post

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