Todd Snider Lyrics

Robert Earl Keen: Ready For Confetti

Robert Earl Keen is a one of the quintessential voices of central Texas. Not as a singer—though his delivery has some magic to it—but as a songwriter and a storyteller. He’s what a country artist should be and nothing it’s not: clever, but not contrived; wise, but not intellectual; tough, but not macho; and, above all, honest.

His lyrics are cerebral—that will never change, but his tone will. On Ready for Confetti , Keen’s 16th release, he opts for a happy-go-lucky mood on most songs. It’s a smokescreen, though. Once the lyrics sink in, we realize he’s setting the same scenes he always has: southwestern stories that act out the indefinable humors, tragedies and ironies of life. Take the title track as an example. It’s not the cheery birthday party anthem it sounds like on first listen, nor is it descriptions of eccentric strangers it sounds like on the second listen. It embodies homelessness and schizophrenia told by a homeless man.

The musicianship on Ready for Confetti is professional and slick, which is basically status-quo for a big-league country album. Keen is a solid guitar picker in his own right and can drive a song on his own, but he’s got a longtime band of crack-players who utilize everything from Hammond B3 organs to congas to keep things from getting dusty. Rich Brotherton’s nylon stringed solo on “Black Baldi Stallion” is paralyzingly great and the knee-slapping percussion on “I Gotta Go” is notable. But instrumental experimentation and expertise has never been the heart of Robert Earl Keen’s music—songwriting is.

“I Gotta Go” is a three-minute masterpiece. Driven by a corkscrew guitar lick, Keen tells the story of a man’s rough life, from start to finish, in just a few short scenes always ending in someone uttering the impassive title-line.

Todd Snider – Greenfield Lake Amphitheater, Concert and Event ...

Initially The Excitement Plan (June 9th on Yep Roc Records) wasn’t supposed to be about anything. I was just trying to come up with the best… most open hearted … well-thought-out lyrics I could come up with. I wanted every song to be sad and funny at the same time, vulnerable and entertaining at the same time, personal and universal at the same time. I wanted every song to be as uniquely written as possible and then I wanted to perform them in a studio loose and rugged and hopefully as uniquely as I could. My hope is to be hard to describe and/or new…I’m not saying I am. I’m just saying that’s the hope.

My producer, Don Was thought the best way to go for what I was talking about was live and spontaneous. So we set up at Henson studios in Los Angeles with myself on guitar, harp and piano. Greg Liesz on steel guitar and dobro. Don on upright bass, Jim Keltner on drums and Krish Harma engineering.

Then, with Don being the only one who’d heard the songs and me being the only one who knew them, we recorded completely live for just two and a half days.

As God is my witness and whether you even like this music or not, it was the most exciting, most challenging, most uninhibited and funnest time I’ve ever had making music… - Todd Snider

The Excitement Plan’s laid- back groove and top- shelf lyrics are being called Snider’s best work yet. “This music is sorta JJ Cale meets Jerry Jeff Walker sounding with words that would hopefully impress Shel Silverstein, Bobby Bare, Chuck Berry, Kris Kristofferson or Randy Newman,” Snider said. With his contributions of stellar guitar, piano and harmonica, his musicianship shares the spotlight as easily as his treasured lyrics.

Snider is a vociferous musician whose fans know him to be quite the workhorse. His acclaimed 2006 release, The Devil You Know found the barefoot troubadour performing live on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Late Night with David Letterman and the CD appeared on numerous year-end Top 10 lists including Spin, Blender and Rolling Stone. More recently, last year’s Peace Queer EP–a concept record featuring all the peace, love and anarchy Snider is known for–inspired Blender to say he “morphed from a wisecracking country-ish journeyman to the sharpest and funniest protest singer working today.” The EP spent five weeks at number one on the Americana chart and Spin Magazine dubbed him, “One of roots music’s slyest, smartest songwriters.

Lyrics

Lyrics, Writing Better Words for Your Songs

Todd

Todd

Sweeney Todd, the demon barber of fleet street