Track 6

Coneville Slough by Greg Brown
From The Evening Call (Red House/2006)
Coneville seems to deal with the feelings of a man looking back on a great love, and that love might be long gone or standing right in his blind spot, only changed so completely that what he see's in his rearview is only recognized by the small, warm stone it has left in his heart. It is such a wistful tune, well-served by Brown's rocky bottom voice. Like Black Cadillac, The Evening Call is a confident, career-defining album. Brown is a veteran who has gotten much better with age, or anyway, as I get older, his songs better inhabit my crotchety sonic world. I realize that Brown is kind of a folky, and the idea of folk frightens a lot of people away, but Brown is the best kind of folky; in addition to all the usual songs about the old homestead and grandma and fly fishing, he can be angry, horny, frustrated and occasionally funny (but not “funny”).