"So Come Back, Woody Guthrie ..."

In addition to our patron saint, here at A Cautious Man there is a special place of honor for Steve Earle (whose own website is somewhat neglected, but who is ably served by the indispensable Original Unoffical Steve Earle Site). As noted recently by Eric Alterman, "Steve Earle’s singing and songwriting connects to a place in the American past that allows him to create timeless music that could have been written yesterday but sounds as if it’s been around a hundred years", while at the same time he is relentlessly political (sometimes, too much for his own good). In these troubled times, Mr. Earle is riding to our rescue with a new album, "The Revolution Starts ...Now", to be released on August 24. The track list shows several politically-minded songs, among them "Condi, Condi", a reggae, sort-of paean to the National Security Adviser, with lines like "They say you're too uptight, I say you're not/Dance around me spinnin' like a top/Oh, Condi, Condi, don't ever stop." There's also "F the CC", described as follows in Billboard:

Earle pulls no punches in his assault on the Ramones-esque track, which boasts the chorus, "F*** the FCC /f*** the FBI / f*** the CIA / I'm living in the motherf***ing U.S.A."

In the column linked to above, Mr. Alterman confessed, "I'm actually ashamed to admit how much I love that song 'F**k the FCC.' It reminds me of being ten and listening to Country Joe and the Fish, but with a much better beat." I'm looking forward to experiencing that guilty pleasure, as well.