Tripping Through the Past

KRIS KRISTOFFERSON
Kristofferson
(Monument/Legacy)
Like a lot of folks my age, I've always thought of Kris Kristofferson as an actor (and an underrated one at that) who just happened to have gotten his showbiz start by writing "Me and Bobby McGee" ages ago. Membership in the Highwaymen (C&W's version of the Traveling Wilburys) and a drunken, shambolic appearance on an Austin City Limits Songwriters Special a couple of years ago did nothing to change my mind. Plus he wrote the odious "For the Good Times," a song in which a cad tries to sweet-talk the woman he's just dumped into the sack one more time—even Ray Price, Frank Sinatra and Al Green, all of whom covered it, couldn't save it from its rancid mix of oily sexism and self pity. So for years I've poo-pooed his status as a legendary Texan songwriter and co-architect of the outlaw country sound.

As this reissue of his 1970 debut proves, I'm full of feces. Yes, "For the Good Times," only slightly less smarmy than future versions, is here, but otherwise it's packed with smart, witty, no-bullshit songcraft. "Best of All Possible Worlds," "Casey's Ride," "To Beat the Devil" and "The Law is For the Protection of the People" spin tales of down-and-outers at the mercy of cruel, capricious fate but determined to keep moving down that lonesome road, even if it's only toward the next drink. Kristofferson distinguished his writing from the rest of the Nashville song factory pabulum by injecting brutal honesty into his tunes. His characters have no illusions about the circumstances in which they find themselves, and are unusually (for the time period) frank about their needs, be they chemical or sexual. Famous tunes like "Help Me Make It Through the Night" and "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down" bear this out. The combination of the superlative songs, raw, chance-taking production that owes as much to Bob Dylan's Nashville-produced Blonde on Blonde as it does to Johnny Cash, and Kristofferson's craggy, unfancy voice is as potent a concoction as Music City has ever produced, and it goes a long way toward vindicating Kristofferson's rep. Lost classic: the songwriter's laid-back, wistful version of that tune that begins "Busted flat in Baton Rouge..." Michael Toland

For fans of: Billy Joe Shaver, Lee Hazlewood, Bob Dylan

THE PSYCHEDELIC FURS
Greatest Hits
(Columbia/Legacy)
It's hard to say what makes the Psychedelic Furs stand out from their 80s brethren. That's not meant as an insult, but as a compliment. Though their music is put together from familiar elements (a little Roxy Music, a dash of Velvet Underground, a whole lotta Bowie), and there's plenty of identifiable Reagan Years production sounds, particularly in the keyboards, it still sounds unique, managing the neat trick of sounding of its time without sounding dated. Most of it, anyway—lesser tracks like "Heartbreak Beat" and "Angels Don't Cry" definitely show their age in the airplay-geared production. On such tunes Richard Butler's "whiskey and fags are my life" croon is the only thing that gives them any personality at all. The best songs, though—"Heaven," "Until She Comes," "Love My Way," "Sister Europe," "Sometimes," President Gas," "Pretty in Pink"—hold up quite nicely as classics of smarter-than-they-seem ear candy. Fanatics already have everything here, but casual fans or newcomers should find this a worthy addition to a well-rounded music collection, especially since it'll probably all the Furs they'll ever need. Michael Toland

For fans of: David Bowie, Duran Duran, late-period Cure