The Earth Rolls On

Amazon.com
Father and son Shaver achieve one of their most powerful syntheses to date--punctuating the plainspoken poetry of Billy Joe's hardscrabble songs with the electrifying charge of Eddy's blues-rock guitar. Recruiting musicians that include Springsteen bassist Gary Tallent and Wilco's keyboardist Jay Bennett and drummer Ken Coomer, the Shavers push country music to its extremes. It's hard to imagine a more exhilarating anthem than the album-opening "Love Is So Sweet," a funnier kiss-off song than "Leavin' Amarillo," or a gut-punch testament that hits harder than the collection's centerpiece, "Blood Is Thicker Than Water." On the six-minute title cut that closes the album, Eddy displays a subtle sensitivity at odds with his reputation as a guitar firebrand. Unfortunately, one of 2001's best albums is a bittersweet triumph, a renewal for the father but an epitaph for the son, with Eddy's death following the sessions. --Don McLeese

The Earth Rolls On,Shaver,New West Records,Country,Country & Western,Pop,Progressive Country

Average customer rating:

Eddie's swan song

The Wall Street Journal was right--this is great music!

I wish everybody could hear this

You don't know me, but I love this record!

A hard-won masterwork

The Earth Rolls On
Shaver
Manufacturer: New West Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Country | Styles | Music
Outlaw & Progressive Country | Country | Styles | Music
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ASIN: B00005ARPK
Release Date: 2001-04-10

Tracks:

Love Is So Sweet
Evergreen Fields
Hard Headed Heart
New York City Girl
Restless Wind
Sail Of My Soul
You're Too Much For Me
Blood Is Thicker Than Water
Star In My Heart
It's Not Over Till It's Over
Hearts A' Bustin'
Leavin' Amarillo
I Don't Seem To Fit Anywhere
The Earth Rolls On

Amazon.com

Father and son Shaver achieve one of their most powerful syntheses to date--punctuating the plainspoken poetry of Billy Joe's hardscrabble songs with the electrifying charge of Eddy's blues-rock guitar. Recruiting musicians that include Springsteen bassist Gary Tallent and Wilco's keyboardist Jay Bennett and drummer Ken Coomer, the Shavers push country music to its extremes. It's hard to imagine a more exhilarating anthem than the album-opening "Love Is So Sweet," a funnier kiss-off song than "Leavin' Amarillo," or a gut-punch testament that hits harder than the collection's centerpiece, "Blood Is Thicker Than Water." On the six-minute title cut that closes the album, Eddy displays a subtle sensitivity at odds with his reputation as a guitar firebrand. Unfortunately, one of 2001's best albums is a bittersweet triumph, a renewal for the father but an epitaph for the son, with Eddy's death following the sessions. --Don McLeese

Customer Reviews:

Eddie's swan song.......2002-09-29

Tragically, Eddie Shaver passed away soon after this cd was completed. He was just too damn young. He left us with a legacy though. Here, he and dad Billy Joe rock one final time with one hell of a country rock album. Billy Joe's songwriting is legendary enough, but he seemed to really get to the heart of some touchy subjects here and turn it up a notch. Especially cool is him and Eddie going back and forth on "Blood is thicker than water." Some very honest and nasty lyrics. I can't help but feel for B.J. as on the back of the disc, there's a picture of him putting his hand in a window; as if he's reaching out for Eddie. I like all Shaver cd's, but this ranks as one of the best for sure.

The Wall Street Journal was right--this is great music!.......2002-05-29

After a reading a review of this album in the Wall Street Journal, I had to buy it. The Journal was right--this is elemental country and not to be missed, even if you're not a country fan. Shaver's voice, lyrics and phrasing rings true to someone who grew up on a farm in rural Colorado. I could imagine him stepping out of his pickup truck, in his dirty jeans (field dirt, not city dirt) and baseball cap with a Co-op logo, and stepping into the local cafe. "Star in My Heart" is the ultimate song of alienation--he says leaving the woman he loves is "taking the thorn out of her side" and "the rock out of her shoe".

I wish everybody could hear this.......2002-04-19

I have a sinking feeling that this CD is not for everybody, but I like it so much I wish it could be. This is a mixed up stew of hard rock and outlaw-country, almost as if Waylon Jennings had recorded with Lynyrd Skynyrd. But Shaver stands apart, and this is no 70s throwback. "The Earth Rolls On" is also a father-son melding of Jennings-generation singer-songwriter Billy Joe Shaver and his rock guitarist son. (In fact, Waylon recorded many songs by Billy Joe.) This is also an album marked by two tragedies. Billy Joe's wife (Eddie's mother) died shortly before the album was made - a fact that influenced at least two songs on the album, the title song "The Earth Rolls On" (#14) and "Blood is Thicker Than Water" (#8). The latter song, sung by both men, is primarily about the father-son relationship (in both the earthly and Christian senses). Then tragedy struck again - Eddie died before the album was released. (I'm not sure how - neither the liner notes nor the web site say). Listening to Eddies' solos on two of the best songs here, "Evergreen Fields" (#2) and "The Earth Rolls On" (#14), one gets the sense he went out in flames (figuratively speaking). My other favorite is "Love is So Sweet" (#1). If you've never heard Billy Joe Shaver before (as I hadn't), he introduces himself in the opening lines of this first song, an upbeat rocker: "I've been around for a long time, Mister, I've got a thing or two to say...I've been a drifter and a low-life loser, you could learn a lot from me...Love is So Sweet, it makes you bounce when you walk down the street." You may react, as I did, with an instant "I like this guy!"

You don't know me, but I love this record!.......2001-06-16

This is my first exposure to the Shaver family. Bought the record on the strength of a friends recommendation, and loved it. I am not a country fan; I don't really care for a lot of that, just not my taste. Although I would naively call this a country record, at the end of the day it is so much more. I won't bore you with my track by track analysis, suffice to say that there is a lot of life in these songs, pathos, humor, everything. Don't be a stooge, get this disk.

A hard-won masterwork.......2001-06-05

This is an album about survival, about staring the grim reaper in maw and flipping him the bird. Seriously, though, the testament to the toughness of this record is the upbeat first tune "love is so sweet" in which the singer meditates on a hard and traveling life and comes away with the most important bit of wisdom being "Love is so sweet/It makes you bounce as you walk down the street". "evergreen fields" is simply gorgeous-- sripped-bare rumination on mortality and being without roots ("no harvest awaits me"). There are plenty of upbeat tunes, and the album generally chugs along with the sound and fury of a runaway locomotive. The late Eddy Shaver's searing guitar licks sound like one man's personal sonic war against his demons. He bottom-feeds from the blues and soars into uncharted country territory. Eddy, we hardly knew ye...

My favorite track is the stubbornly unsentimental "I don't seem to fit anywhere" wherein the singer grapples with his own nomadic existence. All together, a stunning and defiant masterpiece of the first order, and probably the greatest record any of the Shavers has yet produced.

Music Album:

Music Album