At 65 years old, Bob Dylan could easily be sitting back in one of his houses, kicked back, drinking scotch and amazing and amusing with tales of his epic journey. Instead, he's out on the road, playing a hundred or more shows a year and somehow finding the time to write and record his third masterpiece in the past 10 years. Completing the trilogy started by 1997's "Time Out of Mind" and continued with 2001's "Love and Theft", "Modern Times" shows Dylan in top form as a composer and as a performer.

Full of apocolyptic visions made real by modern living, Modern Times stands to remind us all of just how crazy this world we live in can be. But it ain't just about today. It's about all the Modern Times that have come before these, and how the end of the world has always been breathing down our necks and how there ain't no end to the end, only brand new chapters. It's in the songs, it's in the music, it's in the breaths and the pauses between the words. Bob Dylan conjures the ghosts of Lightnin' Hopkins and Robert Johnson and breaths new life into old truths.

Times ain't now nothin' like they used to be...

Be Here To Love Me is probably as close as we'll get to a 2-CD set intro to Townes, and even though it has obvious omissions, it's a pretty good place to begin if you're trying to learn a little about Townes Van Zandt. The soundtrack to the documentary of the same name (the film, by the way, is incredible and is required viewing for anyone who wants to know anything about anything at all), Be Here To Love Me collects some of Van Zandt's greatest songs as well as some more obscure pieces and puts them together in one relatively easy to understand package.

Although the performances on the CD's are not the same performances that were included in the film (a real shame!), they are a good introduction to the life and work of America's Greatest Songwriter.

Thousands of words have been written about this album, and none of them has been able to capture the essence of this performance, and these words won't do that either. These are just words, and like Frank Zappa said, "Writing about music is like dancing about arcitechure". So there's no way I can adequately describe the power of the performance on this album.

Johnny Cash always performed with a certain intensity that was beyond what most performers could muster on the best of nights, and when he was "ON", look out! This show was Johnny Cash on an "ON" night. Tearing through his repertoire and delivering standout versions of his hits like Big River, I Still Miss Someone, Folsom Prison Blues, Ring of Fire, and I Walk The Line as well as timeless renditions of some of his lesser known songs like San Quentin (which was written for this performance), Starkville City Jail, Wanted Man, and A Boy Named Sue (which went on to become a hit), Cash brought a little light into the darkest of places, bringing hope and joy to those who had no hope and hadn't known joy in way too long.

For one night, the darkness which enveloped the men who were locked up at San Quentin was absorbed by one man who then turned the darkness into light and the light back into dark. There was only one Johnny Cash.

Blood On The Tracks is quite possibly Dylan's greatest album ever. Of course, the same thing could be said for Blonde On Blonde, Highway 61 Revisited, Love And Theft, Bringing It All Back Home, or The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. But unlike any of Dylan's other works, Blood On The Tracks shows us the artist at his most vulnerable, pouring out words that most mortals would never dare to speak, even if they could figure out how to say them.

The title says as much about the album as anything. There is BLOOD on them there tracks! These words are the blood, the force that keeps the poet alive, poured directly from his heart and onto the tracks of a recording. What more can be said??

Every track is a standout. There are no "best songs" or "worst songs" on this album. Each and every song is a masterpiece in and of itself. Highlights? Every song is a highlight. Every syllable uttered is a highlight. Every note strummed is a highlight. It doesn't get any more pure than this...

Having already recorded a subtle masterpiece with "Our Mother The Mountain", Townes Van Zandt had already become an underground icon by the time he recorded his self-titled third album. This album is a portrait of the artist in motion, containing songs that some 30 odd years later have yet to lose any of their power. Listen to the haunting imagery of (Quicksilver Daydreams of) Maria, the driving power of Fare Thee Well, Miss Carousel, the subtle assurance of I'll Be Here In The Morning, the paranoid prophecy of Lungs, the world-weary defeatism of Waiting Round To Die, and the reassurance of None But The Rain, and know that Townes Van Zandt earned every iota of praise he ever got, and a whole lot more...