Cbuj Ent
2008
Live Cactus!
About This Album
Live Cactus! is the most intimate of Joe Ely recordings. For those not familiar with Austin, the Cactus Café is a longstanding venue that has played host to every major Americana songwriter of the last 30 years, and then some. It's not as precious as Nashville's Bluebird, but it is a proving-ground room, one where songwriters pay their own money to see their peers. It is also a place that many Texas songwriters -- like Ely, Butch Hancock, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Guy Clark, Rodney Crowell, Alejandro Escovedo, and dozens of others -- feel at home. This set features Ely with accordionist Joel Guzman as his lone accompanist. It is an acoustic date, and there aren't any real honky tonk tunes and absolutely no rockers. It is also electrifying because it presents Ely without his bigger-than-life persona. What comes across is a man who works at his craft as a writer, presenting his work with all manner of attendant stories and monologues left in so the listener is fully allowed into that room. What's more, it contains the "sound" of a live recording. There isn't anything perfectly digital here. You hear what you would have heard being there. And it feels great. The material ranges from early originals such as "Because of the Wind" to later gems like "Letter from Laredo," "Miss Bonnie and Mr.
Track List (try tracks 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 and 9)

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