John Prine: Less political, but no less fun

It has been a struggle, but so far I have managed to keep my musical taste out of this blog.

No more.

I discovered something called "Blue State Jukebox" and the current selection is the new John Prine album, so all bets are off.

I've been a Prine devotee since about 1969, when we both lived in Illinois -- he was delivering mail and I was editing a newspaper -- and his first album was about to come out (I still call them albums today, which is another sign that I am up in years.) I don't mean to suggest that I knew him; we lived in different towns together, as they say.

In those days he was more political -- but so was everyone. "Sam Stone" told of the plight of a Vietnam veteran. "Illegal Smile" was about marijuana but a whole lot more ("I dreamed the police heard everything I thought; what then? I went to court and the judge's name was Hoffman.") "Paradise" was about the coal companies ravaging the environment.

His current album, "Fair and Square," has a line about "some cowboy from Texas" who "starts his own war in Iraq." But mostly this album is classic John Prine. If you don't know what that means, do yourself a favor and find out what you've been missing. John Prine website.