Charlie Robison

Charlie Robison first caught my attention with his Good Times CD. Someone else at Americanaroots wrote a review on the CD before I could. I�d never seen his live show until this year when he played the KNBT Americana jam at Gruene Hall. His performance was one of the highlights of the event. I decided then I should write about him, but never got around to it.

A couple of weeks ago I went to see Shut Up and Sing, a movie about the Dixie Chicks. The movie is excellent; watch it if you can, regardless of your political inclinations. You�ll discover there are real people behind those performers that some choose to hate. Good, decent American people with love for this country and the traditions on which they were raised. In them I saw my sisters, daughters and the mothers of our children, not some evil incarnate the press, Lipton tea or Clearchannel Corporation would have me to believe they are. Charlie appears in the movie�he�s married to Emily, one of the Chicks. And damn if I wasn�t looking at a kindred spirit.

Charlie hails from Bandera, Texas. He�s eighth generation Texan and still lives and works on a ranch. Hot damn. A real person. A real man. A country boy. Hard to find these in the world of glitz and glitter. Unapologetic, uncomfortable in a world where kissing ass is the rule and a necessary part of doing business. He stays home while Emily tours the land playing her songs.

Charlie is a strapping fellow, well over six foot tall and built solid. I heard he played college ball for Texas Tech but don�t know much about that part of his life. He looks the part. He�s comfortable in jeans and work shirts. On a horse. Feeding cows. In a pickup truck. On a tractor. Under a cowboy hat or a farmer�s cap. He wears a comfortable smile, looks you in the eye, no shrinking violet or false modesty here. Bet he�d kick your ass if he saw you offend a woman. But when he takes a child in those massive hands, it�s the safest place in the whole wide world.

I discovered Charlie�s CD�s in reverse order, starting with Good Times. Then Step Right Up and finally Life of the Party. Damn if I know which one I like best. All three are solid from beginning to end. It�s obvious that he didn�t produce the albums on demand or to fit some schedule. Each is carefully crafted, without filler. They are spaced three years apart, beginning in 1998. Live albums appear interspersed among these, but I don�t own them.

I hear of places and people I know in Charlie�s songs: Bandera, Seguin, even Balmorhea appears; oil field workers, ranchers, border towns, tacos, enchiladas, barbecued brisket, and fire roasted weenies when the brisket runs out, the girls that broke my heart, the songs I found to heal those wounds, and the fun we shared with friends. He covers everyone from the preacher to the whore, from a desperate bank robber to a loving wife, from drunk rowdy fun-loving cowboys to devoted parents and generations of hard-working, honest people. I hear traces of Ireland, Germany, Mexico and good old American country music in his songs. Charlie drank and doped, fought and played, loved, lived and bleeds Texas; this boy is Texan, through and though.

Buy his music, watch his live show. You�ll be glad you did.

Author: Don Henry Ford Jr