One of my Christmas gifts was an iTunes gift card, and I always use such windfalls as an excuse to look for music that’s a little outside the mainstream. Coincidentally, a song on SiriusXM’s Outlaw Country station caught my attention, and so I went searching for it. <\/p>\n
Although my car radio’s readout often truncates artist names and song titles (an ongoing source of annoyance, by the way; the display itself appears to have twice as much space as is actually used), I was able to discern that the musician was Tony Joe White<\/a> &…someone<\/i>…and the song title was Closing In On Th<\/i> (thanks a lot, illogical 16 character limit). But the iTune Store’s search led me to a 2004 album by TJW entitled Heroines<\/i>, and his duet with Lucinda Williams called Closing In On The Fire<\/i>. <\/p>\n The album contains four additional duets, matching White’s deep gravelly muttering with the lovely voices of country stars Shelby Lynne, Jessi Colter, and TJ’s daughter, Michelle White. These are fascinating combinations. If all you know of Tony Joe White is Polk Salad Annie<\/i>, Heroines<\/i> will likely be a perception-altering album. The dark, languid blues are still present, but several on this collection have a Latin flavor.<\/p>\n Here’s a live version of Can’t Go Back Home<\/i>, the duet with the Grammy Award-winning Shelby Lynne.<\/p>\n