Charley Crockett does not hang about.
“Age Of The Ram” is his third album in a year, which would be ridiculous enough on its own, but it is also the third and final part of his “Sagebrush Trilogy”. This is the one that brings the whole widescreen thing into view: Crockett’s own musical journey, his road from Texas to New York and back again, refracted through country music, outlaw mythology, hard miles and the sort of songs that sound like they were waiting for him long before he arrived.
And that is the thing with Crockett. He does not so much make records as uncover them.
“Age Of The Ram” is cleverly set out like a film, all themes, reprises, characters and scenes. It has that old cinema feel, the sense of dust on the reel, the image flickering, the hero already doomed but riding on anyway because, well, what else is there to do?
It really should be an album they found in some dusty old vault. “It’s a Coke and Pepsi world and they can have the whole thing, girl” is a lovely way of putting it, and it gets right to the heart of Crockett’s gift. He can write a line that feels old as the hills and somehow entirely his own.
“Lonesome Dove” honestly sounds like some troubadour from way back when, a guitar at his back and a song in his heart. There is no sense of strain here, no desperate grab for authenticity. Crockett simply inhabits this world. “What is life but a hard day to go?” he asks elsewhere, yet the song still finds the sunny side. That is a neat trick, and one he keeps pulling off.
One foot in hock and one in hell is where proper traditional country needs to be, and Crockett understands that better than most. “Lord, I’m just a country boy with trouble on my mind,” he sings, and the whole thing rolls on from there as storytelling in the grand tradition.
There are songs here that feel like campfire confessions, songs that sound like a horse being saddled in the next room, and others that add a little more instrumental depth until you can imagine Creedence Clearwater Revival doing them. When he shifts the mood, it never feels like he is showing off. It feels like the story demanded it.
At times, “Age Of The Ram” feels like a hymn. At others, it digs into proper southern grooves. The instrumentation is perfect throughout: fiddle, lap steel, guitar, rhythm section, all of it serving the song rather than elbowing it out of the way. A lap steel played properly remains one of life’s great pleasures, and there are moments here where it almost becomes a second voice.
And we must talk about Crockett’s voice, because that might be the whole thing. It is wonderfully rich and lived-in, the sound of a man who has not just read about these places but walked through them, got lost in them, and come back with the songs. About 30 years ago, I got massively into the late, great Kelly Joe Phelps, and somewhere in the feel of this record, in its quiet authority and deep-rooted craft, he would surely have been proud.
By the time “Me And Shooter” rolls around, you are ready for a two-step, and so is Crockett. Waylon would be proud of that one. Then there is a little bit of soul to finish, because why not? By this point, he has earned the right to go wherever he likes.
Couldn’t hit country with a baseball bat? Shooter himself sang on his own “Outlaw You”. Not here. This is not costume country. This is as ambitious as it is brilliant, a record with scope, character, confidence and heart.
“Age Of The Ram”? No. It is the year of Charley Crockett.
Rating 9/10
