Line #12 Music/SteveEarle


1	[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/steveearle.jpg]]
2	%%
3	->''He's just singing the same old song\
4	That he always sang before\
5	He's the last of the hardcore troubadours''
6
7	Stephen Fain Earle (born January 17, 1955 in Fort Monroe, UsefulNotes/{{Virginia}}) is an {{OutlawCountry\|Music}}[=/=]AlternativeCountry singer/songwriter, actor, and author. After about 10 years of hanging around his favorite musicians in UsefulNotes/{{Texas}} and UsefulNotes/{{Tennessee}} (he turns up in the 1975 documentary ''Heartworn Highways''), he finally got his breakthrough in 1986 with the album ''Guitar Town'' and became something of a country rock star.
8
9	[[SexDrugsAndRockAndRoll It didn't end well]].
10
11	After weaning himself off crack and heroin in the mid-90s he returned with a [[GrowingTheBeard beard]] and a slightly more mature sound and has been writing and recording a lot ever since. He lives in New York City.
12
13	Earle's music tends to draw on a lot of different influences, including {{country\|Music}}, RockAndRoll, {{folk music}}, UsefulNotes/{{punk}}, and even HipHop. In the 1980s, Earle's music gained considerable popularity with alternative, folk and punk fans, and he is considered to be extremely influential on the development of the AlternativeCountry genre. A self-described socialist, Earle is very politically active in left-wing causes, which often [[ProtestSong shows up in his lyrics]].
14
15	In addition to recording and touring, he's also an acclaimed author with one story collection (''Doghouse Roses'') and one novel (''I'll Never Get Out Of This World Alive'') under his belt, and has done some acting, most notably in the Creator/DavidSimon-helmed TV series ''Series/TheWire'' (in which [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ou_VaZEKZvs his cover]] of Music/TomWaits' "Way Down in the Hole" was [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSGkh61rMhM the Season 5 theme]]) and ''Series/{{Treme}}''.
16
17	Father of the late Music/JustinTownesEarle.
18
19	!!Discography
20	* ''Guitar Town'' (1986)
21	* ''Exit 0'' (1987, with The Dukes)
22	* ''Copperhead Road'' (1988)
23	* ''The Hard Way'' (1990)
24	* ''Train a Comin''' (1995)
25	* ''I Feel Alright'' (1996)
26	* ''El Corazón'' (1997)
27	* ''The Mountain'' (1999, with the Del [=McCoury=] Band)
28	* ''Transcendental Blues'' (2000)
29	* ''Jerusalem'' (2002)
30	* ''The Revolution Starts Now'' (2004)
31	* ''Washington Square Serenade'' (2007)
32	* ''Townes'' (2009)
33	* ''I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive'' (2011)
34	* ''The Low Highway'' (2013)
35	* ''Terraplane'' (2015)
36	* ''Colvin & Earle'' (2016, with Shawn Colvin)
37	* ''So You Wanna Be an Outlaw'' (2017)
38	* ''Guy'' (2019)
39	* ''Ghosts of West Virginia'' (2020)
40	* ''J.T.'' (2021)
41
42	!!Tropes associated with Steve Earle and his works:
43
44	* AfterTheEnd: "Ashes to Ashes" forecasts this in the last verse.
45	-->Now, nobody lives forever, nothing stands the test of time
46	-->Oh, you've heard 'em say "never say never", but it's always best to keep it in mind
47	-->That every tower ever built tumbles, no matter how strong, no matter how tall
48	-->Someday even great walls'll crumble, every idol ever raised falls
49	-->Someday even man's best-laid plans will lie twisted and covered in rust
50	-->We done all that we can but it slipped through our hands and it's ashes to ashes and dust to dust
51	* AlternativeCountry: One of the [[TropeCodifier Trope Codifiers]]. Earle made his name by playing to both country and alt-rock audiences, including a stint opening for Music/TheReplacements in the 1980s.
52	* AmbiguousSyntax: The first verse of "Copperhead Road" doesn't make it clear whether it's the revenue man or John's granddad that never came back from Copperhead Road.
53	* {{Bowdlerize}}: "Guitar Town" had "37 dollars and a Jap guitar" changed to "cheap guitar" on the radio edit.
54	* ClusterFBomb: "F The CC"
55	* CompanyTown: One of these is mentioned as the location of a card game in "Devils Right Hand".
56	* CoverAlbum: ''Townes'' consists entirely of Townes Van Zandt songs.
57	* DramaticDrop: From "Devil's Right Hand":
58	-->''So I asked if I could have one someday when I grew up\
59	Mama dropped a dozen eggs, she really blew up''
60	* DrugsAreBad: "CCKMP"[[note]]Cocaine Cannot Kill My Pain[[/note]] seems to be this [[SubvertedTrope until the final verse]].
61	-->Heroin's the only thing
62	-->The only gift that darkness brings
63	-->Guess you best leave me alone...
64	* EverythingsLouderWithBagpipes: "Copperhead Road"
65	* ForTheEvulz: [[DeconstructedTrope Deconstructed]] in "Billy Austin".
66	-->The kid done like I told him, he lay face down on the floor
67	-->Guess I'll never know what made me turn and walk back through that door
68	-->The shot rang out like thunder, my ears rang like a bell
69	-->[[ApatheticCitizens No one came runnin']] so I called the cops myself
70	-->[[InstantEmergencyResponse Took their time to get there]] and I guess I coulda run
71	-->I knew I should be feeling something but I never shed tear one
72	-->[[CrapsackWorld I didn't even make the papers]] 'cause I only killed one man...
73	* FromCamouflageToCriminal: "Copperhead Road" is the story of John Lee Pettimore, who follows in his grandfather's (a moonshiner) and father's (a bootlegger) footsteps after serving two tours in 'Nam by starting up an illegal drugs plantation on the titular road.
74	* GamblingBrawl: happens in "The Devil's Right Hand":
75	-->''Got into a card game in a company town\
76	I caught a miner cheating, I shot the dog down\
77	I shot the dog down, I watched the man fall\
78	He never touched his holster, never had a chance to draw''
79	* TheGunfighterWannabe: "Devil's Right Hand"
80	* HadToComeToPrisonToBeACrook: A common theme in Earle's songs. An example from "The Truth":
81	-->For every wall you build around your fear\
82	A thousand darker things are born in here\
83	And they're fed on contempt for all that you hold dear
84	* HellHasNewManagement: "The Unrepentant" ends like this.
85	-->''Now he's standin' at Hell's door \
86	With a bad attitude and a .44\
87	The devil said, "What's up man, now what you come here for?"\
88	He said, "Man, let's just get to it"\
89	He said, "I always heard that you were the bad one\
90	There's a few places I ain't been, a few things I ain't done\
91	You got your pitchfork and I got my gun..."''
92	* HesBack: The title track from ''I Feel Alright'', his first full-band album after quitting drugs, is entirely this.
93	-->Now some of you would live through me, lock me up and throw away the key
94	-->Or just find a place to hide away, hope that I'll just go away - HAH!
95	-->I feel alright, I feel alright tonight
96	* HillbillyMoonshiner: The grandfather in "Copperhead Road".
97	* ItRunsInTheFamily: "Copperhead Road" is the story of three generations of modern outlaws - the grandfather was a HillbillyMoonshiner, the father smuggled whiskey, and the son is a Vietnam vet growing marijuana.
98	** In RealLife, both Steve's sister Stacey and his son Music/JustinTownesEarle are acclaimed singer/songwriters in their own right.
99	* KangarooCourt: "Justice in Ontario":
100	-->It was down in London, they were tried
101	-->And the guilty man stood free outside
102	-->When he took the stand to pay his debt
103	-->The judge was blind and the jury deaf
104	* LastNoteHilarity: "Snake Oil" ends with "I knew there was a first-taker on this album somewhere".
105	* MistakenIdentity: The narrator of "Taneytown" is a young black man who is accosted by a group of racists and barely escapes by slashing one of them with his pocketknife. He throws the knife away while running back to his house, another black boy picks it up, and is later lynched when the men see him with it, despite protesting he didn't hurt anyone.
106	* NarratorAllAlong: "Johnny-Come-Lately" seems like it's an American GI in London recounting how he met his wife during the Blitz; the final verse reveals [[spoiler: it's his grandson remembering the story as he returns from Vietnam to no fanfare whatsoever.]]
107	* OneRiotOneRanger: "Justice in Ontario"
108	-->It was the local police who made the call.\
109	They said "Send us Corporal Terry Hall."
110	* OutlivingOnesOffspring: His son Justin died in August 2020. He actually recorded a tribute album named ''J.T.'' in his son's memory.
111	* PrayerIsALastResort: Subverted in "Tom Ames' Prayer", about a bankrobber who finds himself "trapped in an alley in Abilene with all but four shells spent" and turns to God for the first time in his life... only to wind up bragging at length about that time he saved himself from hanging and concluding:
112	-->"Yeah, but who the hell am I talkin' to, there ain't no one here but me."
113	-->And then he [[DramaticGunCock cocked both his pistols]] and he [[SpitefulSpit spit in the dirt]] and he [[BolivianArmyEnding walked out in the street]].
114	* ProtestSong: Many, ranging from the {{Anvilicious}} to TearJerker, occasionally even in the same song. Topics include:
115	** The death penalty: "Billy Austin", Ellis Unit One", "Over Yonder"
116	** The war on terrorism: "John Walker's Blues", "Rich Man's War"
117	** Corporate America: "Amerika v6.0", "Christmastime In Washington", "The Revolution Starts Now"
118	** Immigration: "City Of Immigrants"
119	* RealSongThemeTune: At least 2 of Earles' recordings have ended up as television music.
120	** His CoverVersion of Music/TomWaits' "Way Down In The Hole" is used for the fifth season of ''Series/TheWire''; Earle had a recurring role that season as Walon, Bubbles' Narcotics Anonymous sponsor. (Earle had appeared as Walon a few times in Season 1 and once in Season 4, but he wasn't nearly as prominent as in Season 5, which is when Bubbles gets serious about recovery.) "Copperhead Road" was featured on the Discovery Channel's docudrama: "Moonshiners".
121	* RecordProducer: He and Ray Kennedy (who had a hit in 1991 with "What a Way to Go") produce for himself and others as "Twang Trust".
122	* RecoveredAddict: Both Steve in real life, as well as his character Walon in ''Series/TheWire''.
123	* ReligionRantSong: "Tom Ames' Prayer" is about a bank robber who finds himself "trapped in an alley in Abilene with all but four shells spent" and [[PrayerIsALastResort turns to God for the first time in his life]]... only to wind up bragging at length about that time he saved himself from hanging and concluding:
124	-->"Yeah, but who the hell am I talkin' to, there ain't no one here but me."
125	-->And then he [[DramaticGunCock cocked both his pistols]] and he [[SpitefulSpit spit in the dirt]] and he [[BolivianArmyEnding walked out in the street]].
126	* ReturningWarVet: "Johnny Come Lately"
127	* ShellShockedVeteran: "Copperhead Road".
128	-->Now the DEA's got a chopper in the air, I wake up screaming like I'm back over there.
129	* SmallTownBoredom: Shows up in a few of his songs, most notably "Someday".
130	-->They ask me how far into Memphis, son, and where's the nearest beer
131	-->And they don't even know that there's a town around here.
132	* SnakeOilSalesman: The subject of the ''Snake Oil'' is this. Though there is a strong possibility the sales department is staffed by corrupt politician(s).

Context Music / SteveEarle