Son Volt

Jay Farrar has never been all that interested in experimentation. Hell, his desire to plow ahead, nose to the grindstone, was one of the contributing factors to the dissolution of Uncle Tupelo all those years ago. But his musical trajectory since is proof that he wouldn't have it any other way. You see, the flipside to Farrar's lack of experimental ambition is a driving and passionate certainty about what it is he does want to do. American Central Dust, his latest, is an assured step in the same direction Farrar's been heading since the early '90s, leaning a bit more heavily on mournful mid-tempo country than on the firm, dusty boogie of honky-tonk bar rock, often evoking the dust-bowl vignettes of March 16-20, 1992, with Farrar's deeply sonorous voice lending world-weary credibility. This one won't rocket him back into the hipster limelight, but he'd much rather be a musician than a rock star, anyway.