Fais Do-Do, Gris Gris, Allons…

Occasional Albums Thing 060 - Steve Earle & The Dukes (& Duchesses) “The Low Highway”

We’re heading into quite a run of Steve Earle records that I’ve either recently acquired or forgot to write-up when I did acquire it (don’t know how that happened), so buckle up we’re heading for outlaw country.

The “Low Highway” is another addition to my collection of Steve Earle albums with cover art by Tony Fitzpatrick, I love Tony's artwork as much as Steve's music. In reading about the making of this record I discovered that Tony passed away in October 2025 at the age of 66. As I’m writing this on the day of my 63rd birthday that seems incredibly young to me. Much like Steve Earle, Tony was open about his relationship with drugs and alcohol. Tony produced artwork for Steve Earle’s albums for almost 30 years, beginning (I think) with “I Feel Alright” in 1996. His art is great, you can check it out at https://tonyfitzpatrick.co .

Originally released in 2013, "The Low Highway" is Steve Earle's 15th studio album. It‘s a road album, about both being on the road, touring, and about the road America is on. That may be why, for only the fifth time, a Steve Earle album credits his road band The Dukes and, somewhat cumbersomely, The Duchesses (on this record the Dukes included Earle's then wife Allison Moorer and fiddle/mandolin-ist Eleanor Whitmore).

At the same time it’s an album with its heart in Louisiana. Earle had recently played played Harley Watt, a street musician and busker in HBO's acclaimed TV series “Treme”, which looked at life in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. Two of the songs here, the quite delightful "After Mardi Gras" and "That All You Got?", were originally aired in the series, the latter being a bouncy Creole/Zydeco swinger sung together with (I’m guessing) Allison Moorer. Two of the songs ("After Mardi Gras" and "Love's Gonna Blow My Way", a sorta Django/Grapelli Jazzy type high stepper) were written with violinist, singer and actress Lucia Micarelli, who played another street musician, Annie Talarico, in “Treme”.

The opening two songs tell you about the varied styles you’ll encounter within. Title track “The Low Highway” is a Country ballad, with some beautiful pedal steel by Duke Chris Masterson, a song that puts me in mind of Springsteen’s “The Ghost Of Tom Joad” (I’ve always hoped that there’s a Springsteen/Earle mutual appreciation thing going on out there) with lines like…

Saw empty houses on dead end streets
People linin’ up for something to eat
And the ghost of America watching me
From the broken windows of the factories

…while second song “Calico County” (an imaginary County where Dad’s in prison, brother drives stolen trucks through graveyards and Friday nights are spent suckin’ on a Meth pipe…can’t wait to visit !) serves up crunching guitar riffs, balls out Rockin’ style.

“Invisible” is a beautiful song written from the perspective of a homeless person (“Brother, can you spare a dollar and a dime ?, The cupboard's bare and I'm invisible”)  and was nominated for the Best American Roots Song Grammy in 2014 and may well be this albums standout track.

The old time Bluegrass stepper "Warren Hellman's Banjo" is a tribute to billionaire investment banker and private equity investor F. Warren Hellman, not the usual kinda person you might imagine Steve Earle paying tribute to but Hellman also started and funded the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival, a free 3 day festival held in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park which in 2026 celebrates its 25th year..

“The Low Highway” is a grab bag of scenes and stories and styles from a life lived on the road. As Earle himself says in the  sleevenotes (sentiments I can wholeheartedly endorse)…

“I’ve been on every interstate highway in the lower forty-eight states by now and I never get tired of the view. I’ve seen a pretty good chunk of the world and my well-worn passport is one of my most prized possessions, but for me, there’s still nothing like the first night of a North American tour: everybody, band and crew, crowded up in the front lounge…And I’m always the last one to holler good night to Charlie Quick, the driver, and climb in my bunk because to me it feels like Christmas Eve long ago when I still believed in Santa Claus. God I love this.”

The more I listen to it the more “The Low Highway” is becoming a real favourite. It’s maybe not as Country as some of Steve’s records which might make it an easier listen for the Country-challenged. I think in time I’ll start telling those that don’t know that this is one of those Steve Earle albums you really need to hear.

The Low Highway - https://youtu.be/Qkv-yRyjdzk?si=-eDqrpJyUzlcV6os