Rodney Crowell and I share a birthday, yet for his 75th last August, the Houston Kid released his 17th studio album, Airline Highway. Like New West Records labelmate James McMurtry’s The Black Dog and the Wandering Boy two months earlier, Crowell’s hardscrabble Texicana gets wiser by decade. Country melodicism stills leavens Lone Star songwriter truthsaying. Which oughta pair perfectly with Itasca native and veteran ATX bard Sam Baker, whose only seventh full-length Win Win in 2024 takes his oral history talking to its deepest poignancy yet. Texan William Burroughs maybe, or Gil Scott-Heron? Two nights gets everyone inside the room. – Raoul Hernandez
