Watching America disappear

Charley Engel, Columnist | Last updated Sep 14, 2004 12:0pm0

Tom Russell. photo by Lynn Woodward Americana singer-songwriter Tom Russell and guitar ace Andrew Hardin brought their unique stylings to the Sisters Folk Festival last weekend to the delight of hundreds. Russell is a songwriter's songwriter.

Each of his story songs mixes the meat and spices of everyday people caught in the simmering complexities of the human condition. He then wraps each one up in a tortilla shell of tasty tunesmithing. Johnny Cash, Nanci Griffith, Guy Clark, Dave Alvin, Joe Ely, Ian Tyson, Suzy Bogguss, Iris DeMent, k.d. lang, and Katy Moffatt have all covered his material.

As we sat down I gained an instant rapport with Mr. Russell. It turns out that we both have bad backs. Mine came from being bucked off a colt and his -- now I am purely speculating here -- came from kicking the butts of inept reporters for 30 years.

Nugget: The Sisters Folk Festival Americana music program has touched the lives of over 400 young people. Does a community shortchange itself when it forces schools to choose between math and music?

TR: "Definitely, yeah. We really don't hold the arts in high enough esteem in this country compared, say, to Ireland or Spain, countries where they still hold song writers and players right up with lawyers and doctors. I think music is just as important as math. Math is very important -- you gotta balance your checkbook-- but music brings a lot of joy to people."

Nugget: In El Paso, Texas, you have been involved with "Save The Valley," which is trying to keep overdevelopment from eating up the remaining farm lands in the Upper Valley of the Rio Grande. Sisters is going through very similar growing pains. How do you respond to those who say, "Progress happens, and it cannot be stopped."

TR: "America, no matter where you travel, basically looks the same, especially from the highway. You look around and the country you are living in is being destroyed. Everything looks the same -- so what does that do to people's character?

"So I'm really concerned about that as much as anything else. Because we're accepting of it. It can be stopped -- but we're accepting the fact that the McDonald's is coming; the WalMart is coming. And if you protest against it people think your being a communist or something.

"But its a cultural thing to me. Why would you want your kids to grow up around all these things? It's destroying the character of our people.

"This country was created by people who wanted to get away from oppression. They had a lot of character, those first people. That was a different kind of person that could do that (clear a homestead from the wilderness). A strong person. And all that's being eroded, the more and more of this kind of homogenization happens. You don't run into a lot of real American characters and heroes any more because of this kind of cultural thing happening.

"We're living in a country that's really owned by.... white, monied developers (who) own the city councils. Under the guise of 'development has to happen and all of it is good,' they jam this stuff in and before you know it -- there it is.

"The average Joe like me and you can't spend the amount of time fighting it in city council. But these developers have five or six lawyers that are in city council chambers every day ramming through zoning laws that permit this.

"All development is supposed to be good for us and it's not -- in the long run."

Nugget: Your music to date is mostly about the human condition. But your new song lamenting the passing of radical environmentalist Edward Abbey is more edgy, more political.

TR: "It's edgy but I refuse to be put into a political bag. I've rarely voted, I'm not interested in politicians. I wouldn't walk across the street to see George Bush or Kerry. They don't impact my world.

"What impacts my world is the day-to-day life of people, how they suffer, and putting that into my art. That's what's important to me. Edward Abbey... was a pretty wild, weird guy that couldn't be put in a peg and I liked his spirit. I'm working on a record called 'Hot Walker,' about lots of lost people and voices. Abbey delivers a speech on this record for about a minute telling people to go out and take the wilder trails and preserve our wild nature. It's a very moving speech."