STEVE EARLE & THE DUKES
Ghosts Of West Virginia NEW WEST
8/10
ON April 5, 2010, 300 metres beneath Raleigh County, West Virginia, methane seeping from the coal seams of Massey Energy’s Upper Big Branch mine ignited and exploded. Fire roared through two miles of subterranean tunnel and killed 29 miners. Investigations blamed dereliction of safety procedures; Massey’s CEO, Don Blankenship, was convicted in 2015 of conspiring to violate safety standards, and jailed for a year.
This is the background that informs, arguably Steve Earle’s best album since 2002’s . Earle wrote seven of these 10 songs to accompany a drama by Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen – , drawn from interviews with miners who survived the Upper Big Branch disaster, and families of the miners who didn’t. When the play is staged, Earle serves, as he puts it, as “a Greek chorus with a guitar”. But the songs hold up handsomely on their own merits, well served by the poise and pugnacity of the Dukes – joined here by Chris Robinson Brotherhood bassist Jeff Hill, stepping in for long-serving Earle sideman Kelley Looney, who died last November, aged 61.
