Consumer Guide Album

Hamell on Trial: Choochtown [Such-a-Punch, 1999]
Ed Hamell is a DIY folkie with a punky band who inhabits the sleazy corner where boonie bohemia meets pure low-life. Drugs can make that happen, as can marginal employment slipping toward petty crime. His pals Chooch and Joe Brush certainly don't read Hammett, maybe Elmore Leonard or Carl Hiaasen for the warm weather. I bet Hamell reads them all--and that along with talk TV, they've influenced his narrative poesy. B+