Consumer Guide Album

Jackson Browne: Lives in the Balance [Asylum, 1986]
These antiwar songs give him plenty in common with Holly Near--he even puts nueva canción musicians on the title track. While Browne goes in for higher octane folk-rock, I'll pass on the remixes if you don't mind. The difference is that Browne shouldn't be doing this--however goody-goody his fans or political his recent rep, he's a pop star who's stretching his audience and endangering his market share merely by making such a statement in 1986. And he's thought hard getting here--not only does his way with words render these lyrics somewhat deeper than Holly Near's, but his moralistic put-downs have that edge of righteous anger nobody's yet found the formula for. B