John Prine - Pink Cadillac

John Prine – Pink Cadillac

Asylum, 1979
Acquired: Half Price Books, Used, 2013
Price: $1.50

Annnd, after a terrific run of five records that ranged from pretty damn good to phenomenal, John Prine finally churns out a dud. It’s not that the album is half-covers (his version of Roly Salley’s “Killing the Blues” is one of the best tracks on the album), it’s that it’s trying to hard to be a rollicking 50s C&W affair that it totally fails to define itself. Of the original tracks on the record, “Down by the Side of the Road” is really the only salvageable one and one of the only tracks that doesn’t get lost in trying to Prine’s attempt to burn down not only the barn, but the house, the car, and the whole goddamn county with his rollicking band of shitkickers.