CD Reviews: T Bone Burnett - Twenty Twenty: The Essential T Bone Burnett and The True False Identity - Page 2

Okay, I said it; and now that the "D" word's been uttered, I might as well go ahead and say that if one wanted to find a functional musical analogue or fellow-traveler for T Bone Burnett, Dylan would just about be it — and not only because Burnett first heightened his profile as one of the musical cast of thousands on Zimmy's 1975 Rolling Thunder Revue tour. In fact, Burnett's taste for verbose, cryptic, symbolism-ridden turns of phrase — as well as the occasional adenoidal sneer — make him for once a deserving recipient of the "New Dylan" award; though he's nowhere near as accessible as the man behind "Blowin' in the Wind," "The Times They Are A-Changin'," or "Like a Rolling Stone," with a little effort T Bone Burnett can be every bit as compelling.

It would be a mistake, however, to merely cast Burnett as a poor (or even rich) man's Dylan. Because, while the pair have about as much in common with one another as anyone can with such idiosyncratic artists, there's little doubt in my mind that not even Bob "Self Portrait" Dylan would have had the balls to throw out a multi-lingual slice of baroque, Van Dyke Parks-arranged psychological pop opera like "Image," just when his audience thought they had him pigeonholed. Yet that's exactly what T Bone Burnett did; first on 1988's sprawling The Talking Animals, and now again on Twenty Twenty. The song is an anomaly, but it's undeniably captivating for it. It's pretentious, but why must that word always have such negative connotations? The fact is, a song like "Image" is unlike virtually anything else in "rock" music, even within Burnett's own discography; and for that reason, any hope of unpacking the heart of T Bone Burnett's persona through his past accomplishments is once again foiled. The fact that the song in question is yet another rumination on the nature of identity and perception is just the delicious icing on the cake.

Listening to The True False Identity, however, one really gets the impression that the obfuscation of Burnett's own identity is an intentional one. "Honesty is the most subversive of all disguises," he intones during the ominous tribal rumble of "Hollywood Mecca of the Movies." "I said goodbye a long time ago / You must not have heard me." And while I'm not one to confuse the poet with the poetic persona, it's hard not to read this as a direct address to the audience, even a statement of intent for The True False Identity as a whole. Here is the core of an ingenious record, Burnett's most complex and fleshed-out investigation of the self yet; an album which drops facades by erecting entirely new ones, often more bewildering than the ones he's given us before.

Article Author: Modern Pea Pod

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