Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down

Used to be, we called them “stories” – reportage, analysis, investigation–
the thing we’d come to know as “news.” You’d snap open a newspaper
and travel deep into different worlds, discover some sense of your place
or role in it. More and more, Ry Cooder noted the absence of such
“stories.” Instead of breadth or depth, there was something vague called
“content”– not context – that made us aware but not informed.

His new album, “Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down” grew out of this
information void – and the pervasive political and corporate doublespeak that began swirling in its absence. Snaking through it are familiar
themes – the struggle toward real democracy, the trials of the working
man, the elusive goal of equality – set against the mayhem of
contemporary front page news. Paired with it is Cooder’s fluent
command of the rhythms and textures of American vernacular music -
but bent and reshaped for this moment.

These songs – forthright, declarative – express sentiments or critiques
often voiced only in private, among family or ideological allies. “People
listen to music with a different part of their mind,” says Cooder. “We
need to hear some of these ideas and hear them in musical settings.