Album of the month - December 2023

​Bruce cockburn - nothing but a burning light

​I’d love to feature a new-ish album for yas, but well, it’s the month of Christmas and this 30+ year old album features the best Christmas song ever fuckin’ written.
Cockburn’s clear, lucid and semi-poetic lyrics put you in a song like few writers can. Springsteen was able to from the 70’s to the early 80’s, Jackson Browne did it as well, early in his career… Van Morrison is still doing it (on a whole other level), but y’all get it, this is a rare ability.
This album doesn’t rock out, but when you have Jim Keltner, Edgar Meyer, Mark O’Connor and Booker T. Jones lending a hand, it can’t be anything but awesome. The album is a serious piece like a lot of BC’s work, but it’s beautifully musical. T Bone Burnett’s help on guitar is there, but Cockburn is a fantastic 6-stringer himself. Check out Booker T’s organ work on Mighty Trucks of Midnight – freakin’ sublime.
I have to admit, when this came out in 1991, I was spending a lot of late nights alone in a barn, fixin’/makin’ furniture and refinishing antiques. This is a great album for this kind of solitary work.
The album as a whole is VERY listen-able, but my ‘standout’ picks would be Somebody Touched Me and the aforementioned Christmas tune, Cry of A Tiny Babe.
Give’er a listen and let us know whatcha think.
 
The Merriest of Christmases to You – God bless.
JJ and the Belmar Guitar Crew