Pennsylvanian singer/ songwriter JEFFERSON PEPPER etched himself indelibly on our conscience with his 2006 debut album 'Christmas In Fallujah'. It was, for this writer, up there with Wilco's towering 'Yankee Hotel Foxtrot' in terms of articulating the rage and frustration of living in modern day America. And trying to make sense of the consequences thereof.
As 'Christmas in Fallujah"s title suggested, Pepper's music was potent and politically-charged and also shot through with personal darkness as the album's title track was written in response to one of his best friends' posting to Iraq. 'Christmas In Fallujah' - the song - is also extremely important as it's perhaps the most resonant anthem written about the whole Iraq campaign and its' horrific consequences. It served notice that - finally - there was a younger gun out there unafraid to stand along with seasoned campaigners like Neil Young and Bruce Springsteen when it came to vocally sticking two very rigid digits up at George Dubya's lunatic foreign policy.
Ironically, 'Fallujah"s erstwhile follow up arrives with the American Election campaign turning into a battle royal. But then again, what better time to take stock and look back to look forward while (please God) the wind of change blows though Congress? Why not indeed, says Jefferson Pepper, unleashing his - at least partially - self-explanatory 'American Evolution': the 'Red' album in a trilogy of albums he'll be releasing (the other two are, naturally, the 'White' and 'Blue' albums) in a feverish six-month spell this year.
Sounds ambitious? Well, yeah, 50 tracks over three breathlessly-released albums probably sounds more in keeping with Guided By Voices or Ryan Adams' strike rates, while the idea of covering the evolution of American society from 1492 through to the present day over the course of three lengthy albums may well read like folly on the grandest scale imaginable.
But fear not, for with 'American Evolution - Volume 1' Pepper and his hugely-talented chums are really hitting their stride. Yes, there are 17 tracks all told and it clocks in at a generous 70 minutes, but the great news is that is rivetting stuff all the way and the wastage is utterly miniscule.
Indeed, it's testament to how creatively charged Jeff and his pals are that they have sequenced 'American Evolution' to open with an epic song that most bands would keep in reserve specifically for the grandstanding finale. The song in question is called 'Can't Go Home' and it's basically a potted history of the USA and the changes its' 'evolution' have wreaked upon the individual from 1492 through to 1940. Fading in on birdsong, it's initially resigned and pretty, with Pepper singing of "the land of their fathers, the land of their sons/ all held in common, enough for everyone" before the band slide in and he brings us into the 20th century and the onset of war ("live the good old days through a dreamy haze/ 'til you wake and come around in your little concrete shelter seven stories underground") while they transform it into something truly passionate and anthemic.
It's quite a start and while it's tempting to think you've immediately come upon this record's 'Christmas in Fallujah', I'd personally reserve that honour for 'Trail Of Tears', which is a magnificently-observed vignette reflecting the frustration all decent, right-thinking Americans must feel about their wonderful country's decimated public image around the world. "From the Trail of Tears to the roadsides of Iraq/ we're fighting our enemies, too many aren't coming back/ the emperor's without a stitch...when will we ever see?" sings Pepper with feeling over a proud'n'bloodied chiming rocker taking its' cue from The Replacements or 'Life's Rich Pageant'-era REM. They score again with a similar stylistic set-piece a little later on, courtesy of 'Rockefellers': a chugging, Crazy Horse-ish affair where America's Industrial Revolution is the backdrop and a world-weary Pepper reminds us the deadliest sharks ("the most hated man in America made a fortune on the Civil War/ shipping mass destruction and soldiers by the score/ and his Ohio factories refined Pennsylvania crude") are always ready to go into feeding frenzy and exploit a favourable economic situation.
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Crucially, though, one of the reasons Jefferson Pepper is emerging as such a potent force is that he writes brilliantly when addressing the personal as well as the political. Having grown up the grandson of coal miners and farmers and the son of a factory worker, Pepper intrinsically understands the darker underbelly of the bloated American dream and how it can often rebound on the middle American individual. And, like Billy Bragg, it's sometimes when he turns his hand to writing of the plight of the individual that he really scores.
'American Evolution - Volume 1' hoards a healthy cache of such poignant slices of life and several are among the very best tracks here. 'Can't Come Back' is a folksily personal tale of making the best of the hand you're dealt and its' image of "goin' like a freight train, rollin' down a one-way track/ once you've gone it's forever" is a universal image we can all relate to. Then there's the great 'I Don't Wanna Be Alone' - a gentle country ballad about a couple growing old together which is never less than dignfied and true - and the delightful, waltz-time 'Paperback Romance': an involved small-town narrative about the girl everyone assumes will be left on the shelf who finally falls head over heels in love against the odds and lives happily ever after. Hurrah!
Musically, Pepper's aim with his 'American Evolution' trilogy is to cover as many folk and rock-related styles as are appropriate with the subject matter. However, while 'Volume 1' takes in everything from old-time Appalachian-style tunes through to acoustic folk, full-on rock'n'roll and even a pair of heady, Doug Dillard-style bluegrass instrumentals in 'Lewis &Clark Homecoming' and 'Appomattox' (celebrating the historic 19th century expedition and the end of the US Civil War respectively), it rarely sounds forced or overblown. Actually, the only time they threaten to succumb to pastiche is with the throwaway closing tune 'Primates Swingin': a fun, but disposable Texan swing outing concerning Darwin's theory which has its' tongue very firmly in its' cheek. There again, even this outing has its' flashes of genius as the lyric manages to rhyme "homo erectus" with "prospectus" along the way. So there.
There's much more, of course, but there again with 17 tracks, over 70 minutes of music and the best part of 500 years of history to work with, you probably wouldn't expect an artist to write Residents-style 45 second snippets, would you? Crucially, though, where 'American Evolution' is concerned, quality goes hand in hand with quantity at all times and whether Jefferson Pepper is addressing America's rich history, big modern day issues or small victories notched up by the little man along the way, he makes the grade with compassion to spare. It all adds up to an alternative history lesson that should be a compulsory curriculum entry for all discerning music heads out there from now on.
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