Junky Star

Description

2010 album from acclaimed singer/songwriter Ryan Bingham and his band, the Dead Horses. Bingham recently won the Oscar and Golden Globe for Best Original Song for 'The Weary Kind (Theme from Crazy Heart)', which he co-wrote with multi-Grammy Award winning producer/musician T-Bone Burnett. The collaboration between Bingham and Burnett developed into a solid artistic relationship during the Crazy Heart recordings, and as a result, Burnett signed on to produce Junky Star. All 12 songs on Junky Star were written by Bingham and performed by his longtime band the Dead Horses, featuring Matt Smith (drums), Elijah Ford (bass) and Corby Shaub (guitar/mandolin). Burnett created a recording environment that perfectly complimented the themes and textures of Bingham's reflective songwriting and gravelly voice. "None of us need a hit single or be famous rock stars," he concludes. "Just to be able to make a living playing music and not having to work an eight to five job digging holes makes me feel fortunate enough. I see so many kids living on the street or going off to Afghanistan, so I don't feel comfortable saying I'd been down any tougher road. I'm just another person out here trying to make it." Born in New Mexico and raised all across the Southwest, he set out on his own at a young age, shuffling from town to town looking for a place to sleep between rodeos, day labor, and a weekly gig at a no-frills local bar. That spirit infused Bingham's Lost Highway debut, Mescalito, which won kudos from media outlets as varied as Rolling Stone, Esquire and The Washington Post - the latter noted "anyone seeking to invent a modern-day Texas troubadour couldn't do better than to replicate Ryan Bingham's life story." Indeed, the disc opened many illuminating windows into the soul of a man who, despite still being in his twenties, had already done plenty of living.