Ry Cooder - Pull Up Some Dust And Sit Down

2-LP Set, 140-gram vinyl with insert and bonus CD

"These times," says Ry Cooder, "call for a very different kind of protest song. 'Where Have All the Flowers Gone?' We're way down the road from that."

Whether serving as a session musician, solo artist, or soundtrack composer, Ry Cooder's chameleon-like fretted instrument virtuosity, songwriting, and choices of material encompass an incredibly eclectic range of North American musical styles, including rock & roll, blues, reggae, Tex-Mex, Hawaiian, Dixieland jazz, country, folk, R&B, gospel, and vaudeville.

On his fourth solo effort for Nonesuch/Perro Verde Records, the globe-trotting composer, singer, and multi-instrumentalist leaves behind the fantastical yarn-spinning, the magical realism, and allegorical tunes of his acclaimed, Grammy Award-nominated California trilogy — Chavez Ravine (2005), My Name Is Buddy (2007), and I, Flathead (2008) — for the most forthright album of his career. The 14 songs on Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down are, by turns, angry, outraged, bitterly funny, and deeply poignant. With brilliant, Woody Guthrie-like directness and a healthy dollop of satire, Cooder's lyrics address the often-sorry state of our domestic affairs: the bank bailout, the anti-immigration movement, the ever-growing gap between rich and poor, and the never-ending war in the Middle East and its devastating physical and emotional toll on young soldiers.