20Th Century Masters-DVD Collections

These five music videos, originally intended for play on TNN and CMT, present the hitmaking country star that Steve Earle was in the mid-'80s. The focus is mostly on the singer/songwriter/guitarist himself as he fronts his band in some of his better-known songs of the period. "Guitar Town" is, essentially, a mini-documentary of Earle on the road, as he rides a bus, plays shows, and autographs posters. "Someday," a song of aspiration sung in the character of a small-town gas station attendant, is a black-and-white film with footage of a small town interspersed with Earle's performance. In "Nowhere Road," Earle in the studio has a highway superimposed over his face for much of the running time. "I Ain't Ever Satisfied" is another largely black-and-white treatment that, along with a performance, features some odd roadside footage culminating in a guitar bonfire that includes a cameo by Waylon Jennings. The Earle of the first four videos is a charismatic figure who appears to be young and healthy, but by the time of "Copperhead Road" in 1988, he's looking somewhat more weathered, unshaven with a headband covering his forehead, as he details the story of the grandson of a moonshiner and son of a bootlegger who comes back from Vietnam to start growing marijuana. (Country radio didn't have much use for the song.) This video has plenty of appropriate scenes of stills and backwoods living to provide visuals to the tale. The collection is short, but it gives a good sense of the early years of Earle's popular career. ~ William Ruhlmann|