Jason and the Scorchers

Clear Impetuous Morning
Atlantic-Mammoth
*** (out of 4)

News-Leader (Springfield, MO), November 10, 1996

Copyright 1996 - 2004 - The News-Leader

Offering a demented but entertaining mix of punk and country, Jason and the Scorchers have built a loyal, if small, following during their turbulent 15 years of promising reviews and tepid album sales. Nonetheless, Jason Ringenberg and his cohorts soldier on, continuing to tour and cut neat (if hardly best-selling) albums.
They open with the frantic frolic of “Self-Sabotage” then storm into the relatively relaxed “Cappucino Rosie”, a funny love song. They also tear into “Victory Road”, a song of determination with images of Elvis, and enlist Emmylou Harris for the aching folky country of “Everything Has a Cost”. Ringenberg wrote 13 of the 14 songs, and could have written something similar to his cover of Gram Parsons’ snide “Drugstore Truck Drivin’ Man”.
Whatever the source for his material, Ringenberg delivers it with a brash authority, sounding country when he needs to (“Going Nowhere”), harder and edgier (“Tomorrow Has Come Today”) or something in between (“Cappucino Rosie”). He always sounds good, and maybe this album will do better than other releases that quietly came and went.

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