Steve Earle
Steve Earle
Stephen Fain "Steve" Earleis an American rock, country and folk singer-songwriter, record producer, author and actor. Earle began his career as a songwriter in Nashville and released his first EP in 1982. His breakthrough album was the 1986 album Guitar Town. Since then Earle has released 15 other studio albums and received three Grammy awards. His songs have been recorded by Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Travis Tritt, Vince Gill, Patty Loveless, Shawn Colvin and Emmylou Harris. He has appeared in...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMusician
Date of Birth17 January 1955
CountryUnited States of America
That money was put in that fund for miners who are suffering and dying from black lung, and that's what the intent was and that's what it should be used for.
I'm not trying to get myself deported or something. In a big way this is the most pro-American record I've ever made.
I feel like I owe my audience something. They feed my kids. And I really like my job, a lot.
We're Americans. I don't consider us to be evil, I just don't think we know any better. We're a really young culture. We're hillbillies, and the rest of the world sees us that way. I travel all over the world, and probably the only worse rednecks than us are the Australians. And they're an even younger country.
Politics has always been in my music. Anybody who doesn't understand how political "Copperhead Road" is isn't listening very well.
I really believe that if I make records that are indispensable to my audience, they'll go out and spend money to buy them, even if they've already downloaded them. If they can afford it. If they can't, I'd rather they be able to download it than not get it at all.
What songwriting does better than almost anything is empathy - it's incredibly empathetic. The reason people sat around in bars when they were bummed out and listened to country songs is because it made them feel better in the long run.
I think the music business is changing. Artists that don't want to tour and just want to collect royalty checks and stay home are not going to be able to do that.
I can deal with conservatives in a democracy. With real conservatives, I don't agree with them, but I understand why they believe what they believe and I believe they're being honest with me about it.
My audience doesn't agree with me on everything, but I love my audience, because they're totally okay with us having a dialogue.
It's incredibly irresponsible to allow victims' family members to witness executions.
Songwriters are expanding time rather than compressing time. My short stories tend to be old fashioned, with a beginning, middle and end.
What saves me from being a drug addict is sort of the opposite. It's me realizing that I don't really control anything.
I love theater. I go all the time. It's one of the reasons I moved to New York. But I understand that I have limited range as an actor. I can only play people who talk like me.