Music Review: Jackson Browne, Time the Conqueror

By Steve Morley

In the early 1970s, Jackson Browne’s entrée to the singer/songwriter elite came after penning the Eagles’ debut hit, “Take It Easy.” Though it typified the mellow California ethos at the time, Browne was rarely able to follow the song’s advice. The pensive artist was a watchman on the wall for the remnants of the love generation, chronicling the waning promise of a hoped-for youth revolution. While many of his peers had given up on changing the world as the 70s unfolded, Browne turned his famously bleeding heart toward social activism on projects like 1979’s No Nukes concert. He might be dismissed as a relic of sorts today, if not for the overall excellence of his work and the unwavering commitment to human justice that still informs it today. Browne potently wields his long view of American culture, along with his trademark blend of insight and compassion, on the highly topical Time the Conqueror.  

On Browne’s first all-new release since 2002, he weighs in belatedly on Hurricane Katrina and the U.S. travel ban between America and Cuba. The gently subversive “Going Down to Cuba” sets the singer’s 2004 New York Times editorial to music, decrying the ban’s prohibition of firsthand cultural exchange over a classically Cuban motif. (“People will tell you it’s not easy/ You’re not supposed to go, they say/ They’ll say that Cuba is the enemy/ I’m going down there anyway/ I’m going down to Cuba to see my friends/ Down where the rhythm never ends...”)

“Where Were You” hauntingly examines the social inequities behind the flawed response to the Katrina crisis and pointedly ties the event to a sobering truth that transcends any singular disaster. (“Where were you when you understood/ However decent, however good/ However hard some people try/ They only barely make it by/ They’re born, and live their entire lives in harm’s way.”) Browne’s line of inquiry on “The Drums of War” is more aggressive still, taking point-blank aim at the American government. (“Who is the enemy trying to crush us?/ Who is the enemy of truth and justice?/ Who is the enemy of peace and freedom?/ Where are the courts, now that we need them?/ Why is impeachment not on the table?/ We better stop them while we are able/ Roll out the drums of war…”)

However astute a social critic Browne might be, it’s his admission of his own generation’s failed vision that gives the album dimension and balance. He reviews the sexual permissiveness of the Woodstock era on the breezy “Giving That Heaven Away” and ponders the period’s well-meaning but naïve idealism on “Off of Wonderland.” With songs like “Live Nude Cabaret” and “The Arms of Night,” Browne deflates the myth of innocence surrounding the “free love” of the late ‘60s by connecting dots between that era’s promiscuity and the present-day obsession with sex. “Arms” addresses the unending cycle of conquest, while “Cabaret” condemns the worship of women as objects of gratification. Borrowing a line from the well-known spiritual “Go Down Moses,” Browne seems to ask for deliverance from the hollow idolatry of the female form. (“And men would give them money/ And men would give them gold/And shower them with promises of luxury untold/ And make their vessels of creation/ The temples of our souls/ Oh—let my people go.”)

Though Browne’s robust baritone is dimming in power, neither his eye for injustice nor his grounded optimism shows any sign of weakening. Making conclusions like “in my mind I’m certain/ nothing’s certain yet,” Browne makes it clear on Time the Conqueror that the years rushing under his wheels have yet to conquer his hope.

Audio Clips

"Off of Wonderland"

"The Arms of Night"

"The Drums of War"

"Time the Conqueror"