The Patriot game
New EP by local rocker Will Hoge asks hard questions about war and peace
Amid a divisive election season, it takes nerve for a Middle American roots-rocker like Nashvillian Will Hoge to title an album The America EP. Hoge makes his political position clear with "Hey Mr. President (Anyone But You)," a cheeky talking blues that's already received airplay on Air America, the liberal radio talk-show network featuring Al Franken and Janeane Garofalo. Oddly enough, performed with a crooked grin, it's the album's most lighthearted tune.
For obvious reasons perhaps, The America EP is Hoge's most folk-based effort yet (he even offers a creditable remake of Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin' "). The best thing about the album, though, is that the politics are character-driven; indeed, the two best songs—"Bible vs. Gun" and "America"—come from the perspective of young soldiers.
The former tells of an American frontliner in Iraq writing to his mother, explaining how he's come to realize that the realities of war—"these things I've seen and done"—conflict with his religious upbringing. The title track, the album's hardest-rocking tune, finds an infantryman heading overseas, his wife pregnant with their first child. The young man battles questions about his mission by praying for deliverance, doing his job and hoping to make it home. And he does, only to have the demons in his head break up his family.
The America EP is a layover album for Hoge, who previously issued two solid albums for Atlantic Records. That he uses his creative freedom to make a political statement proves he's a grassroots artist who's more about heart than calculated industry positioning.
—Michael McCall
