I’ll be danged if James McMurtry didn’t come up with 2025’s definitive song about the music business — “Sailing Away,” a track on The Black Dog and the Wandering Boy, which is one of his best albums to date. I’ve been a fan of this storyteller of the fading liberal fringe for years, and the degraded United States he described on 2021’s The Horses and the Hounds has become even more problematic as Trump continues to roll out his obsessions. In short, McMurtry is a Texas singer-songwriter who seems to like rock ’n’ roll and specializes in a kind of studio rock that also makes room for pop. The aforementioned “Sailing Away” demonstrates McMurtry’s savvy as a record maker — the track develops into music that surprises because he understands how to open out his arrangements. “Sailing Away” questions whether McMurtry can even go on in the music business, and it features the album’s best line: “Opening for Isbell in some cavernous room.” In the equally surprising track “Pinocchio in Vegas,” which might be 2025’s best song about the legal system, McMurtry gets off the album’s second-best line: “He had to sue Walt Disney over copyright control.” Starting Feb. 4, McMurtry settles in for a two-night run at 3rd and Lindsley. BettySoo opens.
Feb. 4-5 at 3rd and Lindsley
818 Third Ave. S.
