VICTOR, Idaho — A songwriter’s songwriter, a champion of the working class, and an honest voice of the structural abandonment of the American heartland, James McMurtry still tells it like it is. And lucky for us, he’s made Teton County a regular stop over the years. Here’s yet another chance to experience his quiet endurance as a highly respected crafter of song, an unvarnished truth-teller. There’s no better place to experience “We Can’t Make it Here” or “Cheney’s Toy” than the Knotty Pine in Victor, this Wednesday.
To those who thought McMurtry’s mid-tempo, roots rock fused with dry wit, realism, a dark edge, and flawed characters couldn’t evolve, give a listen to his latest work, 2025’s The Black Dog and the Wandering Boy, and start with the devastating “South Texas Lawman.” Eleven studio albums into his career, McMurtry seems fearless against irrelevance and has a gift for forcing listeners to view life through the eyes of the damaged and desperate, all the while maintaining hyper-literate lyrics. And he’s been doing this since 1989’s Too Long in the Wasteland. Inquiring minds would like to know, James…
Buckrail: When you are translating real-world fragments into a gritty story song, how do you navigate the musical elements (or lack thereof)? And does a song get treated on stage versus studio to support the lyrics?
McMurtry: You do what you think is gonna work, and if it doesn’t, you try something else.
Buckrail: Decluttering and a forced reality of the complexities of American life is what attracts many folks to your lyrics, including myself. And there’s a deeper line when it comes to balancing worldview, giving song characters dignity, all the while not being outwardly preachy. What is your process for finding the exact point of empathy required to make characters human rather than a talking point? Does it comes through refinement, more of conversational lyrical approach, or combination?
McMurtry: I hear a couple lines and a melody in my head. I think, “Who said that?” and try to conjure up a character who might have spoken or thought those lines. If I can find the character, I can sometimes find a story that the character fits into. If the result is cool enough to keep me up at night, I’ll keep playing with the lines and melody until the story falls into a verse/chorus structure that can be sung.
Buckrail: When there’s a big idea, a character to develop, does the short form of song challenge you with word efficiency to get the points across?
McMurtry: Short form is no problem for me. Long form is a problem. So, I don’t write prose.
Buckrail: What’s the biggest challenge for you as a touring artist in the current state of the biz?
McMurtry: Booking lodging for a band on weekends in Rocky Mountain states. It’s hard to profit on a door gig in Missoula when the rooms start at $500 per night.
McMurtry will be joined by his bandmates of The Martial Law Review: Tim Holt (guitar), Cornbread (bass), and Daren Hess (drums).
James McMurtry and The Martial Law Review, 9 p.m. on Wednesday, Aug. 5, at the Knotty Pine in Victor. $35. KnottyPineSupperClub.com.
