Review Summary: "This right here, this is music."
The legacy of Jim Croce has had a Hell of a couple years. First one of his songs was featured in
X-Men: Days of Future Past, and then in 2017 he was featured in
Logan and
Stranger Things. With this, the late Folk singer has been receiving a lot of new attention recently. However, for those who want to get into Jim Croce, they won't know where to start. Of course, the starting point should be
You Don't Mess With Jim. Croce had previously hit the Folk scene with two studio albums in both 1966 and 1969. While both were good Folk albums, it wasn't until this album that Croce began to develop his style of bare bones, old-style, Folk Country. Released in 1972,
You Don't Mess With Jim is Jim Croce's finest album, and one of the greatest Folk albums of the 1970's.
When it comes to tracks, none compare to the title track
You Don't Mess Around With Jim, a classic Wild West style track with pulsating percussion, simple acoustic arrangements, and Jim's recognizable North/South singing accent. A common motif of this album is cautious optimism, with many of Croce's lyrics discussing sad situations with a small touch of optimistic thought. From
Tomorrow's Gonna Be A Brighter Day where he tells someone he loves that their painful days will soon be over, to
New York's Not My Home where he discusses the alienation and discomfort he felt living in the North. Jim sings these thoughts with sincerity, trusting the audience not to judge him for his cynicism or his misgivings, as there are reasons he is the way he is.
Of course not everything involves sad thoughts.
Walking Back To Georgia has a hopeful aura around it as Croce sings of going back to the countryside to live out the rest of his life. Another standout track goes to
Operator (That's Not The Way It Feels); a soft, three-minute tune featuring over-dubbed vocals and some beautiful acoustic rhythm. Like many other tracks on the album, Jim's are filled with a cautious optimism, as he sings of a man looking for the number of a former lover who betrayed him. The man wishes to tell his lover that he is over her, but then confesses to the operator that he is lying to himself.
Another one of his best tracks in his whole career would definitely be
Time In A Bottle, a song that brings out the deepest of emotions within Jim as he contemplates how he wishes to do so many things with the one he loves, but admits that he does not have enough time to do all of these things. It is a short tune, but one in which it's guitar playing is done with such discipline, that Jim's emotion manifests itself through the entire track, becoming a sad revelation that the listener cannot forget.
You Don't Mess With Jim was Jim Croce's most successful album at the time of it's release, and with another album coming a year later, Croce was poised to become an absolute superstar. Sadly, weeks before the release of his 1973 album, Croce was killed in a plane crash. He left his wife, son, and an entire fanbase with both his new album, and a posthumous album later that same year. With his death, Folk lost an artist with extraordinary potential. He was an artist with love in his heart, wisdom in his mind, and peace in his soul; qualities that he injected into every song he wrote. With his music, it was as if Croce treated his audience like a diary, telling them his deepest thoughts and emotions, hoping they would learn something from him.
For those just getting into Croce, wondering what truly defines his music. I'll just leave these verses from this album's final track
Hey Tomorrow, verses that still speaks to me no matter how many times I listen to it.
Hey tomorrow, I can't show you nothin'
You've seen it all pass by your door
So many times I said I been changin'
Then slipped into patterns of what happened before'
Cause I've been wasted and I've over-tasted
All the things that life gave to me
And I've been trusted, abused and busted
And I've been taken by those close to me
Hey tomorrow you've gotta believe that
I'm through wastin' what's left of me
'Cause night is fallin' and the dawn is callin'
I'll have a new day if she'll have me.
The rest, I'll leave up to you.
