LYLE LOVETT

Music among great players can be a conversation

- ROGIER VAN BAKEL

2022 IS TURNING OUT TO BE A GOOD YEAR FOR LYLE LOVETT, NOT LEAST BECAUSE HE IS, TO USE A COWBOY METAPHOR, BACK IN THE SADDLE. “I’VE BEEN OUT OF WORK FOR TWO YEARS,” HE SAYS ARCHLY. NORMALLY, LOVETT PERFORMS MORE THAN 100 CONCERTS A YEAR, REGARDLESS OF WHETHER HE’S RELEASED NEW WORK. BUT THE PANDEMIC PINNED HIM DOWN AT HOME IN HOUSTON, WITH HIS WIFE AND THEIR NOW–four-year-old twins, in the house his grandfather built in 1911. Domesticity suits Lovett. “There was plenty to do every minute of every day. Absolutely no boredom!” He sounds like he means it; unselfconscious mentions of paternal tenderness bubbled up in our conversation from time to time.

Still, for a change of scenery and to keep himself plugged in creatively, Lovett organized 20 live streams (some free, some pay-to-play), where he’d invite colleagues like John Hiatt, Shawn Colvin, Robert Earl Keen, Dwight Yoakam, and Marcus King. Sometimes he and his guest would get upward of a quarter-million live views—not bad for a guy who hadn’t released an album since 2012.

That recording dry spell ended on May 13 with a new song assortment called 12th of June (mild boos to his label, Verve Records, for not choosing June 12 as the release date). In other news, Lovett’s bestselling album to date, 1992’s Joshua Judges Ruth, was rereleased in March as a Vinyl Me Please double-disc anniversary edition.1