"I'm Alive" by Jackson Browne

I really like the earlier work of the musician Jackson Browne. I gather that he used to live with the actress Darryl Hannah, and that they broke up. He wrote, sang and played the songs of their breakup on his album, "I'm Alive." I've loved this album for years, but it has become a part of the soundtrack of my life during the past year.

Several of the songs have been great for walking and punching the air, such as the title song. One of the songs, "Sky Blue and Black," is able to bring tears to my eyes, easily. It's really worth a listen. It's full of poetry and heartbreak, confession and longing, acceptance and pain. It's about love, and love gone horribly wrong.

He has written many great songs. He's a fantastic poet. He wrote a couple of songs that Katie and I both liked a lot: "She Must Be Somebody's Baby," which I recall singing loudly in the car with the windows open, and "In the Shape of a Heart," another break-up song. Oh, and Katie and David both like "The Pretender," among others. It was fun to share my favorite "older" artists with them, like Jackson Browne, and James Taylor, who was their first, real, live concert experience...outdoors, on the bluffs overlooking the Columbia River Gorge, one evening in the summer of 2005. A very fine experience indeed.