Solo Acoustic, Vol. 1

1	The Barricades of Heaven 5:59
2	Intro 1:43
3	These Days 3:39
4	Intro 0:29
5	The Birds of St. Marks previously unreleased 4:46
6	Intro 2:10
7	Fountain of Sorrow 7:04
8	Your Bright Baby Blues 6:11
9	For a Dancer 4:47
10	Too Many Angels 5:07
11	Intro 1:21
12	For Everyman 4:36
13	Intro 0:29
14	Lives in the Balance 3:38
15	Intro 0:34
16	Looking East 5:42
17	Intro 0:14
18	The Pretender 6:39
19	Intro 1:20
20	Take It Easy 4:08

Barnes & Noble

The "unplugged" concept certainly isn't a new one, but when it's explored by an artist whose songs stand up so sturdily to a good old-fashioned strip-down, it's every bit as fresh as it ever was. That's certainly the case with this disc, Jackson Browne's first live release since 1977's seminal Running on Empty -- a disc that's something of a template for Solo Acoustic Vol. 1, but not an exact blueprint. For one thing, Browne's in much better spirits these days, as evidenced by both his jovial between-song banter and the easygoing manner in which he delivers his classic material. Trading off between guitar (the accompaniment for "Take It Easy") and piano (his instrument of choice on a stellar version of 1986's "Lives in the Balance"), Browne has seldom sounded more natural. Refreshingly, he takes listeners down some less well trodden paths as well, stopping at vistas like the poignant "Barricades of Heaven" and an intimate version of the longing love paean "Your Bright Baby Blues." Pretty much all of the disc's tracks offer something of a departure from their studio versions, but the most intriguing piece might be the one that's never been released before in any form, the elegant "The Birds of St. Marks," which exudes a timeless air that belies its three decades on the shelf. It's nice to hear Browne sounding this revitalized -- and if he's this charged up about his past, it's safe to assume that the road ahead looks mighty bright. David Sprague

All Music Guide

The opening 28 seconds of Jackson Browne's Solo Acoustic, Vol. 1 are massive crowd applause. Even its volume level gets boosted the way it did on live albums from the 1970s. Guess he wants you to know he still matters to people -- and it's totally unnecessary. The music here speaks for itself. Whether or not one appreciates Browne's recorded catalog is immaterial; his gift as a songwriter is enigmatic, unassailable, and singular. There are 12 songs here from throughout Browne's career, ranging from "These Days" and "For Everyman" to "Lives in the Balance" and "Looking East" and all points in between. There are numerous spoken and instrumental intros to the material; Browne's a fine and comfortable communicator when it comes to sitting naked and alone in front of an audience, though sometimes his humor is cynical and borders on bitter. The versions of "For a Dancer" and "The Pretender" are deeply moving as are "These Days" and "Too Many Angels." It would be easy to live without all the intros, as they merely point toward Browne and what he has accomplished, when the songs so easily speak for themselves and for him. Perhaps on volume two he'll let that happen. Despite his many asides, this is a fine and necessary addition to Browne's catalog. Still one has to wonder, with the double-disc Rhino set that appeared earlier in 2005 and these live retrospectives, when there will be new material coming from a songwriter who has had something to say that mattered in each of the last four decades. Let's hope it's soon. Thom Jurek