Johnny wasn’t goin’ for any of that shit, no sir. The show, as I recall it, anyway, was just Johnny, singing, alone and with guest stars. Being Johnny cash, he pulled in all sorts of people you wouldn’t otherwise have expected to see on TV. Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell were on the first episode, so that should give you some idea of what I’m talking about.

What put me in mind of all this is John Doe’s new album, Forever Hasn’t Happened Yet. May I go off on a tangent for a moment? Some network (preferably not MTV) should give Doe a show like Johnny’s. Every week the show would open on a solitary figure, clad head to toe in black, standing back to the camera, in a tight spotlight. Suddenly he’d turn around, wait a second or two to break into a grin, and then he’d say, “Hello, I’m John Doe.” The show it self would be Doe interacting with various roots/indie rock greats. The duet he’d do with Merle Haggard on "Silver Wings" would alone be worth the price of setting up such a venture.

I think that’s the kind of programming America is crying out for – the so-called “reality” programming is finally being seen as the gilded cup of crap that it is. Network executives, you know I’m right. I await your call.

OK, back to the business at hand. This album is set up kinda like Johnny’s show was, except there’s no “Ride This Train” segment. What it does have is John singing, alone and with… well, guest stars. Fellow Knitter/erstwhile member of X and The Blasters, Dave Alvin, plays guitar on the first three tracks: “The Losing Kind”, “Heartless”, and “Mama Don’t”; Beck cohort Smokey Hormel lays down six-string backup on “There’s A Black Horse”. On the vocal side of things, Grant Lee Phillips provides backing vox on the rocking “Heartless” and some especially beautiful harmonies on the haunted “Twin Brother”. Cindy Lee Berryhill does the same on the melancholy “Your Parade” and set closer “Repeat Performance”.

Slipping in for one-shot deals are Kristin Hersh on the ode to fallen comrades “Ready”, and Neko Case on “Hwy. 5”, which Doe co-wrote with ex-wife/X co-conspirator Exene. Hersh acquits herself very well; Case, on the other hand, is something of a ghostly presence – you know she’s there, but you can’t quite get a fix on where she is. This is not what I expected coming in. Case is a fantastic harmonizer, as she’s proven on her on albums and in her work with The New Pornographers. One might be excused for thinking that Hersh’s voice would overpower damn near anyone she went up against. She gets the benefit of the better song and the better mix, here. Which is not to take anything away from Kristin’s performance in the slightest. Rather, I’m a little mystified as to how Neko got buried in the mix of “Hwy. 5”, especially when she’s singing what was originally written as Exene’s part. I’ve long thought that Case and Doe’s voices would work incredibly well together. I still think so, provided that they get equal weight in the mix.

Ooooh, I almost forgot Doe’s own daughter, Veronica Jane. She provides some backing harmonies for the old man on “Mama Don’t”. And I’m happy to say that she doesn’t let the team down. She’s no Neko Case, but she does OK.

Alright, enough about the guest appearances – how does John Doe hold up his end? Overall, not badly at all. He’s still got that amazing voice. It’s a little more weathered now than back in the day, but hell, who isn’t? And musically, the album sorta hits a downcast, bluesy groove and sticks there, for the most part. This is not an upbeat album. Downcast is sorta par for John Doe solo, so it's so far, so good.

If he’s got a weak spot these days, I’d say it was his lyrics. Now, don’t get me wrong here. I’m not saying that he’s no longer writes well. This was never intended to be a punk rock album, and it’s not, either sonically or lyrically. Given the idiom he’s working in, though, I’d like to see him a little more adventurous. Referring to a female character in a song as “mama” is, frankly, beneath him. “Ready”, on the whole, shows his writing off in a fitting light, and yet the line “It was black, it was always black / and no one really gave two craps” hits my ears the way biting down on tinfoil hits my fillings. Sure, it rhymes, but who actually says “no one gave two craps”?

Am I quibbling? Probably. I tend to hold John Doe to a higher standard than I do other artists, because I know he’s capable of meeting and exceeding it. And I realize that that may not be entirely fair, to either of us. That said, if I were to sum up Forever Hasn’t Happened Yet, I’d say that it smolders on “The Losing Kind”, “Twin Brother”, “Ready”, and a couple of other tracks, but it never quite catches fire.

(John Doe’s Forever Hasn’t Happened Yet is available through Yep Roc Records. He’s currently on tour with Lucinda Williams.)

*Well, these guys are offering to sell me a DVD, but I don’t know how legit that actually is. I’ve heard rumors that some of the shows will be getting an official release sometime soon, which would be nice.