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40-song retrospective spanning Burnetts entire career of music-making. This 2-CD set is released simultaneously with The True False Identity, T Bones first album of new original songs since 1992. It is no coincidence that T Bone is releasing both a retrospective and a new album on the same day. In his liner notes for Twenty Twenty, he writes "This is they way I wanted to close the book on these songs from a dead man, and open the book on the new life I am beginning after forty years of wandering in the desert." Amazon.com Nobody writes better about surface and depth, illusion and essence, through parable and paradox, than T Bone Burnett. Though he's had more influence as a producer and catalyst (from his days with Bob Dylan's Rolling Thunder Review to his visionary masterminding of the O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack), this two-disc, 40-song retrospective dating back to 1977 celebrates his accomplishment as a unique recording artist. Burnett's range extends from the purest of plain-spoken country songs ("No Love at All," "River of Love," "The Bird That I Held in My Hand," "I'm Coming Home") to spoken-word enigmas such as "House of Mirrors" and "Hefner and Disney" (with the two switching identities as soulmates in Never Wonder Land) that challenge the listener to resolve the complexities. Among the other standouts are the surging rock of "I Wish You Could Have Seen Her Dance" and "Boomerang," the roadhouse rockabilly of "Driving Wheel," the teaming with Elvis Costello (as the Coward Brothers) on "The People's Limousine," and the deadpan reading of "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend." Rather than following a chronological or musical progression, the anthology dares fans to connect the dots and risk stylistic whiplash in the process. With the simultaneous release of The True False Identity, Burnett's first album of new material since 1992, listeners can discover where he's been as well as where he's going. --Don McLeese
