Album: Rant
Year: 2001
At some point, I lost track of Ian Hunter’s solo career. I remember enjoying 1981’s Mick Jones-produced Short Back ‘N’ Sides back at the pre-on air KFSR days, but I never ended up getting it.
And I know that Drew Carey gave him probably his highest profile since “All The Young Dudes” by using a cover of “Cleveland Rocks” as the theme song for a TV show I never watched, but other than the occasional reissue, Ian Hunter dropped off of my radar for the better part of two decades.
But that’s on me, as Ian Hunter has never stopped recording, even after Mick Ronson passed. And so at some point in 2001 — for reasons that I simply do not remember — I decided to take a flyer on what was then his most recent solo album, Rant.
And was rewarded with “Wash Us Away,” which found Hunter making like Rod Stewart on Every Picture Tells A Story, using the rasp that his voice had developed over the years to service a gorgeous slice of autobiographical folk rock.
Everything’s temporary in this world
Ain’t it a shame when you lose someone?
Here tomorrow, gone today
Wash us away, wash us away, wash us away
Alternately jaunty and wistful — with a melody line that’s as beautiful as anything he ever came up with — including “I Wish I Was Your Mother” — “Wash Us Away” was a great reminder that the basics are the basics for a reason, that the ability to write a great song doesn’t disappear with age or obscurity, and that I perhaps should have been paying more attention to Ian Hunter all those years.
“Wash Us Away”
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