When the teen-age Steve Earle left San Antonio, Texas, where he was raised, for Greenwich Village, in 1974, he had an image in his mind: the cover of ?The Freewheelin? Bob Dylan,? showing Dylan and his girlfriend, Suze Rotolo, strolling through the West Village on a snowy day. That was where Earle wanted to be. He made it as far as Nashville. There he became a prot?g? of Townes Van Zandt, and developed his talents as a songwriter, a country singer, and a hard-strumming guitarist, all of which were on display in his fine first album, ?Guitar Town? (1986). By the end of the eighties, Earle seemed on the verge of becoming a troubadour to rank with Dylan and Springsteen. But he had also become an alcoholic and a heroin addict, and in 1994 he was sentenced to a year in prison on drug-related charges. After serving four months, he was released into a twelve-step program, and there, to his surprise, he said, ?I had a genuine spiritual experience.? His career recovered, and his most recent album, ?The Revolution Starts . . . Now,? won a Grammy in 2004.

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