Carlene Carter at Joe's Pub

            Carlene Carter's show last night at Joe's Pub underscored one of the great redemption stories in the history of country music.

            "I know in my life I've done a lot of things," she conceded early on, alluding to the "crooked path" of a legendary life and career full of equal parts success and tragedy. But it was with rare self-awareness and self-assurance that she triumphantly pronounced, "I think I turned out real good."

            It was a lead-in to her song "The Bitter End," which she said she wrote when she feared she had in fact reached the bitter end. But she was merely drawing from her experiences in life: The decade-plus between her acclaimed 2008 album Stronger and its Little Acts of Treason predecessor was spent "doing research," she explained.

            "I learned I don't look good in stripes," the now 55 year-old grandmother joked, alluding to her once edgy outfits, "and that drugs and alcohol don't mix." But Carter, who also acknowledged that she was both "dumb and pregnant" at 15, clearly had turned any negative to positive: "You can't know where you're going if you don't know where you've been, and I know everywhere I was!" she said, with no regrets implied or needed.

            She did, however, retrieve some old stage garb, including a red micro-miniskirt that she bought at New York's East Village punk boutiqe Trash & Vaudeville around the time of her self-titled 1978 debut album, "that I could wear now probably as a spat on my boot." And she held up the historic see-through plastic miniskirt she wore at her infamous Bottom Line show of 1979, when she proclaimed that she was putting the first syllable back in country--not knowing that mother June Carter Cash and stepfather Johnny Cash were in the audience.

            "Now I wear it as a little rain hat," she laughed, and while she's admittedly filled out a bit since those days, she's never looked lovelier--so much now like the woman she referred to as her favorite songwriter, "my blue-eyed, red-haired mama." With that she sang a stripped-down version of June Carter's "Ring of Fire" (Carlene, who played acoustic guitar and autoharp--like her mom--was ably backed by a keyboardist and electric guitarist), also sounding so much like her mom--especially with that smiling, throat-clearing growl, for lack of a better word (as in her here-italicized response to Johnny's boasting in "Jackson": "But they'll laugh at you in Jackson/and I'll be dancin' on a Pony Keg").

            "It says, 'Listen to me now! I'm serious," Carter said after the show in characterizing the hereditary vocal trait, which she displayed throughout the show--same with her handed-down effervescent warmth and inner glow. She clearly had taken to heart what she quoted as advice from her Country Music Hall of Famer father Carl Smith, "Keep smiling, no matter what," if not his admonition, "Keep your money."

            "It's a wonderful thing to be a Carter girl," she said, reminiscing about her times performing with her mother and Aunts Helen and Anita as the Carter Sisters. Saluting the heritage she now embodies, she sang the Carter Family's "Dixie Darlin'" and her own big country hits "I Fell In Love" and "Every Little Thing" before closing with "Stronger," an emotionally powerful tribute to her late sister Rosey.

            Like her mother, she put it all in and let it all out, smiling no matter what.

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