Weekend Music: The Battle of New Orleans

This one’s just for fun. The video quality is not the best, but it serves.

I mentioned earlier this week that I’m working on a guest post for my friend Hannah’s blog, Things Matter. The video is a large hint as to what that post is about, and keep in mind, Things Matter is, among other things, a history blog. So probably not about folk songs played by country bands.

Happy Weekend! Natacha‘s in the house with a #StarWars Saturday for you tomorrow.

Weekend Music: In Which I Have An Epiphany

I went looking for the weekend music last night. Found this. It brought tears to my eyes. So, even though I’ve posted other versions of it here in the past, the audio quality isn’t so good, he talks way too long before he starts the song, and I am posting too many country videos lately, I’m going with it.

This one is entirely more than the sum of its parts.

This song was written almost 30 years ago, maybe longer, and Robert Earl Keen, as far as I know, is still playing it.

I first heard it in a bar in Hattiesburg Mississippi, being played by this guy. He left for the Southwest as I was finishing up my graduate degree, years ago now. The last thing he said to me was “Gene’O, use the headphones.” He said it through a microphone that he was also singing through as I left the bar. And I understand why he said that. Advice to a newbie who was trying to learn to play an electric guitar, is what it was. This happened at a place called the Keg and Barrel, just so you know.

Steve has “left the building,” as we say in these parts, and I did not know it when the song brought tears to my eyes. I found out because I went looking for his website to do him a good turn on account of that memory and the kindness he gave me back in those days.

Steve had a sweet dog. Her name was Edie.

He was good about playing requests. He knew Randy Newman front and back, and that’s no mean feat, since Randy is a pianist and Steve was a guitarist. He introduced me to a lot of music I’d never heard before. I’m grateful to have known him, even if only casually, and for a short time. I have one of his CDs, and I treasure it

“Feelin’ Good Again” a song about hope, and renewed friendships, and joy. It’s a story of a man who’s been absent from his favorite bar for a long time. He goes there. He recognizes everyone and I think they recognize him. He decides to buy a round. Realizes he didn’t cash his paycheck before he came to town. But then, miraculously, he finds enough money in his pocket to actually buy the round, and a REALLY SPECIAL PERSON appears on the scene.

It’s a beautiful story, but life doesn’t work that way.

Except when it does. Life does actually work that way sometimes. Not very often, but now and then. I’ve experienced life working in that beautiful way more than once in my short life.

“Feelin’ Good Again” is surely a song about joy, hope, and possibilities.

But it’s also about memory. And loss. It might even be an ode to wishful thinking. That’s the epiphany I had, when I stumbled upon this video and it brought tears to my eyes. It’s such a happy song, this is easy to miss. It is is about loss as much as anything else.

Despite the brightness of the chord progressions, the friendliness of the lyrics, and the comfort of the story, this is a sad song.

Shake the Dust Off Your Wings and the Sleep Out of Your Eyes

I post Townes Van Zandt here on New Years’ Day, and that is all we do on the first day of the year. Because he left the world on Jan. 1, 1997, much too early, and I miss him.

I make all kinds of allowances for Townes. The videos can be longer than two-and-a-half minutes and they do not need to include a live performance, as long as the audio is good.

“To Live is to Fly” is his best song.

These demo sessions are his greatest musical accomplishment. The voice and strings work together here in a way that is all too rare. This was recorded the year I was born.

We’re back to business tomorrow.

For today, enjoy your greens and black-eyed peas.

Weekend Music: “It Felt Like the World Would Freeze . . . “

This seems appropriate for today. And I must say, you really have to cultivate a powerful hatred of country music to not appreciate Sugarland. Awesome, is what they are. Especially when they are covering late-80s Europop with Little Big Town and *gasp* Jake Owen.

Posting this a little early, just to see who might be about 😉

Some thoughts from me on the recently-ended Doctor Who season at the Monster before the day is out, if we’re lucky 🙂 Tomorrow if we are unlucky.

Happy Weekend, peeps! (I am well and truly back!)