POUR: What's Your Poison?

A rare gap in my day allowed me some further reverie around this theme, wondering whether there is a tipple that at some time has not put the poetic muse into overdrive. (Answer: quite a few, but here are a few that did!)

WATER: Clearly we start with the only real essential, that last choice at the party, adam's ale. And what better than a bit of cheesy soviet folk-jazz-rock, the russians seeming always to me big fans of plain. Yeah, right. I had never heard of Garik Sukachyov before today, but he and his "proletariat jazz" seems quite big in the eastern bloc and more, were I able to read the cyrillic of his publicity pages. The song is "Pour Me Water".

TEA: Can't stand it myself, but the life's blood, it seems of my nation, a brew being the solution to any crisis, the balm to any bluster, the antidote to any antipathy etc etc. I was expecting some Bonzo Dog type parody to celebrate this drink, but, should I be surprised it was rap, sorry, Grime, artist Yungen that celebrates this nectar. And the song? "Comfy". Not really, or, um, my cup of tea.

COFFEE: In truth from where this idea came, this song , "Truck Drivin' Man", and the band both longtime favourites of mine, with the chorus refrain of "Pour me another cup of coffee, for it is the best in the land" lilting into my head at the merest flicker of fancying a flat white. An old country staple, Commander Cody and his Lost Planet Airman nail this as theirs. (I saw erstwhile guitarist Bill Kirchen, self-styled king of Dieselbilly on a solo UK tour in 2015, asking he play it as a request. Without the rest of that stellar crew, he showed he still could.)

COKE: Nope, not that one, the fizzy drink, but I felt a need to slowly build up to liquor, keep you thirsty, as it were. The only reference I could find to pouring one comes from this little Elvis Costello mid-period beauty. From his never bettered "King of America", in 1986, this song references not necessarily its consumption, more to how it may be, in the song, comparable to the vintage wine of the more decadent europeans. (As I listen again I wonder as to whether anyone currently resident in Washington might see themselves somehow as King? What's the name of the song again? Brilliant  Mistake........)

WINE: I know beer probably comes next, but I couldn't find me a convincing one, so onto another King, Dean Martin, no stranger to either grape or grain. Possibly lost for choice, this is the only one with an explicit instruction to pour. Not much else to say. (Is it just me, but anyone reminded just a little of this?)

RUM: You get the drift, by now I am just naming a drink, any drink, and asking google for a stiff one. This is the probably unfeasably long straw I got here, along with an umbrella and, quite possibly, some dry ice. Who the f is Zac Brown and why is he singing this execrable nonsense? "Castaway". I wish it was. A hat band from the southern states, I learn, committing the common if no less cardinal sin of mistaking country music with cruise ship crap in the caribbean. (See also Jimmy Buffett. No link.)

GIN: Gin is dead classy nowadays, taking a place ahead of malt whisky in its myriad styles and varieties, all increasingly exotically and artisanally sourced, prices escalating through the stratosphere. This song, "Galaxy of the Lost" was made in 2007, so the chances are it was a Gordons, possibly ahead even of  Mr Ramsey's last ditch attempt to resurrect the also-ran loser generic (or brand leader as these things often are in the real world.) More tonic than gin in both the song and performance, by ex-Test Icicle, Lightspeed Champion.

WHISKY: Right on cue, waiting for the gin backlash, here's whisky revving in the pits, tho' maybe this band are more down the rotgut end of the market than my tipple of choice, Laphroaig, thanks for asking. Double. No ice. This? "Pour Me" by Trick Pony. I like the way the video finishes before the end of the song. It seems somehow how it should be. Like the amnesia of an alcohol related black-out.

BOURBON: I don't think this is cheating. Bourbon may be generically a whisky, but, no, not really, it is different altogether. And what is about all these country dudes and their drinking? Mind you, this song, by Alan Jackson, is a whole lot classier than the whisky above, a whole lot. Lonesome guy, a broken heart, an understanding bartender. Heck, I'm there already. But if those goddamn rednecks put that Trick Pony song on the jukebox again I swear I won't be responsible for myself.

TEQUILA: Oh, hell, I must have just lost a moment or two there, where am I? That bourbon was just soooooo smooth. But what's this shit? Like that fine line between not enough and too much, I have strayed again from good country to bad country. Or from country to western as we so hilariously put it back home. Never liked tequila anyway, whether "Pour me another Tequila, Sheila" is pouring or not. Bobby Bare sounds someone I don't need to know. Am I right?

Hating to end on a low note, perhaps, but even with that large pint of water, the tea, the coffee, the cola, all that wine, rum, gin, whisky, bourbon and tequila is going to have some effect on the next day. So here is Bobby Bare's son (Bobby Bare Junior!) to remind us quite what. I have one of his records. He seems a whole lot cooler a character than his dad. Less successfull too, I'll wager, but at least he'll be forgotten on account of his art.

Cheers, y'all!

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Father: Drive (For Daddy Gene)

Alan Jackson, Drive (For Daddy Gene)

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Alan Jackson has certainly achieved elder statesman status in country music, and rightly so. But, I’ve always felt his work could be separated between the genuine country good, and the cheesy, cliché-ridden country bad. Songs like Midnight in Montgomery and Murder on Music Row delve into the tropes and images that divide ‘real’ country from the terrible pop, or “bro” country that dominates radio. Then, he cranks out stuff like Chattahoochee, which I know is popular, but has always struck me as appealing to the lowest common denominator of hillbilly ‘aw shucksisms. It’s like Eric Church, who is pretty darn cool in most regards, using ‘mom’s apple pie’ as a key image in a song: it lacks legitimacy and seems like taking the easiest road to wedging in a nice fitting rhyme. Or appealing to what’s comfortable and well known, in order to add some kind of inclusiveness to the music. But, shouldn’t music be about exploring new emotional venues? I don’t know—relying on hack cliché is my biggest gripe with country music, but then, what form of popular music doesn’t rely on the easily identifiable to sell a theme? And t-shirts.  Jackson has done more good than bad, and errs more towards the soulful legacy of Hank Williams than some of his elder contemporaries.  But, he can clunk with the worst of ‘em, too.

Drive (For Daddy Gene), a song about the bonding experiences between father and son, then son become father to his own children straddles the border between the genuine and the over-mapped imagery of “Dad”. But, it’s a wonderful song, with a soaring hook, and just the right amount of sentimentalism to relate to on a level that invokes unaffected authenticity.  Jackson mines the imagery of restoring first a boat with his own father, then a truck, and ends up doing the same with his own daughters later in life to talk not only about beautiful memories, but also of the sense of growth and of freedom that comes from learning to drive and being the pilot, so to speak. The idea of piloting moves from the actual sense of being at the wheel to being able to eventually pilot one’s own life according to and because of the lessons passed on from father to child. And I suppose a little sentimental cliché never hurt anyone, least not when we’re talking about dad (or mom, or little sis….). And really, what else is a father meant to do than teach his children to be better than he was?

And, I must confess, I put on Chattahoochee while I was writing this, and now its stuck in my head…grumble, grumble…

Jukebox: Please Mr. Please; Don’t Rock the Jukebox; Bubba Shot the Jukebox

Olivia Newton-John: Please Mr. Please

Alan Jackson: Don’t Rock the Jukebox

Mark Chesnutt: Bubba Shot the Jukebox

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Ever wonder about what NOT to play on the jukebox? That’s assuming all you button-pushing country music loving cowboys can even find a jukebox in some out-of-the-way diner or laundromat in a turnout off America’s loneliest highway.

In “Please Mr. Please,” Olivia Newton-John beseeches us to “Please, Mr., please don't play B-17, it was our song, it was his song, but it's over.” She put that song out back in 1975 when “you can hear your five selections for a quarter.”

In “Don’t Rock the Jukebox,” Alan Jackson's heart ain't ready for the Rolling Stones. He wants to hear some Jones, as in George Jones, but the heartbroke hillbilly would settle for any good ol’ slow country song with some wailing pedal steel guitar. It’s better that he’s using music to “drown a memory" than the typical whiskey of choice mentioned in most country songs with the same sorrowful theme.

“Bubba Shot the Jukebox” is another one that a friend on social media brought to my attention. She stated, “It was a very funny song, and I loved singing along to it.” As told by Mark Chesnutt, the song does have quite a story. Isn’t it so true about how a sad song can make you cry? Or nostalgically bring back a memory of an old flame?  Or, as in this song’s case, inflict pain?

So what’s one to do if you’re in Margie’s Bar and hear that mournful song that makes you break out in a cold sweat and sends a teardrop down your nose? I wouldn’t recommend doing what Bubba did … jumped to his feet, went to his truck and got a Colt .45. The song’s plot only thickens when the sheriff arrives with his bathrobe on. I’m not going to give away the punch line (the “hook” as they call it in the music business).  You’re just going to have to listen to the song to find out what Bubba Boy is charged with, and what his response is.