Tarnished Angel RIP: George Jones

I’ve been so wrapped up in life’s ‘important things’ this past week I’ve not seen the news or read the paper. So imagine the profound sadness I felt when I saw an old headline from a week ago…George Jones, King of the Honky Tonk, Dies at 81.

I am in no way able to put into words the influence this giant of the 20^th century has had on everyone from Merle Haggard to Elvis Costello and Keith Richards.  Indeed, here is the Rolling Stones' living fossil’s statement issued last Friday.

George Jones has left us. We have lost one of the most individual singers of all time. I cannot express the emptiness I feel.

George was as country as it can get, but he was beyond any bag you want to put him in. He was pure American music without ever waving a flag – you can hear a million imitations on the radio every day – but there was, and ever will be, only one George Jones.

He possessed the most touching voice, the most expressive ways of projecting that beautiful instrument of anyone I can call to mind. You heard his heart in every note he sang. Sinatra called him the second best singer ever. (The number one obviously being Frank!). I would contest that.

I truly loved 'the possum.' He was a crazy as me, and just as free… and, oh boy, could he hang.

For a full obit on the man they called the Frank Sinatra of country music, click here.

In a rush I’ve put together a mixtape of some of my favorite George Jones gems.

Rest in bloody peace, George!  You’ve touched us all!

Track Listing:

01 He Stopped Loving Her Today

02 You And Me And Time (With Georgette Jones)

03 Ain't Your Memory Got No Pride At All

04 If Drinkin' Don't Kill Me (Her Memory Will)

05 Big Fool Of The Year

06 Cold Cold Heart

07 Relief Is Just A Swallow Away

08 Half A Mind

09 All Fall Down (feat. George Jones)

10 I Always Get It Right With You (With Shelby Lynne)

11 The Race Is On

12 Yesterday's Wine

13 A Good Year For The Roses

14 The Old Rugged Cross

15 Accidently On Purpose

16 Once A Day

17 Why Baby Why

18 Developing My Pictures

19 In The Garden

20 Amazing Grace

21 She Knows What She's Crying About

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Hi Ho Stasi and Away!: East German Country Music

East German Music Festival Poster

Much of my life has been lived along borders.  Just a stone’s throw from a border that divided one country from the other and one culture from another. Though an American born in India the real national divide I experienced was not that between the States and India but between India and our mysterious, hated enemy Pakistan.   In the 1960s TIME magazine carried full page ads for Pakistan International Airlines which boasted of its flights to Peking and Shanghai.  This was incredible to me.  India’s other big enemy was China and relations were in the deep freeze throughout the 60s. But here was Pakistan flying into the most isolated country of all! As I did my business on the toilet my fancy would sail wildly across the Himalayas and try to imagine what life was like in Peking.  Did they see movies? What sort of music did they listen to?

 As an adult I’ve lived in a tent along the Iraqi border with Iran, worked on the borders of Afghanistan and Ethiopia.  I’ve been lucky enough to spend time in DPRK (North Korea) and Albania, two of the most isolated nations in the world, and those tantalizing thoughts I had about 1960s China have not disappeared.  Once upon a time Iran had a lively rock scene but in the 1980s you could be arrested for listening to Pink Floyd.  I had a friend in Albania who was arrested for a couple of days because he had a Beatles tape.  We all know what the Taliban think of music, and shudder at the thought of their re-capture of Afghanistan.

Of course, no country is completely isolated.  Kim Jung Un was educated in Switzerland and his dad loved Hollywood movies.  Enver Xhoxa, the Albanian Communist supremo, sent his kids to Sweden and holidayed in the south of France, while he locked the doors of the country to his fellow citizens.  My friends still managed to listen and even dance all night to Pink Floyd and Peter Gabriel at the height of Khomeini’s rule.  As Leonard Cohen says, “There is a crack in everything, where the light gets in”.

And so I suppose I should not have been surprised to discover that there was an audience for American country and western music in East Germany in the 1980s! But surprised I was. 

The Amiga imprint was the record label of the state and its (as yet unwritten) history is surely as significant as Anna Funder’s work on the Stasi or any on the hundreds of books which have explored the counterculture of the DDR, be it political or social. Amiga vinyl itself is a wonder to handle, seeming dust-resistant and impervious to scratching. Lps and singles picked up secondhand over the years still play ‘as new’, where the sleeves demonstrate the ravages of time and the owner’s insistence in playing them post-pub to captive audiences, where cds would’ve perhaps been the more sensible option.

Amiga, was established in 1947 by Ernst Busch, a life long party member who fought in Spain with the International Brigades. Prior to fleeing Germany in 1933, Busch was a well-known actor and singer and he was later a frequent contributor to Radio Madrid, recording two very hard to get albums of Civil War songs. His performance of Peat Bog Soldiers is particularly haunting. The song, covered by the Dubliners on ‘Revolution’ (1970), was written by Nazi political prisoners in the Bögermoor concentration camp and first performed there in 1933. Busch obtained the permission of the Soviet occupation authorities to establish a label to provide music for the masses, however, it took a decade or so before the label realised that the masses were getting tired of an anaemic diet of Brecht, Hans Eisler, bad jazz and Kindermusik. They were now tuning their dials to the American Forces Network stations not subject to the jamming and interference inflicted on Radio Free Europe, the broadcasts of which were unequivocally political. Thus began the golden age of East German pop. (http://wastedonarchaeology.wordpress.com/2011/12/03/the-great-ina-martell/)

Country Roads is a collection of American country classics released by Amiga Records in 1985.  With covers of John Denver, Dolly Parton and Waylon Jennings (often with night-club perfect impersonation of said artists voices) this record is a happy clappy paean to Top 40 Country ca. the mid-70s.  The playing is competent and the singing robust in that communist propaganda film sort of way. 

The cracks in the German Democratic Republic system had obviously widened somewhat to allow such a record to be issued.  In a creepy sort of way this is Stasi-approved country music!  Weird thought. But exactly the sort of thing I used to think about staring at those PIA ads way back decades ago.

For an interesting article on the East German pop scene circa 1968, click here. 

Enjoy this slice of commie country, comrades!

            Track Listing:

01 Thank God I'm A Country Boy [Achim Wilk]

02 Ring Of Fire [Peter Tschernig]

03 Rocky Mountain Music [Harald Wilk]

04 Foggy Mountain Breakdown

05 Back Home Again [Achim Wilk]

06 Apple Jack [Linda Feller]

07 If You're Gonna Play In Texas [M. Jones Band]

08 Take Me Home, Country Roads [Achim Wilk, Viola Kirsten]

09 Detroit City [Harald Wilk]

10 Broken Down Cowboy [M. Jones Band]

11 Good Hearted Woman [Peter Tschernig]

12 Orange Blossom Special [Various]

13 Waiting For A Train [Harald Wilk]

14 Medley: Wabash Cannon Ball, etc. [Achim Wilk, Harald Wilk]

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Two for the Road: Womex 2012 Collection and Junior Brown

Map of Portuguese Goa

Tomorrow, after more than three years, I return to the land of my birth, India. Taking the family for a three week business cum holiday trip that will take in Delhi, Jaipur, Ajmer, Pushkar, Agra, Varanasi (hopefully Allahabad) and Goa.

So there may or may not be much activity on these pages in that time. I certainly will be doing lots of music shopping but will probably not post much until I’m back and settled.  More likely, I will be posting on my other blogs (Harmonium Music and One Photo At a Time) so by all means continue to swing around and check out what’s fresh.

Tonight, however, I post two volumes.

The first, is another from the world of roots music festivals. Womex proclaims itself to be the most professional market for international music in the world and was held this year in Greece. Next year in Wales.  This is a selection of the music from the 2012 event that recently finished.  The organizers obviously are able to attract the cream of musical artists to their event and this CD is one of the most enjoyable samplers I’ve heard.  Full of fresh and scintillating and unusual sounds from the prairies of the Canada, the folds of Europe, corners of Asia and Africa.  Like the Australasian Womex of which I’ve been posting quite a bit lately, the European focus of this selection serves the purpose of showcasing the diversity of the region’s musical talent.

            Track Listing:

            01 Ruhverikko (Finland)

02 Njoka (Radio Edit) (Zimbabwe)

03 Pancho Says (Bulgaria)

04 Maria no me Llevo (Colombia)

05 Caboose (Canada)

06 Mazurek Lakowy (Poland)

07 Na Mera Khuda (India)

08 Cab'Verde na Coracon (Cape Verde)

09 Frangosyriani (Greece)

10 Kheljar Man (Macedonia)

11 Electric Pow Wow Drum (Canada)

12 Go Marko Go (Robert Soko Mix) [Serbia]

13 Oi za lisochkom (Ukraine)

14 Cucaracha (Argentina/France)

15 Quaze Caindo (Brazil)

16 Ehe Gia, panda gia (Turkey)

17 Nu Te Fermare (Italy)

18 Movement on Silence (Republic of Korea)

19 Kuchelere Su sepmishem (Azerbaijan)

20 A foldon (Serbia)

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The second set, switches gears somewhat. Junior Brown has a voice as deep almost at Johnny Cash’s. While he might lose out (just) to the Man in Black, Junior could whup Johnny’s ass with his guitar playing. Brown, hails from outback Indiana which is probably why he poured so much energy into learning the guitar. He found work as a guitarist in a number of American country and swing bands, including the venerable Asleep at the Wheel, before taking up an ‘instructor’s’ gig at the Hank Thompson School of Country Music in Oklahoma. While there he invented a weird contraption that combined the electric and lap-steel guitar which he christened the guit-steel.

His approach to country music is broad.  Western swing, rockabilly and blues all vy for attention on his records and it is indeed, hard to choose his best style. He’s just such a damn hot guitar player, all of his songs are sheer pleasure.  I like Long Walk Back the best for one reason and one strong reason only, the closing blues scorcher, Stupid Blues.  If you’ve ever had a friend who just drank way too much or simply played the fool all the time, this song is the one you want to give him for Christmas.  And it stands on its own as a GREAT blues song, with no country aroma for a mile on either side of the opening and closing bar.

Junior Brown’s music is fun, funny, awesome and infectious.

            Track Listing:

            01 Long Walk Back to San Antone

02 the better half

03 read 'em and weep

04 rock a hula baby

05 lookin' for love

06 peelin' taters

07 freedom machine

08 just a little love

09 keepin' up with you

10 i'm all fired up

11 Stupid Blues

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The Pusherman Prophet: Johnny Cash

One of my earliest musical memories was hearing Ring of Fire cracking out of my dad’s Rambler’s AM radio as we crossed the middle expanses of America in the early 60s. My dad took his religion seriously and still does. But he always had time for Johnny Cash. Several years later when we were back in India, he brought me a cassette of Johnny’s greatest hits from one of his foreign trips.  I thrilled to hear the mariachi trumpets of Ring of Fire once again, but also got my first introduction to Cash’s basic repertoire: Five Feet High and Rising, Ira Hayes, I Walk the Line and Were You There When They Crucified My Lord and of course, Folsom Prison Blues.

That Johnny sang heaps of gospel songs, many that my dad recognized from his own poor, rural American childhood, was no doubt what attracted him to the Man in Black. As for me, sure, I liked the gospel songs too, but not as much as his clackety clack railway train guitar rhythm style or his out of this world bass voice.  After, Ring of Fire, the only Johnny Cash song I knew was his duet with Bob Dylan, Girl From the North Country. The depths, both sonic and emotional, that Cash plumbs in that song are simply inspired.

Amazingly it was not till many years later that I began to understand what a true giant of American music Johnny Cash was.  His songs were so simple, a sort of musical amalgam of Hemingway and Steinbeck.  Johnny never left you in any doubt about  the point of his song.  Whether he was telling you about murdering for fun, and going crazy on cocaine or whether he was telling you how much he loved America yet couldn’t countenance the injustice America meted out to its natives, blacks or poor.

Kris Kristofferson wrote what is about the best and most beautiful summation of Cash in his song Pilgrim Chapter 33:

            He's a poet, he's a picker--

He's a prophet, he's a pusher--

He's a pilgrim and a preacher, and a problem when he's stoned--

He's a walkin' contradiction, partly truth and partly fiction,

Takin' ev'ry wrong direction on his lonely way back home.

It is that walkin’ contradiction part of Johnny Cash that means more to me these days than even his voice.  A man who was equally believable and compelling when he was giving the finger to society as when he was on his knees calling on the love of Jesus.  Johnny Cash had a huge resurgence in popularity the last decade of this life.  Since his death I think his peers and fans and the critics have realized just how deep and wide is the hole he has left in American music and society. Always one of the Greats when he was living, in his passing he has ascended to the level of one of the very Greatest.

I hope you enjoy this collection of Johnny Cash faves from Washerman’s Dog. 

            Track Listing:

            01 Johnny Cash Show Intro And Theme 

02 Five Feet High And Rising

03 Guess Things Happen That Way

04 Get Rhythm

05 One

06 Closing Medley: Folsom Prison Blues/I Walk The Line/Ring Of Fire/The Rebel Johnny Yuma

07 Were You There (When They Crucified My Lord)

08 Ragged Old Flag

09 Joshua Gone Barbados

10 One Piece At A Time [Album-Version]

11 Girl From the North Country (w Bob Dylan)

12 Have A Drink Of Water [Album Version]

13 The Man Comes Around

14 Jackson (With June Carter)

15 How Great Thou Art (Previously Unreleased)

16 Gospel Boogie (A Wonderful Time Up There)

17 We'll Meet Again

18 Over The Next Hill (We'll Be Home) [Album Version]

19 Hurt

20 Far Away Places

21 Big River [Demo]

22 There'll Be Peace In The Valley

23 Life's Railway To Heaven [Album Version]

24 Satisfied Mind

25 Folsom Prison Blues

26 Wide Open Road [Album Version]

27 Delia's Gone

28 The Old Account Was Settled Long Ago

29 Veteran's Day

30 Put The Sugar To Bed [Single Version]

31 When He Comes (w. Rosanne Cash)

32 I'm On Fire

33 I Walk The Line (w Bob Dylan)

34 Ring of Fire

35 Bird On A Wire

36 What On Earth (Will You Do For Heaven's Sake) [Album Version]

37 I Walk The Line [Early Demo]

38 Careless Love (w Bob Dylan)

39 Cocaine Blues

40 Highway Patrolman (Album Version)

41 Luther Played the Boogie

42 Long Black Veil

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