The Fightin' Side of Merle the White Negro
Well, music fans, we've finally reached the "H's" in the vinyl listening project (we're on Bob Dylan in the CD's). We're currently trolling through some of Merle Haggard's impressive catalogue. My Merle collection largely consists of his sixties output, although I've got some of the seventies stuff, too. Obviously, that's the bedrock that his career rests upon.
Holy shit, Merle is great. Although I think George Jones is the greatest male singer in the history of country music, I think Merle is pretty close, and anyway, he's my favorite. His voice has roughened over the years, but it's still bluesy and expressive. His voice was obviously purer when he was younger, and man what an instrument it was. It just reaches into your guts and squeezes. And dang, can he write! You may know the sixties classics--"I Threw Away the Rose"; "Swinging Doors"; "Mama Tried" (we'll get to "Okie from Muskogee" in a sec), but check out his midlife crisis album, Serving 150 Proof for all the mournful trevails of turning forty one. Something I know something about.
If you can ever entice me into a karaoke bar, I promise I'll sing you "Okie from Muskogee." Who knows how serious Merle was when he wrote that song. The Psychedelic Eskimo and I watched him perform it on this late sixties music show called "The Music Seen." Merle was surrounded by dozens of American flags and a hound dog (or am I imagining that part?), singing the song as deadpan as could be for this rock and roll audience (the "irreverent" comedy skit before the song featured two truck drivers holding hands---Hilarious!). Anyway, how seriously was Merle taking his own song?
But weirder still is Merle's very un-PC composition, "I'm a White Boy," which you can find on A Working Man Can't Get Nowhere Today." In no way is it one of Merle's best songs, but it's a fascinating tune. As the great Peter Guralnick writes about this song, "he fights his racial confusion to a draw." Interestingly, sung as a blues, Merle (or his persona) claims that he's a hard working fella, his name isn't "Willie Woodrow" he wasn't "born in no ghetto," and furthermore he "ain't black" and he "ain't yella." But apparently it's okay for his protagonist to bum around from town to town. Free to be a white bum, I guess. Thou doth protest too much, Merle!
A more palatable side of Merle is the fact that he's always had a great swinging band that takes in the honky tonk, blues, western swing, and Dixieland elements of country and western music. I'll just make this probably offensive observation (but I've been reading Norman Mailer, ya see), but I'd say that Merle Haggard is a White Negro! There, I said it!
Holy shit, Merle is great. Although I think George Jones is the greatest male singer in the history of country music, I think Merle is pretty close, and anyway, he's my favorite. His voice has roughened over the years, but it's still bluesy and expressive. His voice was obviously purer when he was younger, and man what an instrument it was. It just reaches into your guts and squeezes. And dang, can he write! You may know the sixties classics--"I Threw Away the Rose"; "Swinging Doors"; "Mama Tried" (we'll get to "Okie from Muskogee" in a sec), but check out his midlife crisis album, Serving 150 Proof for all the mournful trevails of turning forty one. Something I know something about.
If you can ever entice me into a karaoke bar, I promise I'll sing you "Okie from Muskogee." Who knows how serious Merle was when he wrote that song. The Psychedelic Eskimo and I watched him perform it on this late sixties music show called "The Music Seen." Merle was surrounded by dozens of American flags and a hound dog (or am I imagining that part?), singing the song as deadpan as could be for this rock and roll audience (the "irreverent" comedy skit before the song featured two truck drivers holding hands---Hilarious!). Anyway, how seriously was Merle taking his own song?
But weirder still is Merle's very un-PC composition, "I'm a White Boy," which you can find on A Working Man Can't Get Nowhere Today." In no way is it one of Merle's best songs, but it's a fascinating tune. As the great Peter Guralnick writes about this song, "he fights his racial confusion to a draw." Interestingly, sung as a blues, Merle (or his persona) claims that he's a hard working fella, his name isn't "Willie Woodrow" he wasn't "born in no ghetto," and furthermore he "ain't black" and he "ain't yella." But apparently it's okay for his protagonist to bum around from town to town. Free to be a white bum, I guess. Thou doth protest too much, Merle!
A more palatable side of Merle is the fact that he's always had a great swinging band that takes in the honky tonk, blues, western swing, and Dixieland elements of country and western music. I'll just make this probably offensive observation (but I've been reading Norman Mailer, ya see), but I'd say that Merle Haggard is a White Negro! There, I said it!
posted by ken at 6:02 PM
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