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Twin Town High (vol. 8) |
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Round the Dial
Wednesday 09 April @ 12:09:37 |
 by Tom Hallett
QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “There’s a kind of self-censorship that goes on when you’re writing a song. You might attack a public figure, you might attack something you hate, but I wouldn’t use it on my ex-wife. I’ve probably slipped in some cynical things about..uh...people like ex-wives.” -
—Richard Thompson
SONG OF THE WEEK: “Twenty-One”
—Judd Herrmann
09/69
Dear Mom and Dad,
Getting short, Mom, coming home pretty soon. Going to quit flying soon, too much for me now. I went in front of a board for sp/5 will know soon if I made it. I have now 20 oak leaf clusters and some more paper for you. I have flown 1500 hours now, and in those hours I could tell you a lifetime story. I have been put in for a medal again, but this time I have seen far beyond of what ever you will see. That is why I’m going to quit flying. I dream of Valerie’s hand touching mine telling me to come home; but I wake up, and it’s some sergeant telling me I have to fly. Today I am 21, far away but coming home older.
Love,
Larry
Greetings, Dial-heads. Rather than ranting on and on this week in a futile attempt to stop the unstoppable, I thought I’d just kick things off with an actual letter home from Vietnam written over 30 years ago. I’d gotten the idea to check out some of those famous Letters when I was reading a copy of High Times a few weeks back, and next to a huge bush of some of California’s finest cash crop was a short note from a soldier stationed in Iraq. He didn’t complain about having to serve his country, or how much he missed his family, or even about how miserable things are in the land of sand, but I was still struck by his words. He said that he really, really missed his plants and couldn’t believe that he was fighting to free a foreign nation of tyranny when he wasn’t even allowed to grow a simple, harmless plant in the privacy of his own backyard in California. I think that’s really hittin’ it on the head, there. I hope he makes it back to fight for his own rights here in America.
Larry, the cat who wrote the letter back in ‘69, never did make it back. He was killed within 24 hours of writing that letter. He’d served from December of 1968 until September of 1969 in the 129th AHC—and in just under 10 months he’d seen so much horror that he told his folks, “I have seen far beyond of what ever you will see...” He died the day after he turned 21. There was no comin’ home older for Larry. I hope the kid that misses his plants doesn’t suffer the same fate. If you want to check out other letters from Vietnam, you can surf the web to www.grunt.space.swri.edu/letters.htm. And if things keep goin’ the way they are, you can check back online in 20 or 30 years to read Letters Home From Iraq...that is, if there’s a planet Earth left by then.
As Judd Herrmann sings in the Song Of The Week, “Twenty-One,” when he explains the loss of his best friend in Vietnam to his now 21-year-old son: “Son, everyday’s your birthday/For as long as you survive/And everyday’s a reason to rejoice that you’re alive/’Cause all our time is borrowed/Yes, everyday is dear/In the name of someone you don’t know, let dad buy you a beer...” All I can say is, Stop The Madness Now!! And now on to your regularly scheduled Round The Dial and more CD reviews...
Ol' Yeller
Ol’ Yeller
Country
2002
Self-released
Personnel: Rich Mattson, vocals and guitar / Dale Kallman (rhymes with “Mallman”), bass / Keely Lane, drums / Tom Siler, piano / Mike Johnson, pedal steel / CJ Udeen, pedal steel and vocal / Mark Saari, bass
Track Listing: ‘57 Skidoo / She Darked The Sun / Open Heart / Illegal Smile / Some Of Shelly’s Blues / In God’s Country / Train Leaves Here This Morning / I’m Gonna Love You / Nashville Bum / The Red Headed Stranger?
Local guitar hero Rich Mattson and crew—bassist Dale Kallman and drummer Keely Lane—join forces with some friends and cohorts to record a batch of country classics and a couple of originals, mostly as a fan-only treat from the band (there were only 120 homemade copies of the CD pressed). And don’t it jes’ figger that a notoriously down-to-earth fella like Rich would release some of his best work on an underground, limited edition album with almost no fanfare or hoo-rah? (Thankfully, the band’s latest outing, Penance, is out now and due for a review soon) Kicking off with a Mattson original, “57 Skidoo,” this album fairly glides right out of the opening gate, rollin’ along on a bouncy (thanks, in part, to one Tom Siler on piano and guest pedal steel player Mike Johnson), carefree rural vibe that’s reminiscent of some of the Glenrustles’ more rootsy fare.
The band’s cover of the Gene Clark/Doug Dillard tune “She Darked The Sun” evokes the haunted spirit its authors toiled in, and is a perfect vehicle for the so-nonchalant-it-almost-hurts vocals Mattson’s famous for. Guest pedal steel player CJ Udeen positively shines on this track, and the staunch rhythm section of Kallman and Lane thumps and booms as comfortably as a pair of pointy-toed boots on a barroom floor. “Open Heart,” a Chris Mirski (The Youngers) tune, is not only lovingly and faithfully laid out here, but also proves once again what a monumental songwriting talent this town lost when Chris moved out East awhile back. Though the song isn’t technically a “country classic,” I say give it ten or fifteen years and it’ll stand up right beside Mattson’s own—hell, even Clark’s—songcrafting. Exquisite guitarin’ from Mattson and crying pedal steel (again, courtesy of CJ Udeen) seal this one up tighter than a kissin’ cousin on a Sunday afternoon; if you close your eyes you can almost see The Youngers bangin’ into each other on the Turf Club stage, hair flyin’ and feet a’ tappin’.
“Illegal Smile,” the old John Prine chestnut, is about as apropo for Mr. M. and his merry band of modern-day troubadors as you can get: “And you may see me tonight/With an illegal smile/It don’t cost very much/But it lasts a long while/Won’t you please tell the man/I didn’t kill anyone/No I’m just tryin’ to have me some fun...” The rather shrewd choice of ex-Monkee Mike Nesmith’s “Some Of Shelly’s Blues” showcases both Mattson’s deep knowledge of and love for a great tune as well as his refusal to kowtow to what’s hip, popular, or “in” with the critics—like Nesmith, he’s a true original, and he doesn’t care a whit what some college-educated nimrod at a desk thinks about him or his music.
Probably the oddest choice—making it the most logical one for Rich—of covers on this album is that of U2’s “In God’s Country.” But where Bono and the lads take the song to dizzying electronic heights and overblown, compressed production, Ol’ Yeller strips it bare to the bone, with goose-bump-y pedal steel and classic Nashville pickin’ softly covering an exciting, understated rhythm track like a light dusting of late-winter snow—or radioactive waste, depending on the outcome of the song, I guess. Either way, it’s absolutely fucking gorgeous. Just thinking about what this song really means while Ol’ Yeller wails away on a melancholy vibe is enough to choke the toughest trail-rider up (“...sad eyes, crooked crosses/In God’s country...”), I tellyou whut. “Train Leaves Here This Morning,” another Clark/Dillard cut, is a chimey, ringing ode to loneliness, once again punctuated by soul-piercing pedal steel.
“I’m Gonna Love You,” a Jimmie Dale Gilmore-penned West Texas waltz/ballad, is given the North Country treatment, with Ol’ Yeller’s version bringing to mind cold grey winter days rather than long, hot Southern nights—and the funny thing is, it works either way, proving that even the mighty Gilmore is open to geographical interpretation. And anybody who’s ever heard Jimmie Dale’s singing and phrasing knows that it takes a special spirit to capture the essence of one of his American cow/folk classics—kudos to Rich for positively nailing it there, too.
“Nashville Bum,” a Waylon Jennings co-written number, finds the band recapturing that breakneck stage pace they’re so famed for, with Rich half-laughing the simple yet witty-as-fuck lines: “Well I been chasin’ the big wheels all over Nashville/Waitin for my big break to come/Livin’ on ketchup soup/Home-made crackers and Kool-Aid/I’ll be a star tomorrow/But today I’m a Nashville bum...” Sadly, this song makes as much sense today as it did when Waymore was trying to break into the Nashville scene 25 years ago. Remember what happened then? People across the country said “Fuck Barbara Mandrell!” and went out and bought millions of copies of Waylon and Willie’s breakthrough album, The Outlaws. That couldn’t happen to a better band than Ol’ Yeller these days, and I for one am rootin’ like hell for ‘em.
As a matter of fact, this song—hell, the whole album—makes me want to sit down and write a country song for all the Real Musicians, Songwriters, and Singers out there today who aren’t getting the respect, attention, and nurturing that they deserve. My little backwoods ditty would be shamefully under-produced, include several toothless relatives whom I haven’t seen since I was knee-high to a grasshopper on homemade instruments like wash-tub bass, snappin’ turtle drums, and whiskey jug whistle, and it would be called “Will There Still Be A Branson (For The Country Heroes Of Today).” It’d go a little somethin’ like this: “Will there still be a Branson/For the country heroes of today/Will Dwight, Willie, and Rich Mattson still have a place they can play/Will there be a Lucinda parade or a Shania charade/Oh, will there still be a Branson/For the country heroes of today...” You get the idea. Damn, I love this band.
The album closes with another Mattson original, “The Red Headed Stranger?” a hilarious story-song about Ol’ Yeller on tour and their possible run-in with ol’ Willie himself: “So I’m floatin’ along, the van drove like a boat/And every semi that passed depleted my hope/And in my rear-view mirror I saw another Goddamn tour bus/Well at this point I guess I’d about had enough/So I pulled out my bird and I flipped that bastard off just for bein’ so Goddamn cool/And as the thing passed I looked again/And I couldn’t believe what it read/It said The Red-Headed Stranger/And I just about dropped dead....”
The story goes on, C.W. McCall-style, as Rich describes his guilt over giving the finger to that fancy tour bus: “The moral of this song is don’t fly your bird where it don’t belong/And know who you’re flippin’ off before ya do it/But I also imagine Willie was still awake/Watchin’ the sun come up on his bus gettin’ baked/When all of a sudden some jack-ass says, “Fuck Off!”/And I laugh when I think of the expression on his face/Well, actually him and Jody Paine and maybe Paul English was sittin’ there/And they all saw me too/But it’s highly likely that nobody did/And I sincerely apologize if they actually did/God Bless you Willie, I love you, thank you Lord, for not strikin’ me down, hyah!”
On into a mess o’ stanky country-blues guitar, and the only thing left to do is hit replay on the CD and dig into this sticky, beer-stained, loveable collection of odes, covers, and road stories like it’s the last plate of BBQ pork—I mean, venison—you’re ever gonna eat. Mmmm-mmm. Good stuff! The only flaw I can find with this album is that more people won’t hear it. I wouldn’t count on finding a copy just laying around anywhere (I’ve got #94 out of the 120 pressed, and I got mine a month or so ago), but if you’re a fan of Ol’ Yeller—or just a fan of damn good music—you might wanna bug Rich until he presses up another 100 or so. Meanwhile, I’m keepin’ mine close to the vest, baby...
That’s it for this week, folks. Check back next week for more rabble-rousin’, foot-stompin’, and verbal balderdash—and oh, yeah, CD reviews. Also, don’t miss this weekend’s in-store performance at Twin Cities Leather and Boot in St. Paul (570 North Snelling, 651-917-8100), on Saturday, 4/12, when Husker Du co-founder / solo artist Grant Hart will make a very special appearance between 3 and 5 p.m. Until next time—make yer own damn news.
If you have local music news/gigs/events that you’d like to see listed in this column, or you’d just like to let Rich Mattson know that it was your tour bus he flipped off on that Texas highway, send replies to: TMygunn777@aol.com.
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