Guy Clark

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

This is the two-fer Lazarus recommended to me when I recently discovered Guy's song "Desperados Waiting For A Train".

I'm blown away! This Guy is absolutely fabulous, one of the best singer-songwriters -- any genre -- I have ever heard! He gives a whole new meaning to the word "underrated". The weakest song on here is very very good, and there about a dozen great songs. His version of LA Freeway is stronger than Jerry Jeff Walker's, and songs like Texas Cookin', Rita Balou, Virginia's Reel (the best song about square dancing ever!), A Nickel For The Fiddler, and She Ain't Going Nowhere are as great as country and folk music get.

If you have this, play it!! If you don't, get it immediately if not sooner!!!

Like, wow....



"She ain't goin' nowhere, she's just leavin'.
She ain't goin' nowhere she can't breathe in.
And she ain't goin' home, and that's for sure."

[Dan G]

I'll have to track this down. I saw Clark at a folk festival close to 20 years ago, but that's the only time I've heard him. But I just this morning bought tickets to see him, Joe Ely, Lyle Lovett and John Hiatt doing a "songwriter's circle" show - the four of them together with acoustic guitars talking about their craft and playing tunes. A friend who saw the same lineup when they toured a couple of years ago said it was a fantastic show.

[Surfer]

Guy Clark is very good. I dont want to rain on your parade Steve, but he can be way too sentimental for my tastes sometimes. The song "Let Her Roll" and the last verse in particular makes me cringe a little. And most of the ballads, which slog in sentimentality. But the non-ballads are really good. Like "Texas, 1947". Oh and Texas Cooking isnt as good, as it kinda goes downhill on the later half of that album.

Personally I prefer Billy Joe Shaver (and even Townes who is similar), at least as far as songwriting skills go.

But again this nitpicking, this two-fer is a really good album and is highly recommended.

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

Sentimental, huh? Not one of the words that would have occurred to me after a single listen, although I suppose Guy's gravel-edged voice might make that harder to hear right away. I'll see how well his songs wear over time.

I've heard a good deal of van Zandt and a fair sampling of Shaver, and I like them both, but neither one of them ever knocked my socks off like this.

Since the first album was released after some of his songs were already recorded by others, Clark was able to get a blue-chip crew for the recordings, and at least part of the power of these albums comes from the stellar supporting cast and quality of the interpretations. Johnny Gimble's fiddle is huge throughout the first album!

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

The song "Let Her Roll" and the last verse in particular makes me cringe a little.

The last verse echoes Frizzell's "Long Black Veil" and Jones' "He Stopped Loving Her Today".

[walto]

I'm blown away! This Guy is absolutely fabulous, one of the best singer-songwriters -- any genre -- I have ever heard! He gives a whole new meaning to the word "underrated". The weakest song on here is very very good, and there about a dozen great songs. His version of LA Freeway is stronger than Jerry Jeff Walker's, and songs like Texas Cookin', Rita Balou, Virginia's Reel (the best song about square dancing ever!), A Nickel For The Fiddler, and She Ain't Going Nowhere are as great as country and folk music get.

If you have this, play it!! If you don't, get it immediately if not sooner!!!

Like, wow....

Oh SqD, you are such a slutty slut!!

[lazarus]

Steve, I´m glad you like the cd. It´s an old favorite of mine (especially "Old No.1" which I had on vinyl for many years).

I have heard some of his more recent albums (the one on the picture below is one of them) at a friends place and they sounded very good too.

[Tom Storer]

SqdcS, I recommend Together at the Bluebird Cafe, by Clark, Townes van Zandt and Steve Earle--also one of those "just us singer-songwriters sitting around and trading songs" shows. It's worth it for Clark's "Randall Knife" and "Dublin Blues" alone.

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

Oh SqD, you are such a slutty slut!!

I know, I should have remained forever faithful to "Tubby The Tuba" and "Go In And Out My Window". But since I strayed from the high road of musical monogamy long ago, I figure what the hell, vive l'amour!


°°°°°°°°°

Thanks, Laz. I saw one by him from Dublin tonight. I'm sure I'll get to them after I digest this one a bit more. I noticed that about 90% of the cuts on the Essential Guy Clark were from these two first albums. Not sure if that's an accurate assessment of his work, or if the compilers just haven't caught up with his later stuff yet.

°°°°°°°°°°

Surfer: "Let Her Roll" is one of several songs dealing with either white port, hookers or both, and I have to say I find that a bit odd. I'm not sure if we're talking about the same thing, but I can see how Guy could be accused of being overly dramatic (not by me, since I think the high drama works).

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

Tom: sounds like a winner! I'll check it out.

Rod: "that song" being 'Desperados Waiting For A Train', yes?

[Tom Storer]

Tom: sounds like a winner! I'll check it out.

I doubt you'll regret it. It also has some hilarious between-tunes anecdotes from van Zandt.

[Gary Sisco]

One of my top favorite songwriters.

[Root Doctor]

Of Clark's more recent stuff, I like this one a great deal:

[David Gitin]

A few nights ago I heard Emmylou (Cupertino, California) speak about Guy as inheriting the mantle from Harlan Howard to be number one songwriter in Nashville and guru to the younger generation.

(On her album in whatever the series is called for Starbucks wherein the artist chooses her favorites, a kind of mini-anthology, Emmy includes Guy as well as Julie Miller and an eclectic mix of others).

[Chris D]

I'll have to track this down. I saw Clark at a folk festival close to 20 years ago, but that's the only time I've heard him. But I just this morning bought tickets to see him, Joe Ely, Lyle Lovett and John Hiatt doing a "songwriter's circle" show - the four of them together with acoustic guitars talking about their craft and playing tunes. A friend who saw the same lineup when they toured a couple of years ago said it was a fantastic show.

I saw that tour, and it was really, really good. The mutual admiration thing gets a little tired, and I could go for more music and fewer stories, but it is well worth seeing these guys together in such an intimate setting.

[Surfer]

°°°°°°°°°°

Surfer: "Let Her Roll" is one of several songs dealing with either white port, hookers or both, and I have to say I find that a bit odd. I'm not sure if we're talking about the same thing, but I can see how Guy could be accused of being overly dramatic (not by me, since I think the high drama works).

I listened to it this morning. First, the song isnt bad, it just doesnt hit me square for a number of reasons:

1. The circular repeating guitar figure, which should have been retired after Alice's Restaurant. In fact, because Dylan and Guthrie (pere and fils) all used that repeating figure on more humorous songs, this one takes on a kind of cartoon quality.

2. The last lines which go of the last three verses go:

"Was a crumblin' picture of a girl in a door,
An' an address in Dallas, and nothin' more."

and then his voice breaks on this one

"and no one cried,
'Cept some lady in black, way off to the side."

and then, the kicker, bring it home Guy

"Ol' One-Eyed John said her name was Alice,
An' she used to be a whore in Dallas."

To me, that just makes me roll me eyes its such a blatant appeal to sentimentality, especially when his voice cracks.

Compare that to:

"She stood in the crowd and shed not a tear
But late at night, when the north wind blows
In a long black veil, she cries ov're my bones"

which is so much more dignified and understated to me
(yeah, I caught that connection)

Its funny, somehow Waylon and BJShaver can get away with some sentimentality (though they seem to couch it in more hard nosed cynicism - see "Old Five And Dimers" but even when he goes full on balladry like "We Had It All" he can get away with it, though that's not my favorite tune by far.

However, a song like "Like A Coat From The Cold" is just pure schmaltz to me, I dont know if Guy's voice isnt gravelly enough or deep enough to anchor it or rough enough, or whether its the instrumentation, but it doesnt work for me.

Even a song I really like "She Aint Going Nowhere", the first line bugs me:

"Standing on the gone side of leaving
she found her thumb and stuck it in the air"

is so self-consciously clever (she found her thumb, really?, had she lost it?) that I cant imagine Waylon or Billy Joe or even Willie ever writing something like that. It just comes off as affected, and trying to hard to be lyrically clever.

Actually songs 1-7 on Old #1 are classics straight through, but the last three songs dont work for me. Texas Cookin' is kinda hit or miss, some great, some meh.

I have been meaning to pick up more of his stuff, maybe I'll try that one with Townes and Earle.

Anyway, if I had know you didnt have this two-fer I wouldve sent it to you right away Steve, its definitely a minor classic (to me) but I know a lot of people (like everyone here, apparently) who think it is straight up gold.

Glad you're liking it.

[Root Doctor]

I've always gotten a kick out of Clark's "Doctor Good Doctor:"

I said doctor good doctor I got trouble on my mind
Listen to me doc I don't have too much time
I got a feelin' down inside me and it will not go away
You know it hangs on and bangs on my soul every day
Doctor good doctor I'm grabbin' at loose ends
And I haven't felt like I used to since I don't know when
Yersterday go past me today is all the same
And tomorrow really scares me I just can't play the game

He said quit whinin'
He said straighten up and fly right
He said life is not a piece of cake
He wanted to know if my insurance was paid up
Well I'm O.K. You're O.K. if the check's O.K.

Second best hundred dollars I ever spent

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

Compare that to:

"She stood in the crowd and shed not a tear
But late at night, when the north wind blows
In a long black veil, she cries ov're my bones"

which is so much more dignified and understated to me
(yeah, I caught that connection)

Well you'll get no argument from me that Long Black Veil is the greater song; but we're comparing one of Guy's weaker cuts from his first album with one of Lefty's best, maybe one of the 10 greatest country songs ever.

[David Gitin]

Lefty sang it; he didn't write it.

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

Right. Nor did George Jones write "He Stopped Loving Her Today", the other example I gave of the lover showing up at the funeral.

Here's little history of Long Black Veil from The Band's website:

>>It was written by Nashville songwriters Danny Dill (composer of The Streets of Laredo) and Marijohn Wilkin (the writer of Jimmy Dean’s two hits, the JFK-mythologising P.T. Boat 109 and Big Bad John) in March 1959. The Long Black Veil (its full original title) was inspired by the real life murder of a New Jersey priest combined with newspaper accounts of a woman in a black veil who regularly visited Rudolph Valentino’s grave. Dill and Wilkin set out to make it sound like an old Appalachian ballad so as to hang onto the coat tails of the then burgeoning folk music revival. Within days of writing it, they got the then fast-fading country star Lefty Frizell to record the song in March 1959 (with a line-up that included Grady Martin and Harold Bradley on guitars and Marijohn Wilkin on piano). The result was released in May 1959 and the hit record revived Frizell’s career. Other artists have recorded the song, including Johnny Cash, Joan Baez and The Country Gentlemen, but The Band learned the song from Frizell’s original version. -- Peter Viney<<


The "fast-fading" bit about Lefty was due to his alcoholism and anger management problems.

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

But somebody should tell Mr. Viney there are two Zs in Lefty's name.

[steve(thelil)]

I'll have to track this down. I saw Clark at a folk festival close to 20 years ago, but that's the only time I've heard him. But I just this morning bought tickets to see him, Joe Ely, Lyle Lovett and John Hiatt doing a "songwriter's circle" show - the four of them together with acoustic guitars talking about their craft and playing tunes. A friend who saw the same lineup when they toured a couple of years ago said it was a fantastic show.

I saw the same lineup do the same type of show maybe 4 or 5 years ago and it was a great time. To me the revelations were Clark and Lovett - who I liked on the "Large Band" LP but never figured to be so impressive solo with only his guitar as accompaniment. His voice was quite powerful and expressive.

As for Clark, I had no previous exposure to him and was moved by both his talent as a songwriter and the respect -if not awe - the others showed for him.