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Speaker 1: Pushkin. I started listening to country music when I was

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Speaker 1: about twelve or thirteen. This was rural Ontario in the

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Speaker 1: nineteen seventies. Everyone else my age was listening to The

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Speaker 1: Eagles or Fleetwood Mac or some properly Canadian rock band

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Speaker 1: like Rush. But for some inexplicable reason, I, a British

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Speaker 1: Jamaican kid marooned in the Canadian heartland, found solace in

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Speaker 1: the music coming out of Nashville. Lots of Johnny cash Lorette, Lynn,

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Speaker 1: Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings. I can still sing almost all

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Speaker 1: of Good Hearted Woman from memory, and of course George Jones.

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Speaker 1: I still remember the first time I heard the grand

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Speaker 1: tour step right up, come on in, if you'd like

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Speaker 1: to take the Grand Tour of a lonely house that

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Speaker 1: once was home, sweet home, and then the amazing lines,

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Speaker 1: I have nothing here to sell you, just some things

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Speaker 1: that I will tell you, some things I know will

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Speaker 1: chill you to the bone. To my Maudlin thirteen year

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Speaker 1: old heart, the line some things I know will chill

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Speaker 1: you to the bone was so fantastic, so over the top,

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Speaker 1: so bonkers, and just thinking about that lonely house that

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Speaker 1: was once home, sweet home brought tears to my eyes.

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Speaker 1: Pop music, particularly the pop music of that era, just

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Speaker 1: couldn't compete with that. I carried George Jones in my

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Speaker 1: heart for a very long time until the point that

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Speaker 1: I decided it was time to revisit the question what

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Speaker 1: exactly is country music doing when it makes you cry?

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Speaker 1: In Nashville, Tennessee, there is a songwriter named Bobby Braddock.

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Speaker 1: He's in his seventies, maybe five foot seven, bald head,

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Speaker 1: scruffy beard, wiry, like if you messed with them in

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Speaker 1: a bar, you'd probably lose. The most striking thing about

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Speaker 1: him is his eyes, which are the palest and most

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Speaker 1: intense shade of blue. He wears sunglasses a lot, and

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Speaker 1: it's almost as if he needs to protect the world

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Speaker 1: from that look there. I met him on a music

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Speaker 1: row in Nashville. We had lunch, and then we sat

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Speaker 1: in one of the writer's rooms in the Sony building,

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Speaker 1: piano in the corner, couches to one side, and he

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Speaker 1: talked about his education in the music business.

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Speaker 2: I think I always had the reputation as being kind

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Speaker 2: of a quirky writer, maybe a little left field.

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Speaker 1: The turning point in Braddock's career was a song you've

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Speaker 1: probably heard of. It was performed by Tammy Wynette back

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Speaker 1: when she was the reigning Queen of country music nineteen

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Speaker 1: sixty eight, about a mom who had to spell out

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Speaker 1: the word dvo rcee so her kids wouldn't know their

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Speaker 1: parents were splitting up.

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Speaker 3: So dw r C.

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Speaker 2: Yeah wrote this, did it? Demo on it and no tikers,

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Speaker 2: nobody did it, nobody would recorded.

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Speaker 1: D iv o r C was a song with a gimmick.

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Speaker 1: Braddick did a lot of gimmicky songs back then. No

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Speaker 1: one wanted this one. So Braddick went to a friend

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Speaker 1: and longtime collaborator, Curly Putman, So.

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Speaker 2: I said, well, why is nobody recording? He said, I

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Speaker 2: think around the important part of your song said, sad song,

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Speaker 2: and your melodies on that part is too happy. What

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Speaker 2: I was doing was, oh, I wish that could stop

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Speaker 2: this lifty s a little bit like a like a

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Speaker 2: soap commercial. I said, well, what would you do? And

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Speaker 2: he gave a guitar and he had this really mournful

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Speaker 2: singing style. Tammy Whenette was a big fan of Curly singing,

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Speaker 2: she left her singing because he had I mean, he

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Speaker 2: just he singing was just so sad. It gives it

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Speaker 2: a guitar and.

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Speaker 4: Said, oh, wish that we could start this, So I said,

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Speaker 4: just get your guitar, let's put it on.

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Speaker 5: Take what.

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Speaker 1: D I V O r C went to number one.

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Speaker 1: It was Bobby Braddock's first great exercise in how to

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Speaker 1: make people cry, and from then on things just got sadder.

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Speaker 1: My name is Malcolm Gladwell. You're listening to Revisionist History,

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Speaker 1: my podcast about things overlooked and misunderstood. This episode is

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Speaker 1: about something that has never made sense to me. Maybe

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Speaker 1: it's because I'm a Canadian, or maybe Americans puzzle about

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Speaker 1: this too. I'm talking about the bright line that divides

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Speaker 1: American society, not the color line or the ideological line.

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Speaker 1: I'm talking about the sad song line. I don't know

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Speaker 1: why people don't talk about this more because it's weird.

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Speaker 1: For the sake of argument, let's use the rock magazine

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Speaker 1: Rolling Stone's list of the best songs of all time,

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Speaker 1: the top fifty. These are the critics choices. Hotel California

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Speaker 1: by The Eagles comes in at forty nine, which, as

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Speaker 1: far as I can tell, is a song about drugs.

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Speaker 1: Tooty Fruity by Little Richard at forty three. Tutty Fruity,

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Speaker 1: which I remind you has is its signature lyric tooty fruity,

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Speaker 1: oh ruddy touty fruity, Oh rudy tooty fruity, Oh rudy

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Speaker 1: tooty fruity, oh rudy Wop Bop alo bop a loop

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Speaker 1: bam boom. There's Dancing in the Street at forty light,

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Speaker 1: My Fire Be My Baby, Nirvana's smells like teen Spirit,

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Speaker 1: Derek and the Dominoes Leila. There are songs about wanting

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Speaker 1: to have sex, songs about having sex, songs about getting high,

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Speaker 1: presumably after having sex. Number one song on the list

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Speaker 1: like a Rolling Stone by Bob Dylan. Ah, You've gone

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Speaker 1: to the finest schools, all right, miss Lonely, but you

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Speaker 1: know you only used to get juiced in it. Nobody's

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Speaker 1: ever taught you how to live out on the street,

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Speaker 1: and now you're gonna have to get used to it.

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Speaker 1: I think that's a song about someone who dropped out

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Speaker 1: of Harvard. The number one rock song of all time

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Speaker 1: is about dropping out of Harvard. In all of those

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Speaker 1: fifty songs, nobody dies after a long illness, No marriage

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Speaker 1: disintegrates nobody's killed on a battlefield. No mother grieves for

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Speaker 1: a son. The closest that any song in Rolling Stone's

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Speaker 1: list comes to being truly sad is Smokey Robinson's Tracks

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Speaker 1: of My Tears, which is first of all, number fifty,

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Speaker 1: so they put the sad song at the bottom of

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Speaker 1: the list. And secondly, it's about a guy at a

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Speaker 1: party in their moments of greatest travail. The protagonists of

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Speaker 1: rock and roll's sad songs still get to go to parties. Now.

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Speaker 1: Just turn on a country music station, especially a traditional

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Speaker 1: country music station, and listen. It's like a different universe.

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Speaker 1: Marriage is going to hell, people staring into their shot

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Speaker 1: glass in a honky tonk, people dying young. If you

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Speaker 1: ever heard John Prine's Unweed Fathers, it's a devastating bit

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Speaker 1: of songwriting about a teenage mom fleeing town. He sings

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Speaker 1: it with his wife Rachel.

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Speaker 6: Almost so Verio man smoking man Bell, Now come in,

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Speaker 6: Lolla bad.

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Speaker 7: Your daddy meant to hurt you, ever, it's just don live.

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Speaker 8: That you got his.

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Speaker 1: Those last two lines. Your daddy never meant to hurt

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Speaker 1: you ever. He just don't live here. But you've got

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Speaker 1: his eyes that's brutal, black subad dream.

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Speaker 2: All on.

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Speaker 1: We fove One half of the country, the rock music part,

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Speaker 1: wants their music to be hymns to extra version. The

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Speaker 1: other half wants to talk about real life dramas and

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Speaker 1: have a good cry. I don't get it. By the way,

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Speaker 1: you know who wrote that unwed father's song with John Prime,

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Speaker 1: Bobby Braddock? Or maybe you've heard this another classic recorded

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Speaker 1: by Tammy Whynatt Golden.

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Speaker 8: Good, Long Time.

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Speaker 6: Arcas Loud the bung.

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Speaker 1: Bus Golden Ring. It follows a couple from first love

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Speaker 1: to the breakup of their marriage by tracing the journey

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Speaker 1: of their wedding ring from chop to pawnshop. It's a weeper.

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Speaker 1: Who wrote it, Bobby Braddock, and today, forty years after

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Speaker 1: he wrote it, Braddock is still mad about a one

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Speaker 1: word change made by the song's producer of Billy Cheryl,

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Speaker 1: because that made his song one crucial degree less sad.

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Speaker 2: But we had He says, you won't admit it, but

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Speaker 2: I know you're running around and Billy changed it too.

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Speaker 2: He says, you won't admit it, but I know you're

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Speaker 2: leaving town. That's not as that's not as powerful as

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Speaker 2: you're running around.

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Speaker 9: He says, you won't admit it, but I know you

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Speaker 9: leave in town.

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Speaker 10: She says one, thanks for circ I don't love you anymore.

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Speaker 10: It throws down the ring as she walks out the door.

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Speaker 2: I think country music is supposed to be about real life,

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Speaker 2: you know, and I try to reflect that about all right.

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Speaker 1: Gold which brings us to maybe the greatest country song

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Speaker 1: of all time, certainly the saddest country song of all time,

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Speaker 1: the song that made me get on a plane and

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Speaker 1: go to Nashville. It was recorded by the great George Jones,

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Speaker 1: one of the half dozen or so most iconic figures

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Speaker 1: in the history of country music. You just heard him

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Speaker 1: singing in Golden Ring. Jones was famously the husband of

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Speaker 1: Tammy Wynett for a time, a hard living, dissolute megastar. Once,

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Speaker 1: in the midst of an epic bender, jones family took

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Speaker 1: his keys away, so he got on his riding mower

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Speaker 1: and drove eight miles to the liquor store to get

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Speaker 1: some whiskey. This was a man who could pour his

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Speaker 1: fractured heart into his music like no one else. A

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Speaker 1: half dozen times in his career, Jones found a song

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Speaker 1: truly worthy of his talents, but it never got better

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Speaker 1: than he stopped loving her. Today, I still remember when

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Speaker 1: I first heard that song, and from the day I

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Speaker 1: started thinking about this episode, I haven't been able to

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Speaker 1: get it out of my head.

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Speaker 10: He said, I'll love you till I die. She told

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Speaker 10: him you forgetting time. As the years went slowly by,

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Speaker 10: She's still prayed up all his his wine.

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Speaker 11: He kept her pictures on his wall.

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Speaker 1: Do I need to tell you who wrote that song?

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Speaker 1: Bobby Braddock? Bobby Braddock is the king of tears.

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Speaker 7: But he still loved through it all, hoping she'd come

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Speaker 7: back again.

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Speaker 1: Oh man. One of the things that got me interested

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Speaker 1: in sad songs was a story my sister in law, Bev,

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Speaker 1: told me. She and my brother live in the same area.

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Speaker 1: I grew up in Waterloo County in southern Ontario, and

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Speaker 1: a while ago she went to a performance by a

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Speaker 1: local chamber choir thirty singers. They sang a cantata called

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Speaker 1: Annalise by the British composer James Whitbourne, a choral composition

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Speaker 1: which puts the words of an Frank's diary to music.

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Speaker 1: I know this seems like a little bit of a

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Speaker 1: digression from country music, but it's a really useful case

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Speaker 1: study in understanding why some songs make us cry. The

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Speaker 1: performance Bev told me about was on a Sunday afternoon,

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Speaker 1: a free performance of the Public Library, which is a

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Speaker 1: very utilitarian, very nineteen sixties building on Queen Street in

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Speaker 1: downtown Kitchener. I've been there many times, waldewell carpet, that

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Speaker 1: old books library smell, which I have to admit, I love.

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Speaker 12: How many people are there.

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Speaker 3: It's in their main reading room, moved around all the

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Speaker 3: tables and one hundred, one hundred and twentieth full, pretty

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Speaker 3: much standing room only.

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Speaker 13: Why as they're singing, I think, why is that also

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Speaker 13: not singing? And then I look over and I think

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Speaker 13: somebody else as Aprian, I'm not singing. That's odd because

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Speaker 13: everybody else in their parts is singing. And I realized

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Speaker 13: they were crying and they couldn't sing.

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Speaker 1: Bev says she cried pretty much through the entire performance.

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Speaker 1: She was looking straight ahead because she didn't want people

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Speaker 1: to see she was crying, but it didn't matter because

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Speaker 1: everyone was crying. When the performance was over, Bev approached

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Speaker 1: the stage to talk to the soloist, the woman singing

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Speaker 1: Anne Frank's words.

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Speaker 3: I just went up to her afterwards and congratulated her

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Speaker 3: on the beauty of the piece then and her singing,

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Speaker 3: And I said, and how did you to sing without crying?

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Speaker 3: And she said, well, I couldn't look at Mark the

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Speaker 3: conductor because he was wiping tears from his eyes, and

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Speaker 3: I had my back to the choir, so that was good.

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Speaker 3: And I didn't look at anybody in the audience because

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Speaker 3: they were crying. So I just looked up in the

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Speaker 3: middle distance and I sang, it was a good thing.

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Speaker 3: I hadn't memorized.

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Speaker 1: I was at home in Canada when Bev told me

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Speaker 1: that story, so I called up Mark the conductor, and

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Speaker 1: the soloist, whose name is Natasha. They're actually husband and wife.

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Speaker 1: They only live a few minutes away from my brother.

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Speaker 1: So they came over. Mark sat at the piano in

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Speaker 1: the living room and Natasha stood behind him, and they

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Speaker 1: performed one of the pieces from Annalyst that they did

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Speaker 1: that day in the library.

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Speaker 14: This is the last movement. It's called Anne's Meditation. I

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Speaker 14: see the world, I see the world being slowly turned

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Speaker 14: turn into a wilderness.

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Speaker 1: Now I realized this is a crazy question, because we're

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Speaker 1: hearing a piece based on the Diary of Anne Frank,

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Speaker 1: which is one of the most heartbreaking stories from one

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Speaker 1: of the most horrific moments in recent history. But why

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Speaker 1: was everyone crying that day at the Kitchener Library. The

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Speaker 1: obvious reason is that the music is beautiful, so is

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Speaker 1: Natasha's singing. The performance is also authentic. There's nothing contrived

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Speaker 1: about it. It wasn't at Carnegie Hall. People weren't wearing

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Speaker 1: suits and evening gowns. They were at the Kitchener Library.

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Speaker 1: And whose family's getting books and kids running around and

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Speaker 1: everyone's on stacking chairs with the tables pushed off to

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Speaker 1: the side. But here's the most important thing annelis is specific.

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Speaker 1: It's a cantata about the actual experiences of a real person.

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Speaker 1: In her own words, Bev says that when she cried,

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Speaker 1: she started thinking about her own family, Mennonites, who escaped

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Speaker 1: terrible persecution in Russia. Natasha says that as she sang

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Speaker 1: about twelve year old and Frank, she was thinking about

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Speaker 1: her own daughter, who was ten and who was sitting

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Speaker 1: right next to Bev in the audience. Beauty and authenticity

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Speaker 1: can create a mood. They set the stage. But I

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Speaker 1: think the thing that pushes us over the top into

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Speaker 1: tears is details. We cry when melancholy collides with specificity,

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Speaker 1: and specificity is not something every genre does well. Wild

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Speaker 1: Horses by the Rolling Stones, written by Keith Richards and

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Speaker 1: Mick Jagger. It's a song about a conversation a man

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Speaker 1: is having with a silent, suffering loved one. The story

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Speaker 1: goes that Mick Jagger dreamt up the verses while sitting

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Speaker 1: at the bedside of his then girlfriend Mary and Faithful,

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Speaker 1: as she recovered from an overdose. Oh love you suffer.

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Speaker 12: Bell.

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Speaker 1: I watched you suffer a dull, aching pain. Now you've

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Speaker 1: decided to show me the same. No sweeping exit or

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Speaker 1: off stage lines could make me feel bitter or treat

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Speaker 1: you unkind. Wild Horses couldn't drag me away. Wild Wild

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Speaker 1: Horses couldn't drag me away. Wild Horses was recorded first

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Speaker 1: by the legendary Graham Parsons. Not long afterwards, Parsons died

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Speaker 1: of an overdose, and his friend in protege, the country

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Speaker 1: music singer Emmy Lou Harris, made a song in his memory.

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Speaker 1: She wrote it with Bill Danoff. It's called from Boulder

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Speaker 1: to Birmingham.

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Speaker 8: I don't want a hee, so.

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Speaker 1: I got on the zep plane just to flow.

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Speaker 8: Damn nolder me, but all that you can show me,

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Speaker 8: he's a pre masco.

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Speaker 6: I don't want to hear said story.

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Speaker 1: Someone who has suffered a terrible loss has gotten on

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Speaker 1: a plane and she's so numbed by grief that she

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Speaker 1: can no longer see those around her.

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Speaker 4: Blessed time a fool like this.

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Speaker 6: I was in the wilderness and again those on.

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Speaker 1: The from Boulder to Birmingham and wildhorses are both beautiful melancholy.

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Speaker 1: They're about the same thing, the ties the living and

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Speaker 1: the healthy have to those in pain. But which is

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Speaker 1: the sadder song? I don't think there's any question. Wild

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Speaker 1: horses is generic. Listen to how it starts. Childhood. Living

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Speaker 1: is easy to do the things you wanted. I bought

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Speaker 1: them for you. Graceless lady. You know who I am.

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Speaker 1: You know I can't let you slide through my hands.

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Speaker 1: What's going on? Any idea? What is Mickey hammering on about? Now?

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Speaker 1: Compare that to the specificity of looking down from the

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Speaker 1: airplane and seeing nothing but prairie. Then standing on a

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Speaker 1: mountain and watching a canyon burn.

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Speaker 8: Was our rackassle.

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Speaker 7: In the bosom of a.

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Speaker 6: I would hold.

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Speaker 5: Race away from bald.

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Speaker 14: About at sea.

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Speaker 7: I could see.

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Speaker 1: First she references the great black spiritual rock my soul

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Speaker 1: in the bosom of Abraham. The bosom of Abraham is

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Speaker 1: where the righteous dead go while awaiting judgment. Then she sings,

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Speaker 1: and I would also walk all the way from Boulder

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Speaker 1: to Birmingham. Now she's locating her grief. I would make

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Speaker 1: a pilgrimage from progressive hippie liberal. Remember this is nineteen

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Speaker 1: seventy three, dope smoking Colorado back to the repressive heart

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Speaker 1: of the old South, just to see your face. Two

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Speaker 1: completely different specific images, each with its own set of

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Speaker 1: emotional triggers, and she's piled one on top of another.

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Speaker 1: Mark Vornan, the music director of the choir in My hometown,

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Speaker 1: says that there's a part in Analyse that does the

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Speaker 1: same thing Anne is.

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Speaker 5: They're in hiding already, and she starts singing, and the

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Speaker 5: composer has set these words in kind of a style

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Speaker 5: of an American sousa march, and so she's talking about

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Speaker 5: being in the bathtub and being scrubbed in the bathtub,

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Speaker 5: and it's a Susa. We scrub, scrubs, scrub ourselves in

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Speaker 5: La Tinta right, very happy and optimistic music.

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Speaker 1: And Frank in the bathtub to the tune of a

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Speaker 1: Sousa march with the horrors of the Holocaust outside her door.

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Speaker 1: Three absolutely concrete images in merciless combination.

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Speaker 5: It just floored me every time I heard it because

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Speaker 5: it was so close to our own daughter, you know,

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Speaker 5: to think that she would have to create this kind

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Speaker 5: of fiction in order to just get through the day.

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Speaker 1: That's how you get tears. You make the story so

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Speaker 1: real and the details so sharp, and you add in

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Speaker 1: so many emotional triggers that the listener cannot escape. But

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Speaker 1: it's a risky thing to do, right If you aren't

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Speaker 1: a talented composer, and you don't do a sensitive rendition

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Speaker 1: of those lyrics, they could fall flat, could seem forced,

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Speaker 1: even offensive. Far easier just to fall back on the

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Speaker 1: blend cliche that wild horses couldn't drag you away. Country

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Speaker 1: music makes people cry because it's not afraid to be specific.

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Speaker 11: You know, she came to see him one last time,

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Speaker 11: and we all wondered if she would, and it kept

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Speaker 11: brought in through.

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Speaker 10: My mind.

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Speaker 11: This time.

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Speaker 1: Bobby Braddock was born in Auburndale, Florida, a little town

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Speaker 1: between Tampa and Orlando. His father grew Citrus. They were

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Speaker 1: Church of Christ, just about the most fundamentalist of fundamentalist Christians.

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Speaker 1: Braddock moved to Nashville in nineteen sixty four, just after

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Speaker 1: getting married, to seek his fortune in the music business.

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Speaker 1: He wrote his memoirs a few years ago. It's called

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Speaker 1: A Life on Nashville's Music Row. I read it before

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Speaker 1: I went to see him, and the best way to

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Speaker 1: describe the book is that it's exhausting. I don't mean

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Speaker 1: that in a bad way because I couldn't put it down.

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Speaker 1: But so much happens.

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Speaker 12: You've lived this incredibly tumultuous, emotionally tumultuous lit Yeah, And

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Speaker 12: in the book it sounds like the first precipitating event

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Speaker 12: is the death of your son.

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Speaker 1: Braddock was touring with the country music legend Mardy Robbins

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Speaker 1: at the time. He and his wife, Sue had a baby.

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Speaker 1: The child was just a few months old when he died.

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Speaker 2: Whenever I was in town, not on the road with

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Speaker 2: Marty Robbins, every single day we'd buy fresh flowers, go

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Speaker 2: put it on. It's gray. We were just pathetic.

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Speaker 1: He and Sue fight. She cheats on him. He cheats

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Speaker 1: on her, they break up, they get back together, they

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Speaker 1: have a daughter, they divorce. His ex wife mysteriously vanishes.

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Speaker 1: He drinks a lot, gets into fights, owes enormous sums

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Speaker 1: to the irs, has a major bout with depression, smokes

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Speaker 1: a lot of pot, lurches from one volcanic event to

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Speaker 1: the next, and through it all, Braddock writes songs, hundreds

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Speaker 1: of them.

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Speaker 12: You were kind of tolerance for emotional volatility seems extraordinary.

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Speaker 6: I guess.

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Speaker 2: Tolerance is probably a pretty good word for it.

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Speaker 1: Braddock walks over to the keyboard on the other side

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Speaker 1: of the room. He begins to talk about an old

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Speaker 1: girlfriend named Angela, who committed suicide by driving her car

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Speaker 1: into the river.

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Speaker 2: When Angela died, her mother took her baby to raise it.

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Speaker 2: And she sent me a picture with a little girl,

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Speaker 2: Angela's child when she was about four or five years old,

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Speaker 2: look just like her mom. Picture her standing out in

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Speaker 2: the yard. And boy did a number on me, despite

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Speaker 2: all the dishters.

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Speaker 1: He wrote a song about that in twenty minutes. He

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Speaker 1: played it for me. Then he played his favorite bit

381
00:26:20,916 --> 00:26:23,636
Speaker 1: of a sad Randy Newman song. He played me a

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00:26:23,756 --> 00:26:26,516
Speaker 1: heartbreaking song he wrote once after getting up in the

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Speaker 1: middle of the night and passing his lover in the hallway,

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Speaker 1: and as he played one weeper after another, I realized

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Speaker 1: that the thing I'd said about Braddock's tolerance for emotional

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Speaker 1: volatility tolerance was the wrong word. That was just me

387
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Speaker 1: projecting my uptight Canadian self on to Braddock. But Braddock

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Speaker 1: is from the musical side of the United States, where

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Speaker 1: emotion is not something to be endured, it's something to

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Speaker 1: be embraced. At one point, when cell phones were still analog,

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00:26:57,116 --> 00:26:58,916
Speaker 1: you could buy a scanner and listen in to other

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Speaker 1: people's conversations, and that's what Braddock does. He can't help himself.

393
00:27:04,356 --> 00:27:06,996
Speaker 1: A woman complains to her husband for an hour about

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Speaker 1: his lack of affection from the parking out at the

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00:27:09,476 --> 00:27:12,996
Speaker 1: grocery store. Then ask him what he wants, and he says,

396
00:27:13,636 --> 00:27:16,676
Speaker 1: maybe Apple Newton's. And then this is my favorite part

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00:27:16,916 --> 00:27:20,396
Speaker 1: I'm quoting now from Braddock's memoir. The conversation that truly

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00:27:20,476 --> 00:27:24,116
Speaker 1: touched me was between a man perhaps forty and his mother,

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Speaker 1: maybe late sixties, in which the sun opened up about

400
00:27:27,236 --> 00:27:30,196
Speaker 1: sexual problems he was having with his wife. And I

401
00:27:30,396 --> 00:27:33,836
Speaker 1: envied the sprinkling of profanities and the mother's invitation to

402
00:27:34,236 --> 00:27:36,436
Speaker 1: come over to the house, son, and let's open a

403
00:27:36,476 --> 00:27:39,236
Speaker 1: bottle of whiskey and talk about it. Wishing I had

404
00:27:39,356 --> 00:27:42,036
Speaker 1: that kind of easy and open communication with my mom.

405
00:27:42,676 --> 00:27:45,676
Speaker 1: Then learning that the guy's mother was terminally ill with cancer.

406
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Speaker 1: If you're keeping track, that's marital difficulty, sex, profanity, whisky mom,

407
00:27:51,996 --> 00:27:56,596
Speaker 1: and terminal cancer in one conversation, and it truly touched him.

408
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Speaker 1: Do you know what Braddot's favorite song is? Vince Gills

409
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Speaker 1: Go Rest High on that Mountain, which Gil wrote in

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Speaker 1: memory both of his brother who died young of a

411
00:28:08,756 --> 00:28:12,516
Speaker 1: heart attack and fellow country star Keith Whitley, who drank

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Speaker 1: himself to death.

413
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Speaker 9: Oh on, and son, you.

414
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Speaker 2: Corner is dn go dude, Oh my god. When Vince

415
00:28:34,276 --> 00:28:38,356
Speaker 2: Gill and Ricky Skaggs and Painty Lovelace are singing harmony

416
00:28:38,396 --> 00:28:41,276
Speaker 2: on that thing, I go nuts. It still tears me up,

417
00:28:41,836 --> 00:28:44,956
Speaker 2: knowing that it's about death, and Vince wrote it about

418
00:28:45,716 --> 00:28:48,636
Speaker 2: Keith Whitley and then about his own brother, and just

419
00:28:48,716 --> 00:28:51,516
Speaker 2: the emotion that sending that song. It's just it's just powerful.

420
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Speaker 8: Day you lift us.

421
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Speaker 1: Gathered round.

422
00:29:01,556 --> 00:29:03,436
Speaker 8: You agreed to.

423
00:29:06,356 --> 00:29:17,236
Speaker 10: Shock good seeing.

424
00:29:15,036 --> 00:29:19,396
Speaker 1: It's heartbreaking. Listening to that song makes me wonder if

425
00:29:19,436 --> 00:29:22,516
Speaker 1: some portion of what we call ideological division in America

426
00:29:22,956 --> 00:29:26,796
Speaker 1: actually isn't ideological at all. How big are the political

427
00:29:26,836 --> 00:29:29,876
Speaker 1: differences between red and blue states anyway, in the grand

428
00:29:29,916 --> 00:29:33,236
Speaker 1: scheme of things, not that big. Maybe what we're seeing

429
00:29:33,276 --> 00:29:37,396
Speaker 1: instead is a difference of emotional opinion. Because if your

430
00:29:37,476 --> 00:29:42,036
Speaker 1: principal form of cultural expression has drinking, sex, suicide, heart attacks,

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00:29:42,156 --> 00:29:45,716
Speaker 1: mom and terminal cancer all on the table for public discussion,

432
00:29:45,996 --> 00:29:47,716
Speaker 1: then the other half of the country is going to

433
00:29:47,756 --> 00:29:51,036
Speaker 1: seem really chilly and uncaring. And if you're from the

434
00:29:51,156 --> 00:29:54,556
Speaker 1: rock and roll half clinging semi ironically to two Dy

435
00:29:54,676 --> 00:29:57,796
Speaker 1: Fruity O Rudy, when you listen to a song written

436
00:29:57,836 --> 00:29:59,796
Speaker 1: about a guy's brother who died young of a heart

437
00:29:59,836 --> 00:30:03,316
Speaker 1: attack and another guy who drank himself to death, you're

438
00:30:03,316 --> 00:30:11,956
Speaker 1: going to think, who are these people? Here's another way

439
00:30:11,996 --> 00:30:17,836
Speaker 1: to think about the sad song line. Let me read

440
00:30:17,916 --> 00:30:20,676
Speaker 1: you the list of the birthplaces of the performers of

441
00:30:20,756 --> 00:30:23,676
Speaker 1: the top twenty country songs of all time Again. I'm

442
00:30:23,716 --> 00:30:30,996
Speaker 1: going to use the Rolling Stone magazine list. Ready, Arkansas, Virginia, Alabama, Texas, Mississippi,

443
00:30:31,036 --> 00:30:41,396
Speaker 1: Mississippi Georgia, California, Central Valley, by the way, not Los Angeles, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Texas, Kentucky, Alabama, Tennessee, Arkansas, Texas, Texas, Kentucky, Texas.

444
00:30:43,116 --> 00:30:45,916
Speaker 1: I could do the top fifty, or the top one hundred,

445
00:30:46,156 --> 00:30:49,436
Speaker 1: or the top two hundred, and you get the same pattern. Basically,

446
00:30:49,556 --> 00:30:52,876
Speaker 1: you cannot be a successful country singer or songwriter if

447
00:30:52,916 --> 00:30:56,636
Speaker 1: you're not from the South. It's impossible. There's one exception,

448
00:30:56,756 --> 00:30:59,836
Speaker 1: which is the great songwriter Harlan Howard, who was born

449
00:30:59,876 --> 00:31:03,796
Speaker 1: in Detroit, but almost immediately thereafter his family moves to

450
00:31:03,876 --> 00:31:06,516
Speaker 1: a farm in rural Kentucky. It's like the five to

451
00:31:06,596 --> 00:31:08,636
Speaker 1: second roll when you drop a piece of food on

452
00:31:08,716 --> 00:31:10,996
Speaker 1: the floor. If it's not on the ground long enough,

453
00:31:11,196 --> 00:31:13,996
Speaker 1: it doesn't count. As far as I can tell, there

454
00:31:14,036 --> 00:31:17,116
Speaker 1: are no Jews on the country list, almost no Catholics,

455
00:31:17,596 --> 00:31:21,956
Speaker 1: only two black people. It's white Southern Protestants all the

456
00:31:21,996 --> 00:31:27,316
Speaker 1: way down. Now compare that to the rock and roll list.

457
00:31:27,956 --> 00:31:32,076
Speaker 1: You've got Jews from Minnesota, black people from Detroit, Catholics

458
00:31:32,116 --> 00:31:37,236
Speaker 1: from New Jersey, middle class British art school dropouts, Canadians, Jamaicans.

459
00:31:38,156 --> 00:31:42,796
Speaker 1: Rock and roll is the Rainbow Coalition that diversity is

460
00:31:42,836 --> 00:31:45,716
Speaker 1: a good thing. It's why there's so much innovation in

461
00:31:45,796 --> 00:31:47,916
Speaker 1: rock and roll, but you pay a price for that.

462
00:31:51,796 --> 00:31:54,436
Speaker 1: There was a very clever bit of research published recently

463
00:31:54,516 --> 00:31:58,276
Speaker 1: by Colin Morrison the magazine The Pudding. He analyzed fifteen

464
00:31:58,396 --> 00:32:02,916
Speaker 1: thousand popular songs using an algorithm that can presses digital files.

465
00:32:03,836 --> 00:32:06,436
Speaker 1: So if you take out the repetitive bits in a song,

466
00:32:07,036 --> 00:32:10,596
Speaker 1: how much of it is left. Morris's big finding is

467
00:32:10,676 --> 00:32:14,756
Speaker 1: that rock and roll as a genre is really, really repetitive.

468
00:32:15,356 --> 00:32:19,316
Speaker 1: Britney Spears, Lady Gaga, the Beatles, If you take out

469
00:32:19,356 --> 00:32:24,156
Speaker 1: the duplicative parts, their music shrinks by sixty percent. That's

470
00:32:24,236 --> 00:32:28,436
Speaker 1: what happens when everyone is from somewhere different. Nobody speaks

471
00:32:28,476 --> 00:32:31,596
Speaker 1: the same language, so you have to use cliche, the

472
00:32:31,716 --> 00:32:35,316
Speaker 1: same phrases over and over again, because if you go

473
00:32:35,516 --> 00:32:38,956
Speaker 1: deeper or try to get more specific, you start to

474
00:32:39,036 --> 00:32:42,876
Speaker 1: lose people. Country music, on the other hand, is not

475
00:32:43,036 --> 00:32:46,916
Speaker 1: nearly as repetitive. When Morris ran the lyrics of popular

476
00:32:46,956 --> 00:32:50,076
Speaker 1: country singers through his algorithm, they only shrank by about

477
00:32:50,156 --> 00:32:53,236
Speaker 1: forty percent, a third less than the rock and rollers.

478
00:32:54,036 --> 00:32:57,676
Speaker 1: Nor is hip hop repetitive, which makes sense. The birthplaces

479
00:32:57,756 --> 00:33:00,716
Speaker 1: of everyone on Rolling Stones list of greatest rap songs

480
00:33:01,116 --> 00:33:04,356
Speaker 1: reads like an urban version of the country list. Queen's

481
00:33:04,756 --> 00:33:08,396
Speaker 1: South Central lal A Brooklyn, Long Island, South Central Long Beach,

482
00:33:08,476 --> 00:33:12,716
Speaker 1: Houston means the Bronx Englewood, New Jersey. The Bronx. Hip

483
00:33:12,756 --> 00:33:17,236
Speaker 1: Hop and country are both tightly knit musical communities. And

484
00:33:17,356 --> 00:33:20,356
Speaker 1: when you're speaking to people who understand your world and

485
00:33:20,516 --> 00:33:23,716
Speaker 1: your culture and your language, you can tell much more

486
00:33:23,836 --> 00:33:28,676
Speaker 1: complicated stories. You can use much more precise imagery. You

487
00:33:28,756 --> 00:33:36,836
Speaker 1: can lay yourself bare because you're among your own. In

488
00:33:36,956 --> 00:33:40,996
Speaker 1: the book, it sounds like your relationship with Sparky was

489
00:33:41,076 --> 00:33:44,436
Speaker 1: the one that seemed the most creatively fruitful. It was

490
00:33:45,116 --> 00:33:49,236
Speaker 1: it was Sparky was a beautiful blonde from northern Alabama,

491
00:33:49,836 --> 00:33:51,676
Speaker 1: the great love of Bobby Braddock's life.

492
00:33:52,316 --> 00:33:52,796
Speaker 9: Why was that?

493
00:33:54,556 --> 00:34:01,476
Speaker 2: I think because my favorite her are so strong. I mean,

494
00:34:01,756 --> 00:34:05,076
Speaker 2: is it's sort of a visceral thing.

495
00:34:06,196 --> 00:34:08,636
Speaker 1: I think That's why I found Bobby Braddock's book so

496
00:34:08,756 --> 00:34:13,996
Speaker 1: exhaust It's because everything is felt, everything is a mountain

497
00:34:14,076 --> 00:34:18,956
Speaker 1: peak and Sparky, Sparky was everest high altitude infatuation.

498
00:34:20,236 --> 00:34:23,276
Speaker 2: That's the sort of thing that made people go absolutely crazy.

499
00:34:23,676 --> 00:34:28,236
Speaker 2: You know, and that was the case with her. You know,

500
00:34:29,796 --> 00:34:33,516
Speaker 2: that's what gets the animal instinct of people maybe who

501
00:34:33,596 --> 00:34:36,396
Speaker 2: haven't evolved as much as they should, and cause them

502
00:34:36,476 --> 00:34:39,116
Speaker 2: to go out and get a gun, blow somebody's brains

503
00:34:39,156 --> 00:34:42,636
Speaker 2: out over some gun not being a can't stand the

504
00:34:42,716 --> 00:34:45,796
Speaker 2: thought or someone you know, having sex with a person

505
00:34:46,116 --> 00:34:46,716
Speaker 2: that he loves.

506
00:34:48,356 --> 00:34:50,916
Speaker 1: Braddick and Sparky were on and off lovers for years.

507
00:34:51,596 --> 00:34:57,076
Speaker 1: It was intense, painful, euphoric. When it ended, Braddick was

508
00:34:57,116 --> 00:34:57,596
Speaker 1: in pieces.

509
00:35:00,356 --> 00:35:07,836
Speaker 8: He kept her picture on the wall wind half crazy

510
00:35:08,396 --> 00:35:08,756
Speaker 8: now in.

511
00:35:08,836 --> 00:35:11,316
Speaker 1: The that's Braddick in the original demo he made of

512
00:35:11,396 --> 00:35:12,836
Speaker 1: he stopped loving her today.

513
00:35:12,836 --> 00:35:20,636
Speaker 8: He still loved her through it all, hoping she'd come back.

514
00:35:22,676 --> 00:35:24,276
Speaker 2: I'm not sure where it came from. It may have

515
00:35:24,356 --> 00:35:27,596
Speaker 2: come from Sparky, you know, honestly not know it would

516
00:35:27,596 --> 00:35:28,116
Speaker 2: be interesting.

517
00:35:29,236 --> 00:35:29,836
Speaker 12: How could it not?

518
00:35:30,276 --> 00:35:32,516
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, if I think it probably, I think it

519
00:35:32,596 --> 00:35:34,436
Speaker 2: probably did. But I just I can't see it. I

520
00:35:34,516 --> 00:35:36,796
Speaker 2: can't see that for certainty to.

521
00:35:36,916 --> 00:35:38,556
Speaker 8: Marvell carry him.

522
00:35:39,676 --> 00:35:42,476
Speaker 1: I felt like Bradick shrink at that moment, listening to

523
00:35:42,596 --> 00:35:45,196
Speaker 1: his tangled dreams and then wanting to shake him at

524
00:35:45,196 --> 00:35:47,836
Speaker 1: the end of the session. It's Sparky Sparky.

525
00:35:48,796 --> 00:35:51,356
Speaker 8: They found some letters by He's a being.

526
00:35:52,396 --> 00:35:54,036
Speaker 1: I mean, you wrote a song in the middle of

527
00:35:54,116 --> 00:36:01,596
Speaker 1: the great defining love affair of your life, the relationship ends,

528
00:36:01,636 --> 00:36:04,476
Speaker 1: and you write write a song about the heartbreak of

529
00:36:06,316 --> 00:36:10,756
Speaker 1: that a man carries to his grave. I mean, could

530
00:36:11,116 --> 00:36:11,996
Speaker 1: could it be more clear?

531
00:36:12,636 --> 00:36:15,556
Speaker 8: I went to see him one last time.

532
00:36:18,116 --> 00:36:20,556
Speaker 1: Bobby Braddick wrote he stopped loving her today with his

533
00:36:20,676 --> 00:36:23,796
Speaker 1: friend Curly. In nineteen seventy seven, they took it to

534
00:36:23,836 --> 00:36:27,316
Speaker 1: the singer George Jones. Jones was then at his lowest

535
00:36:27,356 --> 00:36:30,876
Speaker 1: ebb a wreck, strung out on cocaine and whiskey. He

536
00:36:31,116 --> 00:36:34,356
Speaker 1: just checked out of a psychiatric hospital. The great love

537
00:36:34,436 --> 00:36:37,636
Speaker 1: of his life, Tammy Wynette, had embodied her hit song

538
00:36:37,836 --> 00:36:41,916
Speaker 1: div O RCEE and left him. Jones had just nearly

539
00:36:41,956 --> 00:36:45,556
Speaker 1: shot and killed one of his best friends. The heartbroken

540
00:36:45,676 --> 00:36:48,276
Speaker 1: Bobby Braddock has written a song about a man who

541
00:36:48,316 --> 00:36:51,076
Speaker 1: cannot stop loving a woman, and it's sung by the

542
00:36:51,196 --> 00:36:56,276
Speaker 1: heartbroken George Jones. Who cannot stop loving a woman, Get

543
00:36:56,316 --> 00:36:56,596
Speaker 1: him some.

544
00:36:56,916 --> 00:36:59,396
Speaker 8: Letters byes Babe.

545
00:37:03,396 --> 00:37:03,436
Speaker 3: D.

546
00:37:03,516 --> 00:37:05,916
Speaker 10: In nineteen sixty two.

547
00:37:10,036 --> 00:37:12,676
Speaker 8: He had underlined and m.

548
00:37:14,636 --> 00:37:20,996
Speaker 1: Underlined in red every single I love you, every single

549
00:37:21,276 --> 00:37:21,756
Speaker 1: I love you.

550
00:37:22,916 --> 00:37:30,676
Speaker 10: I went to see him just today. Oh but I

551
00:37:30,836 --> 00:37:39,476
Speaker 10: didn't see no tears, all dressed up to go away.

552
00:37:42,916 --> 00:37:45,596
Speaker 10: First time I've seen him smiling.

553
00:37:45,876 --> 00:37:45,916
Speaker 2: You.

554
00:37:47,036 --> 00:37:49,356
Speaker 1: Why did he finally turn his back on his great love?

555
00:37:49,876 --> 00:37:52,316
Speaker 1: Why is this the first time he smiled in years?

556
00:37:52,716 --> 00:37:55,636
Speaker 1: Because he's dead. Only death could end his love.

557
00:37:56,196 --> 00:37:59,676
Speaker 7: It blazed red upon his dog.

558
00:38:02,716 --> 00:38:04,916
Speaker 8: And sing, They'll carry.

559
00:38:09,996 --> 00:38:10,036
Speaker 3: You.

560
00:38:10,196 --> 00:38:12,676
Speaker 8: Stopped loving hard today.

561
00:38:14,156 --> 00:38:18,316
Speaker 1: It's totally over the top, Madelin sentimental Kitchie, call it

562
00:38:18,396 --> 00:38:22,836
Speaker 1: whatever you want, just don't fight it. One thing that

563
00:38:22,876 --> 00:38:25,716
Speaker 1: Bobby Braddock told me in passing that I think about

564
00:38:25,756 --> 00:38:28,196
Speaker 1: a lot is that he thought of the character in

565
00:38:28,276 --> 00:38:31,476
Speaker 1: his song as a bad role model. The man was obsessed.

566
00:38:32,116 --> 00:38:36,116
Speaker 1: He couldn't let go. But that's the point, right, That's

567
00:38:36,156 --> 00:38:39,676
Speaker 1: why we cry, because the song manages to find beauty

568
00:38:39,956 --> 00:38:43,156
Speaker 1: and even a little bit of grandeur in someone's frailty.

569
00:38:44,996 --> 00:38:46,756
Speaker 10: I'm sol carried.

570
00:38:52,076 --> 00:38:55,836
Speaker 8: He stopped loving hard today.

571
00:38:57,396 --> 00:38:59,676
Speaker 1: Wild horses, please.

572
00:39:10,236 --> 00:39:12,996
Speaker 9: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Grand

573
00:39:13,036 --> 00:39:16,716
Speaker 9: Ole Opry House to the celebration of life of George

574
00:39:16,916 --> 00:39:20,396
Speaker 9: Glenn Jones. One of the most important people ever of

575
00:39:20,516 --> 00:39:23,076
Speaker 9: all time and of any time in the history of

576
00:39:23,116 --> 00:39:23,836
Speaker 9: country music.

577
00:39:24,516 --> 00:39:28,676
Speaker 1: George Jones died in twenty thirteen. Everyone who was anyone

578
00:39:28,756 --> 00:39:31,636
Speaker 1: in country music came to his memorial service. You should

579
00:39:31,636 --> 00:39:33,756
Speaker 1: watch it if you get the chance. It's on YouTube,

580
00:39:34,076 --> 00:39:36,836
Speaker 1: all two hours and forty one minutes of it, because

581
00:39:36,876 --> 00:39:40,236
Speaker 1: it's everything I've been talking about. Vince Gill stands up

582
00:39:40,276 --> 00:39:42,876
Speaker 1: with Patty Lovelace and sings, go rest high in that

583
00:39:42,996 --> 00:40:06,596
Speaker 1: Mountain and breaks down halfway through. Travis Tritt remembers a

584
00:40:06,636 --> 00:40:10,036
Speaker 1: conversation he once had with Chris Christofferson about how they

585
00:40:10,116 --> 00:40:12,716
Speaker 1: expected George Jones to have died years before.

586
00:40:14,076 --> 00:40:16,516
Speaker 15: And I looked at Chris and I made the comment,

587
00:40:17,796 --> 00:40:21,796
Speaker 15: you know, with all the years of hard living that

588
00:40:21,956 --> 00:40:27,236
Speaker 15: George had, who would have ever thought that he would

589
00:40:27,276 --> 00:40:35,116
Speaker 15: outlive Tammy. And Chris looked at me and said, had

590
00:40:35,156 --> 00:40:39,036
Speaker 15: it not been for Nancy, he would not have.

591
00:40:42,796 --> 00:40:47,236
Speaker 1: Nancy Jones, George Jones's fourth and final wife, the real

592
00:40:47,356 --> 00:40:51,716
Speaker 1: love of his life, his soulmate and companion. Travis Tritt

593
00:40:51,956 --> 00:40:55,036
Speaker 1: holds out his hand towards Nancy, who's sitting right in

594
00:40:55,116 --> 00:40:55,716
Speaker 1: the front row.

595
00:40:56,356 --> 00:41:00,276
Speaker 15: George said it many times. She's my angel, and she

596
00:41:00,476 --> 00:41:03,916
Speaker 15: saved my life, and so we owe you a debt

597
00:41:03,916 --> 00:41:05,156
Speaker 15: of gratitude.

598
00:41:06,116 --> 00:41:06,356
Speaker 5: For that.

599
00:41:09,356 --> 00:41:12,276
Speaker 1: Comes the crowning moment of the day, the final performance.

600
00:41:12,956 --> 00:41:16,596
Speaker 1: Alan Jackson strides out onto the stage a big rangy

601
00:41:16,676 --> 00:41:21,436
Speaker 1: guy craggy features cowboy boots, jeans, long coat, white statson.

602
00:41:21,916 --> 00:41:26,316
Speaker 1: He looks squarely at Nancy Jones and without introduction, launches

603
00:41:26,356 --> 00:41:27,876
Speaker 1: into he stopped loving her today.

604
00:41:29,636 --> 00:41:37,036
Speaker 7: He shout, all love you till I die. She told

605
00:41:37,276 --> 00:41:46,316
Speaker 7: em you are yet time as he years when clool.

606
00:41:48,436 --> 00:41:52,316
Speaker 1: And you realize as he sings that Braddock's song has

607
00:41:52,396 --> 00:41:56,396
Speaker 1: gotten even more specific. It's no longer about a long

608
00:41:56,436 --> 00:42:00,596
Speaker 1: ago love affair. It's about right now. This is the

609
00:42:00,676 --> 00:42:08,036
Speaker 1: day George Jones stopped loving Nancy Jones. Alan Jackson takes

610
00:42:08,076 --> 00:42:10,396
Speaker 1: off his hat and play says it over his heart.

611
00:42:12,156 --> 00:42:14,116
Speaker 7: He stopped loving her.

612
00:42:17,276 --> 00:42:17,716
Speaker 12: Today.

613
00:42:22,276 --> 00:42:24,956
Speaker 1: And if you aren't crying, I can't help you.

614
00:42:26,276 --> 00:42:33,236
Speaker 9: I love you, George. All of the three grades of

615
00:42:33,316 --> 00:42:38,836
Speaker 9: our time, ladies and gentlemen at all time. That's Alan Jackson,

616
00:42:38,916 --> 00:42:39,676
Speaker 9: Thank you so much.

617
00:43:03,476 --> 00:43:07,156
Speaker 1: Revision's History is produced by Emil LaBelle and Jacob Smith,

618
00:43:07,276 --> 00:43:11,996
Speaker 1: with Camille Baptista, Stephanie Daniel, and Ciomara Martinez White. Our

619
00:43:12,116 --> 00:43:16,556
Speaker 1: editor is Julia Barton. Lawn Williams is our engineer. Original

620
00:43:16,676 --> 00:43:20,236
Speaker 1: music by Luis Sciarra. Special thanks to Andy Bauers and

621
00:43:20,356 --> 00:43:23,236
Speaker 1: Jacob Weisberger Panicle. I'm Malcolm gadwe