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Speaker 1: Pushkin. Alice Randall is a country music songwriter, a New

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Speaker 1: York Times bestselling author, and a newly minted memoirst. She

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Speaker 1: calls her new book, My Black Country a love letter

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Speaker 1: to black country music. In addition to her memoir, Alice

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Speaker 1: has also released the album My Black Country The Songs

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Speaker 1: of Alice Randall that includes her rendition of the song

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Speaker 1: The Ballad of Sally Anne performed by Rhiannon Giddons. The song,

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Speaker 1: which confronts the harsh realities of lynching and the American South,

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Speaker 1: was nominated for a Grammy last year in the Best

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Speaker 1: American Roots Performance category. On today's episode, Bruce Hettlam talks

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Speaker 1: to Alice Randall about her lifelong love of country music

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Speaker 1: and how growing up in Detroit during the height of

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Speaker 1: Motown influenced her musical sensibilities. She also traces the countless

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Speaker 1: contributions African Americans have made to country music and why

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Speaker 1: she believes that history has been ignored. This is broken record,

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Speaker 1: real musicians, real conversations. Here's Bruce Headlin's conversation with Alice Randall.

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Speaker 2: So you have your book, My Black Country. We should

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Speaker 2: mention it's far from your first book. You're also a novelist.

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Speaker 2: You've done many other things. You had the tribute album

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Speaker 2: My Black Country, which is the songs of Alice Randall

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Speaker 2: and beautifully designed in that classical Nashville way. Now and

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Speaker 2: you talk about all of this as your project. Are

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Speaker 2: there other elements to this project? Is there more coming?

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Speaker 3: Yes? There actually is more coming. There is my Black

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Speaker 3: Country documentary that Reggie will be directing that will let

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Speaker 3: us take a deeper dive into some of this material

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Speaker 3: and a visual dive into it. And I've actually just

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Speaker 3: begun work on my Black Country Country Cookbook, which will

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Speaker 3: actually create taste monuments to some of the women who

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Speaker 3: performed on the album and to some of the people

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Speaker 3: that are make appearances in the book. In the memoir

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Speaker 3: in history, but the memoir in History is very much

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Speaker 3: focused on the past and up to the present, and

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Speaker 3: my Black Country Cookbook is going to be focused on

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Speaker 3: the present and into the future.

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Speaker 2: When did this whole idea come to you that there's

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Speaker 2: got to be some way to pull all these threads together?

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Speaker 2: And we should mention the book is it's a history

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Speaker 2: of Black country. It's a very personal history as well.

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Speaker 2: It's your history, and it's also the music's history.

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Speaker 3: Absolutely and succorded and unrecorded music history. The music of

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Speaker 3: My Black Country begins in the seventeenth century and goes

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Speaker 3: to the present, but it focuses on the recorded era

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Speaker 3: that starts in nineteen twenty seven and the radio era

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Speaker 3: with Deft Bailey on WSM radio, with Lil Harden playing

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Speaker 3: on Blue Yodel number nine in nineteen thirty one, country's

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Speaker 3: first million selling single. So that's the history part of

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Speaker 3: the project. And then it takes up in nineteen eighty

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Speaker 3: three with my forty year history, which is the memoir part.

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Speaker 3: But the larger project occurred to me when I was

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Speaker 3: a little girl in Motown. I was born in Detroit

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Speaker 3: nineteen fifty nine, and my parents were not involved in

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Speaker 3: the music business, but they were surrounded by people in

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Speaker 3: the music business, particularly the Gordy family, particularly Marvin Gay,

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Speaker 3: Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder. This very rich musical world swirled

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Speaker 3: around me, and so did a lot of great music gossip.

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Speaker 3: And so I had heard from early childhood's day that

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Speaker 3: Lil Harden played on that big Sometimes they said Hillbilly hit,

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Speaker 3: sometimes they said Pekko would hit, meaning Blue Yoga number

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Speaker 3: nan and Lil Harden was still moving through that world

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Speaker 3: when I was a little girl. So by the time

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Speaker 3: fast forward, I'm at Harvard and I'm interested in country music,

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Speaker 3: and I'm not hearing any of that, and I start

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Speaker 3: to trace the oral history, track down the oral history

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Speaker 3: I've been hearing in my Detroit childhood and interrogate it

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Speaker 3: with the facts and the history that we were learning

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Speaker 3: and was available, and see how much of it was true. Well,

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Speaker 3: it turned out my daddy was right about who was

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Speaker 3: playing on Jimmy Rogers and Orchestra, so that that was

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Speaker 3: also Louis Armstrong and also a little hardened. And so

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Speaker 3: I think the project began when I was a little

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Speaker 3: girl in Detroit hearing counter narratives and continuing to hear

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Speaker 3: counter narratives when I was in middle school, and that

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Speaker 3: I loved the Johnny Cash Show, but my father had

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Speaker 3: counter narratives to what was happening on the Johnny Cash

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Speaker 3: Show too. But in Earnest twenty eighteen, I was diagnosed

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Speaker 3: with breast cancer and it was a sort of serious

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Speaker 3: of one, and I thought about if I did die soon,

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Speaker 3: what were the things I wanted to do and the

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Speaker 3: two projects I wanted to do was one write a

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Speaker 3: history of the Motown music scene as I understood it

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Speaker 3: that I thought should be a novel that was Black

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Speaker 3: Bottom Saints. And the other was I wanted to write

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Speaker 3: the history of black people in country music, everything that

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Speaker 3: I've been collecting and learning and knowing for all that time.

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Speaker 3: Then when Black Bottom Saints came out and that book

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Speaker 3: did well, I was proud that the New York Times

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Speaker 3: picked it as one of the best historical novels of

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Speaker 3: the year. People wanted to hear my old records a lot,

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Speaker 3: and they and even for the website, they wanted me

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Speaker 3: to put up a Spotify playlist of these old recorded songs,

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Speaker 3: many of which have been hit and I realized I

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Speaker 3: could barely bear to listen to any of them. So

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Speaker 3: it's a visceral, real hm event because particularly taken as

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Speaker 3: a group, when you look at the one that starts

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Speaker 3: off the album, small towns are smaller for girls. I

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Speaker 3: was very proud to get that Holly Done cut. But

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Speaker 3: when you listen to that cut, it doesn't sound like

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Speaker 3: any black girl ever lived in a small town in

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Speaker 3: the South, when small towns in the South were full

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Speaker 3: of black girls. When you listen to girls ride horses too,

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Speaker 3: my first Top ten sung by G. D. Rodman. You're

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Speaker 3: thinking white girls in the West ride horses too, But

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Speaker 3: I was actually thinking about black and brown women in

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Speaker 3: the Western road horses and black and brown women who

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Speaker 3: are being caught up in the drug trade that that

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Speaker 3: song was about on the tax Mexican border. When Sister

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Speaker 3: String sings that, you hear that and more significantly, even

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Speaker 3: the Ballad of Sally Inn that had been on a

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Speaker 3: Grammy nominated album that was an extraordinary album. Mark O'Connor

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Speaker 3: is playing the fiddo, one of the great voices of

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Speaker 3: new grass and blue grass. John Cowan is singing the lead.

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Speaker 3: But when he sings the Ballad of Sally Anne, it's

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Speaker 3: from the perspective of a white man who watched the

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Speaker 3: body hung in the trees and couldn't at best do it,

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Speaker 3: needing to stop it. When Rihannan sings the Ballad of

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Speaker 3: Sally Anne, it's from the perspective of the woman whose

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Speaker 3: husband has been lynched between his wedding and his reception.

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Speaker 3: And it's the voice of love, transcending death, love eclipsing hate.

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Speaker 3: It is a much more profound thing, and it's closer

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Speaker 3: to the thing I was writing in the first place,

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Speaker 3: because I was writing in my head for my own voice,

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Speaker 3: though I did not want to be a singer.

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Speaker 2: Mm hmm. Okay, you've just covered an enormous amount of territory.

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Speaker 2: So you mentioned you were born in Detroit, but you

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Speaker 2: were surrounded by country music.

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Speaker 3: Yes, like many black people, I was born in nineteen

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Speaker 3: fifty nine. Many black people from my era and before.

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Speaker 3: Remember the Golden Age of black radio was yet to

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Speaker 3: happen in nineteen fifty nine, that the vast majority of

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Speaker 3: radio programming in America, in the American South was country programming,

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Speaker 3: and so Ray Charles grew up listening to the opera

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Speaker 3: on Saturday nights. He says that his mama would let

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Speaker 3: him stay up late. That's the only time she'd let

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Speaker 3: him stay up late to listen to it. But intimately,

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Speaker 3: I have always said that my mother, my grandmother, and

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Speaker 3: my aunt only had one thing in common, and it

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Speaker 3: should have been loving me, but it was actually loving

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Speaker 3: country music because my mother did not love me so

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Speaker 3: but the music they loved was different. My grandmother would

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Speaker 3: seemed to me on her lap the old songs, Will

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Speaker 3: the circle be unbroken? My auntie would wear out the albums,

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Speaker 3: particularly Ray Charles's Modern Sounds in Country and Western.

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Speaker 2: Which came out I think a year after you were born.

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Speaker 3: Yes, right after I was born, and my mother played

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Speaker 3: the country radio. That was her secret pleasure. She would

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Speaker 3: do it in the laundry room in the basement of

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Speaker 3: the house, and she was playing Ernest Tubb and Hank

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Speaker 3: Williams and all the honky tar kits of the radio.

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Speaker 3: So I was getting country in live voice on my

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Speaker 3: grandmother's lap, dancing around the living room with Mary Francis,

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Speaker 3: my auntie, and snuck out to the radio with my mother.

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Speaker 3: And then I eventually moved to Washington, d C. Where

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Speaker 3: I got to hear a lot of live bluegrass, seldom

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Speaker 3: seeing country gentlemen ROBERTA. Flack, who I actually think of

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Speaker 3: as a country artist. So it live country would come

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Speaker 3: into my life then. And I also fell in love

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Speaker 3: with the Johnny Cash Show. I actually loved the Johnny

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Speaker 3: Cash Show, and I watch got a lot of country

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Speaker 3: in the television when I was in middle school.

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Speaker 2: Do you remember was there one particular song, Was there

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Speaker 2: one moment that made you think, maybe I want to

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Speaker 2: do this?

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Speaker 3: They were so oh many moments I mean I was

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Speaker 3: literally a little girl. I think I was four or

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Speaker 3: five in a Motown cherry tree when I wrote my

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Speaker 3: first country song, Daddy, don't go in that var Please

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Speaker 3: don't leave me alone in the car.

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Speaker 2: But you need to tell the story of that song.

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Speaker 3: Well, I was, I know, I was about three years

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Speaker 3: old when the first event happened. It was a fall,

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Speaker 3: dark was coming and my father had stopped in front

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Speaker 3: of a door in his car and pointed to hands

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Speaker 3: on the clock and said, when the hands got to

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Speaker 3: this point, he'd be back. And I knew he would

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Speaker 3: be because he was always back before the hands got

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Speaker 3: to where he pointed the car. But this time it

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Speaker 3: was cold and it was getting dark, and I was

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Speaker 3: feeling a little scared. I did not want to be

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Speaker 3: left alone in the car. And I looked at these

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Speaker 3: letters hanging in the sky, write letters, and I said, Daddy,

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Speaker 3: don't go in that baar, because that was the letters

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Speaker 3: I saw. I couldn't read those letters. That's how I

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Speaker 3: know it was three And he said, I've left you

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Speaker 3: in fid of too many bar signs, neon signs. If

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Speaker 3: you're spelling those letters out to me now. He still

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Speaker 3: went in, but he took me with him, and so

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Speaker 3: that was one when I learned the power of language

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Speaker 3: and power of using my words. I got to go inside.

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Speaker 3: He put me on a barstool. I got something with

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Speaker 3: a Maraschino cherry in it. I remember that, And so

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Speaker 3: that event happened to me. And fast forward about a

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Speaker 3: year or two. It was not immediately, it was around

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Speaker 3: the time I was starting kindergarten to around five. I

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Speaker 3: used to spend four or five I used to spend

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Speaker 3: a lot of time in the cherry tree on the

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Speaker 3: side of our house we actually had. It was Detroit, Michigan,

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Speaker 3: and there was four fruit trees, and then the highway,

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Speaker 3: So the highway and the cars on that were like

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Speaker 3: my river in Detroit. But I was actually sitting up

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Speaker 3: in a fruit tree, a cherry tree. And of course

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Speaker 3: they told me that birds poo pooed on the cherries

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Speaker 3: in the tree, so I didn't get to eat any

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Speaker 3: of those. So this is a Detroit childhood. I am

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Speaker 3: sitting in a cherry tree, eating from a jar of

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Speaker 3: bar Cherry's Marashino cherry, and I think thinking about that.

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Speaker 3: In that first drink I started, you know, I was

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Speaker 3: singing to the birds. John Lewis said he used to

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Speaker 3: preach to the chickens. I never said I didn't have

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Speaker 3: any chickens, and I didn't do any preaching, but I

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Speaker 3: used to sing to the birds a very bad voice.

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Speaker 3: I don't have a good voice, and usually first I

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Speaker 3: was singing songs I learned from my grandmother, my mother,

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Speaker 3: my aunt. But eventually I started making up my own

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Speaker 3: little songs. And the first one I really remember making

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Speaker 3: up was Daddy, don't go in that bar, Please don't

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Speaker 3: leave me alone in the car. I'm wishing on a

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Speaker 3: something star, Daddy don't go in that bar. And I

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Speaker 3: love that song so much, the bones of it. I

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Speaker 3: brought it with me to Nashville, and I brought it

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Speaker 3: into several meetings, and I remember Archie Jordan, who wrote

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Speaker 3: What a Difference You Made in My Life and some

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Speaker 3: Grammy winning big songs. Archie said to me, that's the

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Speaker 3: hit and I said that happened to me and he

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Speaker 3: said I know, and I said, how could you know?

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Speaker 3: He said, you can't invent that, but I love that

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Speaker 3: event was so precious to me. I could never work

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Speaker 3: on that song to make it a professional or co

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Speaker 3: written song because I couldn't change anything about it. So

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Speaker 3: I've known from almost my earliest hours music was so

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Speaker 3: important to me. It's been a lifeline to me through

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Speaker 3: my whole life. It was the soundtrack that filled up

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Speaker 3: the silences around me in an unhappy home. I've always

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Speaker 3: loved music and always wanted to write, write makeup songs.

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Speaker 3: I love making up songs.

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Speaker 2: And did you start playing piano or guitar when you

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Speaker 2: were young as well?

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Speaker 3: Weirdly I took some piano lessons. So I went to

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Speaker 3: a school called the Ziggie Johnson School of the Theater,

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Speaker 3: which I've written a lot about in Black Bottom Saints,

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Speaker 3: And that's a real place. It was run by a

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Speaker 3: man called Ziggie Johnson, who was, like you, an important journalist.

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Speaker 3: He wrote for the Michigan Chronicle of the black newspaper

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Speaker 3: there and it was a column largely about the national

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Speaker 3: music industry from a Detroit perspective. And he had this

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Speaker 3: dance school. So I'm at a dance school where, for example,

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Speaker 3: the Supremes will come in and they actually perform on

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Speaker 3: the yearly pageant, and Sammy Davis comes in. He's also

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Speaker 3: showing us bootleg film a Barishnakov the man was very interesting.

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Speaker 3: So I early knew one because I'm hearing not that

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Speaker 3: much older than me. Stevie Wonder played the harmonica or

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Speaker 3: make music that I am not a great musician. I

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Speaker 3: am not a dancer, but I could write. I realized

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Speaker 3: I did put words together in sort of interesting ways.

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Speaker 3: But I knew so I did not play the piano

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Speaker 3: long or the guitar long. And I will make a

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Speaker 3: confession I've hardly ever confessed my own daughter, who now

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Speaker 3: plays I think a very cool guitar and sings very interestingly.

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Speaker 3: It will put out an album next year, and I

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Speaker 3: love that. Justin Town's earl said, like he said, you're

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Speaker 3: a guitar playing and worth the ship. I can do

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Speaker 3: something with your voice that she actually does play some

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Speaker 3: interesting guitar. But when she was a little girl, when

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Speaker 3: she had been at it just a few years, and

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Speaker 3: she went through all this great classical piano lessons, I said, Carol,

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Speaker 3: if you were a great pianist for a guitar, we

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Speaker 3: wouldn't know that. By now. This is like, Mommy, I

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Speaker 3: am not the mother who could listen to this and

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Speaker 3: say this is great. It wasn't originally great, but eventually

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Speaker 3: she actually has become I think actually a very unusual,

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Speaker 3: really great guitar player. And I love acclaiming she wasn't

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Speaker 3: for a long time. But I never I cannot sing

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Speaker 3: at all, and I cannot play the guitar, and I

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Speaker 3: have very good ears. I have. I can tell when

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Speaker 3: things are slightly off. I can recognize talent at the

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Speaker 3: very beginning. But I have great ears and do not

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Speaker 3: play any instrument or sing or anything.

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Speaker 2: Okay, this surprises me because your daughter clearly was working

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Speaker 2: at it, and you were like, oh, you don't know

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Speaker 2: she is going to get there. But you worked at

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Speaker 2: being a lyricist. You write in the book about listening

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Speaker 2: to the radio. I don't know when you had the typewriter,

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Speaker 2: but you would type up the lyrics you would hear

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Speaker 2: and then analyze them.

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Speaker 3: Well at first what I do at night. So we

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Speaker 3: have to back in the days. This is the early eighties.

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Speaker 3: So I have worked so hard at being a lyricist.

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Speaker 3: So in the early eighties, when I moved here in

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Speaker 3: eighty three, I would let the radio run all night,

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Speaker 3: and if on the country radio, and if I heard

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Speaker 3: a song that I hadn't heard, I would wake up

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Speaker 3: and write down so I started with a pad in

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Speaker 3: my bed, you know, and of course radio format when

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Speaker 3: things are moving up there on every hour, every couple hours,

295
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Speaker 3: literally because there was no Google back then everything. I

296
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Speaker 3: was literally catching the song all through the night, and

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Speaker 3: then I would type it up in the daytime in

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Speaker 3: this little portable typewriter, but it would be a pad

299
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Speaker 3: in the bed with me during the night, that is how.

300
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Speaker 3: And my goal first was you've heard and written down

301
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Speaker 3: the lyrics for every single song on the top one

302
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Speaker 3: hundred country chart. So once you got through all hundred,

303
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Speaker 3: it wasn't as hard as it seems, because back in

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Speaker 3: those days a song might take two three months to

305
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Speaker 3: rise from the bottom of the chart to the top.

306
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Speaker 3: So once it was on and I had it typed out,

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Speaker 3: I had that one, and so I only was having

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Speaker 3: to deal with that new songs, And there weren't really

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Speaker 3: that many new songs that broke, but I truly would

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Speaker 3: work on the new songs that way, and then I

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Speaker 3: would go sometimes to the Country Music Hall of Fame

312
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Speaker 3: they're archives a museum, and I would look up all

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Speaker 3: songs and write them out, and then I studied those

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Speaker 3: songs like I studied Jane Austen and Shakespeare at Harvard.

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Speaker 3: I remember coming across Red Bandana, which is an amazing song,

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Speaker 3: that red bandana tied around your abbn hair. You look

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Speaker 3: like you ought to be somebody's wife somewhere. You ain't

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Speaker 3: never gonna be no Bobby McGee, but you're trying to.

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Speaker 3: What I learned from that is that country songs can

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Speaker 3: actually reference characters in other songs, like that Bobby McGee,

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00:18:09,876 --> 00:18:13,676
Speaker 3: the Christofferson song being referenced in this other song. I

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Speaker 3: found weird, wonderful old songs like Don't Forget the Coffee,

323
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Speaker 3: Billy Joe, mamanise her medicine, She's got that real bad cough.

324
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Speaker 3: I love that portrait of the depression. So I took

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Speaker 3: it very seriously both the craft, but I also took

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Speaker 3: it very seriously of finding the songs that truly utterly

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Speaker 3: spoke to me, that I thought were as important as

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Speaker 3: any poetry ever. And also I was interested from those

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Speaker 3: very beginnings to find the evidences of what I recognize

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Speaker 3: as black influence and black presence in these songs, and

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Speaker 3: fascinated by whether it be banjo riff, whether it be

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Speaker 3: evangelical Christianity, whether it be a sense of sacred place.

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Speaker 3: All these things that I knew were part of what

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Speaker 3: Africans brought to the American experience. I was tracing that down,

335
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Speaker 3: but I was also just tracing down proud waves of

336
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Speaker 3: human dignity in the face of poverty that claims, and

337
00:19:12,396 --> 00:19:15,676
Speaker 3: I also chased down other wonderful portraits. I was on

338
00:19:15,676 --> 00:19:17,956
Speaker 3: a panel last night, and I didn't get to straighten

339
00:19:17,996 --> 00:19:21,596
Speaker 3: out this one thing. Somebody's saying, Oh, all these idealized

340
00:19:21,716 --> 00:19:25,876
Speaker 3: usions of mothers in country songs. I'm thinking, what I

341
00:19:25,876 --> 00:19:29,996
Speaker 3: love Bobby gentry Fancy and a cockroach rope pulled across

342
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Speaker 3: the tip of her high heeled shoe, and she said,

343
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Speaker 3: just be good to the gentleman, Fancy, and they'll be

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Speaker 3: good to you. This is a mother. Your daddy's the

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00:19:37,996 --> 00:19:40,236
Speaker 3: baby's real sake, Your daddy's run off, and we're about

346
00:19:40,236 --> 00:19:42,556
Speaker 3: to starve to death. And this mother is basically not

347
00:19:42,636 --> 00:19:45,796
Speaker 3: basically she is pouring her daughter out. She takes the

348
00:19:45,876 --> 00:19:48,916
Speaker 3: last money she has and buys her a tight fitting

349
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Speaker 3: dress and sends her off. That is just one of many.

350
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Speaker 3: Daddy Love Mama, Mama loved Men, mamposite in the graveyard,

351
00:19:58,036 --> 00:20:01,596
Speaker 3: Daddy's in the pen, Country tells some very hard truths

352
00:20:01,916 --> 00:20:05,716
Speaker 3: about mothers. One of the songs I love the most.

353
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Speaker 3: It's the opposite of slut shaming. It's so of its time.

354
00:20:09,676 --> 00:20:12,476
Speaker 3: It is done by many people, by Whitey Schaeffer is

355
00:20:13,596 --> 00:20:17,396
Speaker 3: Hickory Holler, tramp Merle Haggard did it, Oci Smith did it.

356
00:20:17,876 --> 00:20:20,636
Speaker 3: And it's about a mother who horse herself out in

357
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Speaker 3: the very cabin with her children. And at the end

358
00:20:24,516 --> 00:20:27,476
Speaker 3: of it, it moves to the graveside and there's a

359
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Speaker 3: big bouquet of thirteen roses and a card that says,

360
00:20:30,356 --> 00:20:33,476
Speaker 3: to the greatest mom on Earth in the history of

361
00:20:33,516 --> 00:20:39,436
Speaker 3: American literature, there is nothing that feminist woman ford about.

362
00:20:39,796 --> 00:20:41,956
Speaker 3: You know. That's the opposite of sluck shaining, that this

363
00:20:41,996 --> 00:20:45,756
Speaker 3: woman is a dynamic sex worker doing her thing and

364
00:20:45,796 --> 00:20:46,836
Speaker 3: her kids are getting it.

365
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Speaker 2: And this is country music, and it's.

366
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Speaker 3: Country music, and it's country music that traveled into other genres.

367
00:20:53,516 --> 00:20:56,556
Speaker 3: It was country. It had multiple country cuts, and it

368
00:20:56,636 --> 00:20:59,956
Speaker 3: also had R and B cuts. It's an amazing song.

369
00:21:00,196 --> 00:21:02,836
Speaker 3: So this whole journey that Beyonce is making right now,

370
00:21:02,916 --> 00:21:06,076
Speaker 3: it's not the first time. Ray Charles is what came

371
00:21:06,116 --> 00:21:08,436
Speaker 3: before it. This song that I've just told you about

372
00:21:08,436 --> 00:21:12,116
Speaker 3: it so much conversation going back and forth. I always

373
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Speaker 3: loved this song about Midnight Train to Georgia. We all

374
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Speaker 3: know that song, Gladys Knight. I knew Gladys Knight in Detroit,

375
00:21:21,156 --> 00:21:23,996
Speaker 3: but I met Jim Weatherley, who wrote that song in Nashville.

376
00:21:24,076 --> 00:21:26,356
Speaker 3: And the two things Jim Weathery said, I think one

377
00:21:26,396 --> 00:21:29,516
Speaker 3: was there are no minor leagues of country songwriting, and

378
00:21:29,556 --> 00:21:33,436
Speaker 3: the other was Midnight Train to Georgia started off as

379
00:21:34,436 --> 00:21:37,876
Speaker 3: Midnight Playing to Houston and it was about Farah Fawcett

380
00:21:37,876 --> 00:21:40,756
Speaker 3: and Lee Natures and when she was telling him, I'm

381
00:21:40,756 --> 00:21:43,956
Speaker 3: going to have to leave Charlie's Angels because I can't

382
00:21:44,076 --> 00:21:46,516
Speaker 3: keep it together with this man. And then a black

383
00:21:46,516 --> 00:21:48,716
Speaker 3: group was recording it and they changed it. They said,

384
00:21:48,756 --> 00:21:51,196
Speaker 3: can we change the name? But it shows you these

385
00:21:51,676 --> 00:21:56,476
Speaker 3: this deep that's a real collaboration that black singers of

386
00:21:56,516 --> 00:21:59,956
Speaker 3: this song collaborated. And I will just say that the

387
00:21:59,956 --> 00:22:04,116
Speaker 3: hook Midnight Train to Georgia is a far stronger hook

388
00:22:04,196 --> 00:22:08,516
Speaker 3: than Midnight Playing. Yes, and those collaborators even I don't

389
00:22:08,556 --> 00:22:10,516
Speaker 3: know what their name are now because I'm not sure

390
00:22:10,556 --> 00:22:12,876
Speaker 3: if it was the original artist that recorded it or

391
00:22:12,916 --> 00:22:15,956
Speaker 3: somebody working with them. A producer that was working with them,

392
00:22:16,036 --> 00:22:18,156
Speaker 3: and poor Jim Webber's dad, so he can't tell us.

393
00:22:18,316 --> 00:22:22,036
Speaker 3: But the point being, there have always been migrations when

394
00:22:22,076 --> 00:22:26,316
Speaker 3: you're talking about important stories. Because one of the things

395
00:22:26,356 --> 00:22:30,196
Speaker 3: that's and important songs that I love about country music

396
00:22:30,556 --> 00:22:32,196
Speaker 3: as well as what I love about soul food and

397
00:22:32,196 --> 00:22:38,036
Speaker 3: Southern food, they're both evidences of how African all Americans

398
00:22:38,036 --> 00:22:42,796
Speaker 3: are and how black and white and indigenous Southerners co

399
00:22:42,916 --> 00:22:47,676
Speaker 3: created a world and multiple art forms, one of these

400
00:22:47,836 --> 00:22:50,996
Speaker 3: art forms being country music, one of them being what

401
00:22:51,036 --> 00:22:56,716
Speaker 3: we call soul food. But these are co created forms

402
00:22:56,756 --> 00:23:02,516
Speaker 3: with English, Irish and Scottish plus African plus Evangelical Christian roots.

403
00:23:04,356 --> 00:23:06,596
Speaker 1: We'll be back with more from Alice Randall after a

404
00:23:06,676 --> 00:23:07,356
Speaker 1: quick break.

405
00:23:11,716 --> 00:23:15,876
Speaker 2: You make a very sharp observation about country music the

406
00:23:15,916 --> 00:23:19,876
Speaker 2: way it's understood, and it's largely understood. The narrative that

407
00:23:19,956 --> 00:23:24,356
Speaker 2: your book argues against is largely understood as a white

408
00:23:24,396 --> 00:23:25,116
Speaker 2: form of music.

409
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Speaker 3: A lot of people think is white music made by

410
00:23:28,116 --> 00:23:29,356
Speaker 3: white people for white.

411
00:23:29,156 --> 00:23:32,676
Speaker 2: People, right, And you say that kind of country music,

412
00:23:33,116 --> 00:23:35,036
Speaker 2: you know, one of the kind of tenets of that

413
00:23:35,196 --> 00:23:38,996
Speaker 2: music is that the past is always better than the present.

414
00:23:40,156 --> 00:23:42,396
Speaker 3: I think there are four big themes in Country. One

415
00:23:42,476 --> 00:23:47,756
Speaker 3: is life is hard, God is real, the road, liquor

416
00:23:47,996 --> 00:23:51,116
Speaker 3: and family are compensations. And the past is better than

417
00:23:51,156 --> 00:23:55,076
Speaker 3: the present. For mouch of White Country, the past is

418
00:23:55,156 --> 00:23:57,956
Speaker 3: better than the country, or some of it is a

419
00:23:57,996 --> 00:24:03,276
Speaker 3: long foreign lost dick see. For the black people, the

420
00:24:03,316 --> 00:24:06,236
Speaker 3: past that's better than the present. And country is alonged

421
00:24:06,356 --> 00:24:09,716
Speaker 3: for and lost to Africa before colonization, and I think

422
00:24:10,036 --> 00:24:12,876
Speaker 3: and both there's a shared sometimes since that the past

423
00:24:12,916 --> 00:24:18,116
Speaker 3: that's it's a longed for and lost childhood before adult misery.

424
00:24:18,956 --> 00:24:23,596
Speaker 3: But there never has been any country music that doesn't

425
00:24:23,636 --> 00:24:28,556
Speaker 3: have Black influences. Literally it does not exist. And so

426
00:24:29,156 --> 00:24:33,156
Speaker 3: it is just there hasn't been the recognition that unfortunately

427
00:24:33,836 --> 00:24:35,956
Speaker 3: we talk about when we're looking at the history of

428
00:24:35,956 --> 00:24:39,076
Speaker 3: this country, stolen land, what we stole from indigenous people,

429
00:24:39,396 --> 00:24:43,956
Speaker 3: stolen bodies and lives Africans brought and chains here. But

430
00:24:44,116 --> 00:24:49,356
Speaker 3: there's also stolen creativity that you take people's creations, the melodies.

431
00:24:49,996 --> 00:24:52,836
Speaker 3: No the case of Leslie Riddle, I was very excited

432
00:24:52,876 --> 00:24:56,356
Speaker 3: to just be able to be at Focal Alliance this

433
00:24:56,476 --> 00:25:00,276
Speaker 3: year and they gave me a Lifetime Achievement award, but

434
00:25:00,796 --> 00:25:02,916
Speaker 3: even more exciting to me than that though. That was

435
00:25:03,036 --> 00:25:07,956
Speaker 3: very exciting was I was able to accept Leslie Riddle's

436
00:25:07,996 --> 00:25:12,436
Speaker 3: award posthumously and speak to his brilliance. And this is

437
00:25:12,476 --> 00:25:16,356
Speaker 3: a man we've always acknowledged that top maybe Carter and

438
00:25:16,396 --> 00:25:19,556
Speaker 3: the Carter family a lot of songs and some guitar techniques,

439
00:25:20,036 --> 00:25:23,516
Speaker 3: but it gets left out is long before any knowledge

440
00:25:23,516 --> 00:25:26,116
Speaker 3: we have that maybel Carter ever played one bit of

441
00:25:26,116 --> 00:25:31,396
Speaker 3: guitar or ever sung a song. Leslie Riddle was in

442
00:25:31,436 --> 00:25:36,276
Speaker 3: a cement factory accident and lost his leg. Then he

443
00:25:36,356 --> 00:25:39,716
Speaker 3: was so depressed and we're out by this. He had

444
00:25:39,756 --> 00:25:42,636
Speaker 3: a gun accident that may have been a suicide attempt

445
00:25:42,876 --> 00:25:46,556
Speaker 3: in which he lost two fingers, and he began to

446
00:25:46,716 --> 00:25:50,276
Speaker 3: play with three fingers, and the way he played is

447
00:25:50,316 --> 00:25:52,996
Speaker 3: a whole lot like Carter family scratch.

448
00:25:53,116 --> 00:25:57,956
Speaker 2: Yeah, which everybody it's the basis of fingerpicking exactly.

449
00:25:58,716 --> 00:26:02,116
Speaker 3: But the weird thing about this, what is the likelihood

450
00:26:02,196 --> 00:26:04,916
Speaker 3: that these two sets of people in the extended same

451
00:26:04,996 --> 00:26:09,196
Speaker 3: neighborhood both developed independently the same thing, or did the

452
00:26:09,276 --> 00:26:14,836
Speaker 3: Carters see how Leslie Leslie Riddle played the guitar and

453
00:26:14,956 --> 00:26:17,596
Speaker 3: be in artistic communion with that which I don't have

454
00:26:17,636 --> 00:26:19,676
Speaker 3: any problem with that. What I have problem with is

455
00:26:19,716 --> 00:26:23,716
Speaker 3: erasing Leslie Riddle from the story because we can document

456
00:26:23,796 --> 00:26:25,876
Speaker 3: the only way he could have been playing the guitar

457
00:26:26,076 --> 00:26:28,876
Speaker 3: was with those three fingers, right, and we know that

458
00:26:29,036 --> 00:26:30,796
Speaker 3: because those are the only fingers he had.

459
00:26:31,716 --> 00:26:33,436
Speaker 2: So I want to get back to your story and

460
00:26:33,516 --> 00:26:37,116
Speaker 2: then get to some of these figures, particularly DeFord Bailey,

461
00:26:37,156 --> 00:26:39,756
Speaker 2: who we've talked about before on this on our show,

462
00:26:40,356 --> 00:26:43,796
Speaker 2: Lil Harden, who that we haven't So you left Harvard,

463
00:26:44,516 --> 00:26:47,036
Speaker 2: you went to Nashville to become a songwriter.

464
00:26:47,636 --> 00:26:49,316
Speaker 3: And form a publishing company.

465
00:26:49,476 --> 00:26:52,196
Speaker 2: Yes, you formed a publishing company, but first you got

466
00:26:52,196 --> 00:26:55,716
Speaker 2: a letter from people who looked over your stuff and

467
00:26:55,716 --> 00:26:56,356
Speaker 2: it said.

468
00:26:56,116 --> 00:27:01,156
Speaker 3: What I had no talent whatsoever. Ronnie Gant the head

469
00:27:01,196 --> 00:27:04,236
Speaker 3: din of a Cuff Rows. So grew up in Detroit,

470
00:27:04,316 --> 00:27:06,836
Speaker 3: that moved to Washington, DC, as I said, and went

471
00:27:06,876 --> 00:27:10,076
Speaker 3: to Harvard, where I started listening to loutcountry music. And

472
00:27:10,436 --> 00:27:14,956
Speaker 3: my college roommate freshman year. Roommate's mother was a woman.

473
00:27:15,556 --> 00:27:17,396
Speaker 3: Since we're talking about race, I identify her as a

474
00:27:17,396 --> 00:27:20,676
Speaker 3: white woman who went to Yale Law School and she

475
00:27:20,876 --> 00:27:23,236
Speaker 3: was the managing director of ASCAP by the time I

476
00:27:23,276 --> 00:27:25,916
Speaker 3: was about to graduate and so she was able to

477
00:27:25,916 --> 00:27:29,316
Speaker 3: set up some meetings and she got me with some

478
00:27:29,356 --> 00:27:32,396
Speaker 3: of the biggest writers and publishers when I graduated from

479
00:27:32,396 --> 00:27:35,436
Speaker 3: Harvard AB a year later that were working in Nashville

480
00:27:35,436 --> 00:27:37,276
Speaker 3: at the time, and one of them was Ronnie Gant,

481
00:27:37,356 --> 00:27:39,916
Speaker 3: And of course I wanted to go there because acaf

482
00:27:39,956 --> 00:27:42,996
Speaker 3: Ros was Hank Williams publisher that they had done so

483
00:27:43,076 --> 00:27:47,316
Speaker 3: many amazing things. And I got there and Ronnie just

484
00:27:47,356 --> 00:27:49,436
Speaker 3: put his feet up on the desk and he first

485
00:27:49,516 --> 00:27:51,996
Speaker 3: told me that I should just go back to wherever

486
00:27:52,036 --> 00:27:55,756
Speaker 3: it was I came from. And then he told me

487
00:27:55,996 --> 00:27:57,716
Speaker 3: that maybe I was at such a low level of

488
00:27:57,756 --> 00:28:03,036
Speaker 3: development that he could not judge my material because people

489
00:28:03,076 --> 00:28:06,276
Speaker 3: didn't sent him people that were this undeveloped, and he

490
00:28:06,356 --> 00:28:08,036
Speaker 3: was going to share it with some young writers of his.

491
00:28:08,396 --> 00:28:10,316
Speaker 3: Then he sent me, He said, I shared it with

492
00:28:10,356 --> 00:28:13,396
Speaker 3: my writers and they agree with me, you have no

493
00:28:13,516 --> 00:28:16,036
Speaker 3: talent whatsoever. And that, of course is parb me. I

494
00:28:16,196 --> 00:28:18,476
Speaker 3: was moving to Nashville, Tennessee and show them wrong.

495
00:28:18,996 --> 00:28:20,636
Speaker 2: Okay, but but where does that come from?

496
00:28:20,716 --> 00:28:20,796
Speaker 1: That?

497
00:28:21,276 --> 00:28:24,436
Speaker 2: Because most people if that happened, they would be devastated.

498
00:28:24,636 --> 00:28:27,516
Speaker 2: You'd just been to Harvard, I'm sure Wall Street was

499
00:28:27,556 --> 00:28:31,636
Speaker 2: calling whatever else you wanted in life. Instead, it was like,

500
00:28:32,076 --> 00:28:34,116
Speaker 2: I have no talent whatsoever. I'm going to go there

501
00:28:34,116 --> 00:28:34,676
Speaker 2: and show them.

502
00:28:35,676 --> 00:28:39,996
Speaker 3: I was born in Detroit City the same year as

503
00:28:39,996 --> 00:28:43,956
Speaker 3: Motown Records, and at that time when by five years later,

504
00:28:44,076 --> 00:28:47,196
Speaker 3: Motown is the largest black company in America. So one

505
00:28:47,196 --> 00:28:50,436
Speaker 3: thing is I do understand. And I'm a child who

506
00:28:50,476 --> 00:28:52,716
Speaker 3: sat on the lap and realized how important music was

507
00:28:52,756 --> 00:28:55,996
Speaker 3: to me. So Wall Street, my best friend did go

508
00:28:56,076 --> 00:28:58,316
Speaker 3: to Wall Street. My friends were all going to investment

509
00:28:58,356 --> 00:29:01,356
Speaker 3: banks and to law firms, and I did consider that.

510
00:29:02,476 --> 00:29:06,636
Speaker 3: But I really love people and I love life, and

511
00:29:06,836 --> 00:29:09,836
Speaker 3: I knew how I wanted to impact world was through

512
00:29:09,876 --> 00:29:12,516
Speaker 3: songs because I had seen the power of Motown. It

513
00:29:12,556 --> 00:29:14,476
Speaker 3: wasn't the kind of music I wanted to do, but

514
00:29:14,596 --> 00:29:17,836
Speaker 3: it had created a new narrative of what black life was,

515
00:29:17,876 --> 00:29:21,916
Speaker 3: a sort of softer, sweet thing I wanted to take

516
00:29:22,076 --> 00:29:24,716
Speaker 3: use to preach to the unconverted part of it. Actually

517
00:29:24,756 --> 00:29:27,356
Speaker 3: no one asked these questions, but you did so. And

518
00:29:27,756 --> 00:29:29,676
Speaker 3: I wrote my thesis on mothers and Daughters in the

519
00:29:29,716 --> 00:29:32,316
Speaker 3: novels of Jane Austen, and I did ultimately do well

520
00:29:32,316 --> 00:29:34,556
Speaker 3: on that thesis. But I realized that there are probably

521
00:29:34,636 --> 00:29:36,636
Speaker 3: six people in the world who could understand it and

522
00:29:36,716 --> 00:29:38,916
Speaker 3: four people that could benefit from it. You had to

523
00:29:38,956 --> 00:29:42,276
Speaker 3: know so much about Jane Austen, so much about structuralist criticism,

524
00:29:42,716 --> 00:29:45,276
Speaker 3: and so much about feminist criticism to be able to

525
00:29:45,316 --> 00:29:49,076
Speaker 3: evaluate what I did. And I wanted to create and

526
00:29:49,116 --> 00:29:53,836
Speaker 3: write with words and affect lots of people. So country

527
00:29:54,356 --> 00:29:56,676
Speaker 3: was the place I felt, you know, it was a

528
00:29:56,716 --> 00:30:00,556
Speaker 3: Reagan era. I felt that I could enter in and

529
00:30:00,596 --> 00:30:03,836
Speaker 3: that artistic voices are all political voices. I didn't want

530
00:30:03,836 --> 00:30:05,956
Speaker 3: to write New York or poetry, and I didn't want

531
00:30:05,956 --> 00:30:08,716
Speaker 3: to do what's now called Americana. I wanted to go

532
00:30:08,876 --> 00:30:13,836
Speaker 3: on the charts in the radio and actually change what

533
00:30:14,156 --> 00:30:17,076
Speaker 3: might be called hardened hearts and minds. I wanted people

534
00:30:17,316 --> 00:30:21,596
Speaker 3: who were thinking about environmental justice to hear Glenn Campbell

535
00:30:21,676 --> 00:30:26,156
Speaker 3: saying who's minding the garden and maybe start wondering. Oh,

536
00:30:26,516 --> 00:30:28,756
Speaker 3: Bible told me I'm supposed to be concerned with Eden.

537
00:30:28,796 --> 00:30:31,556
Speaker 3: Maybe that means I should actually be supporting Earth Day

538
00:30:32,156 --> 00:30:35,316
Speaker 3: so one because I thought the work was urgent. I

539
00:30:35,396 --> 00:30:38,876
Speaker 3: actually think I was a person who knew I've left

540
00:30:38,876 --> 00:30:40,996
Speaker 3: out that hard part of my story. I told you

541
00:30:41,116 --> 00:30:42,756
Speaker 3: I had a mother who didn't love me. She wasn't

542
00:30:42,756 --> 00:30:45,796
Speaker 3: a good mother, and in high school I was raped,

543
00:30:46,076 --> 00:30:48,356
Speaker 3: you know, within the family circle. I had a very

544
00:30:48,396 --> 00:30:52,636
Speaker 3: hard experience and music helps sustain me from that. So

545
00:30:52,676 --> 00:30:57,556
Speaker 3: I also had human lived experience that music will crawl

546
00:30:57,716 --> 00:31:01,916
Speaker 3: in to people's pain, to isolation and sustain them. And

547
00:31:02,196 --> 00:31:05,436
Speaker 3: I wanted to be one of the people creating the

548
00:31:05,516 --> 00:31:08,476
Speaker 3: kind of music that could do that. Emily Dickinson did

549
00:31:08,476 --> 00:31:11,636
Speaker 3: that for me, John Prime did that for me. Was

550
00:31:11,636 --> 00:31:14,196
Speaker 3: that a tharp did that for me? And I wanted

551
00:31:14,276 --> 00:31:17,436
Speaker 3: to be a person who's done that. And one of

552
00:31:17,476 --> 00:31:20,116
Speaker 3: the most exciting things about this book tour is when

553
00:31:20,276 --> 00:31:24,756
Speaker 3: I was in Indianapolis, I went to the Madam C. J.

554
00:31:24,876 --> 00:31:28,476
Speaker 3: Walker Theater and gave a talk and Layla mccallall played.

555
00:31:28,916 --> 00:31:32,756
Speaker 3: But afterwards, a young woman came up to me, black

556
00:31:32,796 --> 00:31:35,836
Speaker 3: woman from Michigan, and she said, my brother was killed

557
00:31:35,876 --> 00:31:40,076
Speaker 3: in a shooting accident, and I was so unhappy. She

558
00:31:40,076 --> 00:31:41,956
Speaker 3: felt like the world has coming apart. And she said,

559
00:31:41,996 --> 00:31:47,276
Speaker 3: the first time I smiled again after that murder was

560
00:31:47,316 --> 00:31:50,756
Speaker 3: when I heard x's and o's on the radio, or

561
00:31:50,836 --> 00:31:53,636
Speaker 3: people who told me that their mother and they had

562
00:31:53,756 --> 00:31:57,596
Speaker 3: cleaned their houses to exes and o's. So many times

563
00:31:57,636 --> 00:32:00,716
Speaker 3: someone has told me how some one of these songs

564
00:32:00,716 --> 00:32:03,436
Speaker 3: sustained them. That's so it took me a long time

565
00:32:03,436 --> 00:32:06,196
Speaker 3: to find out it really happened. Then it really worked.

566
00:32:06,236 --> 00:32:08,516
Speaker 3: You send them out there, there's some things that you

567
00:32:08,556 --> 00:32:12,236
Speaker 3: hear early. I worked up Ariba video of the Year

568
00:32:13,276 --> 00:32:15,076
Speaker 3: is their Life out There, which I actually put on

569
00:32:15,196 --> 00:32:17,236
Speaker 3: a lot of my own trauma has an abusive mother.

570
00:32:17,436 --> 00:32:21,156
Speaker 3: I actually put Maya Angelo's I Know Why the Cage

571
00:32:21,156 --> 00:32:23,276
Speaker 3: Bird Sings is right in that you can see it.

572
00:32:23,556 --> 00:32:26,316
Speaker 3: Reba's reading it to her child. That's a book about

573
00:32:26,356 --> 00:32:29,756
Speaker 3: a child that God abused. So I'm signing it. I

574
00:32:29,796 --> 00:32:31,996
Speaker 3: walk through that video in case people don't believe it.

575
00:32:32,436 --> 00:32:34,596
Speaker 3: But we know that video it also starts off with

576
00:32:34,676 --> 00:32:38,076
Speaker 3: sexual harassment. That the waitress played by Riba is trying

577
00:32:38,076 --> 00:32:39,636
Speaker 3: to get her tip and the man tries to touch

578
00:32:39,756 --> 00:32:42,036
Speaker 3: or caress our hand when she does it. We know

579
00:32:42,236 --> 00:32:45,676
Speaker 3: that the Department of Education said that that video sent

580
00:32:45,956 --> 00:32:50,996
Speaker 3: thousands of women, mainly I think lower middle class white

581
00:32:51,036 --> 00:32:55,116
Speaker 3: women back to college or to college to get their education.

582
00:32:55,196 --> 00:32:57,076
Speaker 3: They saw Riba do it, they thought they could do it.

583
00:32:57,596 --> 00:32:59,756
Speaker 3: That's the kind of work I wanted to do. I

584
00:32:59,796 --> 00:33:02,116
Speaker 3: want to send women back to colleges with a country

585
00:33:02,196 --> 00:33:07,076
Speaker 3: music video. Becklas Night was my first song that got

586
00:33:07,116 --> 00:33:09,596
Speaker 3: recorded by the Forrester Sisters, who to be one of

587
00:33:09,636 --> 00:33:12,436
Speaker 3: the most successful female groups in country that sort of

588
00:33:12,476 --> 00:33:16,516
Speaker 3: get forgotten about. It's about a young unweb mother. It's

589
00:33:16,516 --> 00:33:18,196
Speaker 3: one of the songs I did bring with me from

590
00:33:18,276 --> 00:33:21,676
Speaker 3: Washington to Nashville. And I wrote it with that guy

591
00:33:21,716 --> 00:33:24,756
Speaker 3: who told me I had near tilant whatsoever. And it

592
00:33:24,836 --> 00:33:27,316
Speaker 3: was the B side of a number one single back

593
00:33:27,316 --> 00:33:29,236
Speaker 3: when there were still numbers one single.

594
00:33:29,476 --> 00:33:32,516
Speaker 2: But X's and O's was your first number one, my first.

595
00:33:32,276 --> 00:33:34,676
Speaker 3: It's about only in two weeks at number one, and

596
00:33:34,676 --> 00:33:37,316
Speaker 3: it wasn't my first top ten, which which I'm very

597
00:33:37,356 --> 00:33:39,556
Speaker 3: proud to say. You know, I got songs on the

598
00:33:39,636 --> 00:33:43,036
Speaker 3: charts in the eighties and nineties, the hots at tens

599
00:33:43,036 --> 00:33:43,796
Speaker 3: in the twenties.

600
00:33:44,676 --> 00:33:47,356
Speaker 2: But I do want you there's a because you were

601
00:33:47,356 --> 00:33:49,396
Speaker 2: working on that song for a while it wasn't working.

602
00:33:49,636 --> 00:33:51,076
Speaker 2: You tell a great story about it.

603
00:33:51,436 --> 00:33:54,756
Speaker 3: I would love to year the x'es and o's I had.

604
00:33:54,836 --> 00:33:57,076
Speaker 3: I realized a lot of my songs were weird and

605
00:33:57,156 --> 00:33:59,436
Speaker 3: that they need to be introduced to the world in

606
00:33:59,436 --> 00:34:01,716
Speaker 3: special ways. In one of the ways I thought we

607
00:34:01,756 --> 00:34:04,796
Speaker 3: could introduce them is by film or television. So actually

608
00:34:05,476 --> 00:34:09,036
Speaker 3: worked to write a series for CBS that we present

609
00:34:09,196 --> 00:34:12,076
Speaker 3: it as a movie of the week, blacktoor pilot, but

610
00:34:12,236 --> 00:34:15,316
Speaker 3: of the ex Wives of Country Stars and the George

611
00:34:15,396 --> 00:34:18,076
Speaker 3: Jones star renamed him George S. Randall, after my father.

612
00:34:18,476 --> 00:34:20,596
Speaker 3: But the show was focused on the women, the X

613
00:34:20,636 --> 00:34:24,356
Speaker 3: wives of their lives, And I got it in my

614
00:34:24,396 --> 00:34:26,316
Speaker 3: contract that I got to write the theme song because

615
00:34:26,316 --> 00:34:28,836
Speaker 3: I knew that theme songs were really those are very

616
00:34:28,876 --> 00:34:30,996
Speaker 3: profitable and that would be a great way to launch

617
00:34:30,996 --> 00:34:34,316
Speaker 3: a song. So when I got that opportunity, I knew

618
00:34:34,316 --> 00:34:36,276
Speaker 3: I want to share it with Mtresa Burg, who's one

619
00:34:36,316 --> 00:34:39,516
Speaker 3: of my favorite writers. When I was driving down to

620
00:34:39,596 --> 00:34:42,276
Speaker 3: Nashville in the eighties, I was listening to her first

621
00:34:42,356 --> 00:34:45,356
Speaker 3: number one. I think fake in love only temporary lovers.

622
00:34:45,756 --> 00:34:48,156
Speaker 3: So Matrasa and I get together to write and we

623
00:34:48,196 --> 00:34:51,156
Speaker 3: write a couple of songs and they're just not good.

624
00:34:51,876 --> 00:34:54,356
Speaker 3: And I remember calling my publisher it was a Sunday night,

625
00:34:54,476 --> 00:34:58,196
Speaker 3: I think, and saying I can't do it. We're going

626
00:34:58,236 --> 00:34:59,796
Speaker 3: to use ring a fire or something. I'm not going

627
00:34:59,836 --> 00:35:02,836
Speaker 3: to pretend something's good, that's not good. That theme song

628
00:35:02,916 --> 00:35:04,596
Speaker 3: is just going to have to be a country classic.

629
00:35:05,796 --> 00:35:07,636
Speaker 3: And I woke up the next morning. I was feeling

630
00:35:07,796 --> 00:35:11,356
Speaker 3: so depressed. You know, you got to picture your mama

631
00:35:11,396 --> 00:35:12,756
Speaker 3: and heals some prolls. You're trying to make it, and

632
00:35:12,796 --> 00:35:16,476
Speaker 3: your daddy's it's not working. And then my phone rings,

633
00:35:16,556 --> 00:35:18,836
Speaker 3: and it's my child's school that I had forgotten to

634
00:35:18,876 --> 00:35:21,276
Speaker 3: put something in her backpack she absolutely had to have

635
00:35:21,356 --> 00:35:24,356
Speaker 3: that morning, I'm thinking, you are get into the shower

636
00:35:24,556 --> 00:35:26,636
Speaker 3: and that line comes with you got to picture your

637
00:35:26,636 --> 00:35:27,996
Speaker 3: mama and heals some prolls, you're trying to make it,

638
00:35:27,996 --> 00:35:30,476
Speaker 3: and your daddy's world that in it. I thought, that's

639
00:35:30,516 --> 00:35:34,716
Speaker 3: my song. That is my song, and I raised to

640
00:35:34,756 --> 00:35:37,516
Speaker 3: my daughter's school. First, I raced over to Matreesa's house.

641
00:35:37,836 --> 00:35:40,036
Speaker 3: This is I don't think we had cell phones. We

642
00:35:40,036 --> 00:35:43,396
Speaker 3: certainly didn't use. I begged on her door, and when

643
00:35:43,436 --> 00:35:46,316
Speaker 3: she was opened it, I start telling her that first

644
00:35:46,636 --> 00:35:51,116
Speaker 3: lyric on the porch, and then she quickly is telling

645
00:35:51,156 --> 00:35:55,796
Speaker 3: me the second verse. But that first there phone rings,

646
00:35:55,996 --> 00:35:59,596
Speaker 3: baby cries, TV, die Guru lies, good morning, honey. It's

647
00:35:59,676 --> 00:36:02,516
Speaker 3: just what actually had happened, except for it wasn't a

648
00:36:02,516 --> 00:36:04,396
Speaker 3: baby crying, It was a baby's school calling. We had

649
00:36:04,396 --> 00:36:06,636
Speaker 3: to change it around a little bit. And Matrey said

650
00:36:06,716 --> 00:36:09,116
Speaker 3: was newly married to Jeff Hannah and they had to

651
00:36:09,116 --> 00:36:11,836
Speaker 3: this beautiful house I'd driven over to. He was with

652
00:36:11,836 --> 00:36:14,436
Speaker 3: the nitty gritty dirt band, and so they were more

653
00:36:14,956 --> 00:36:18,916
Speaker 3: in this beautiful house that they're renovating, and how do

654
00:36:18,956 --> 00:36:22,476
Speaker 3: you keep love and romance going into the deep of it?

655
00:36:22,556 --> 00:36:24,556
Speaker 3: So hers was fixed to sink mowed the law and

656
00:36:24,636 --> 00:36:26,716
Speaker 3: really isn't all that hard if you could pay. Mama

657
00:36:26,756 --> 00:36:29,836
Speaker 3: needs romance and a live in Maine. They were in

658
00:36:29,956 --> 00:36:33,356
Speaker 3: that couple thing, and so that's what the second verse

659
00:36:33,436 --> 00:36:35,796
Speaker 3: was about. I was in the single mom thing. That's

660
00:36:35,796 --> 00:36:38,756
Speaker 3: what the first verse was. It became this universal anthem

661
00:36:38,796 --> 00:36:41,516
Speaker 3: for all the women trying to keep the balance up

662
00:36:41,556 --> 00:36:44,196
Speaker 3: between love and money, which is pretty much all the

663
00:36:44,236 --> 00:36:49,276
Speaker 3: women living in any capitalist society anywhere. So I thirty

664
00:36:49,356 --> 00:36:51,996
Speaker 3: years later, it's still being played, and I now have

665
00:36:52,236 --> 00:36:55,796
Speaker 3: generations of students at Vanderbilt who are raised on it.

666
00:36:55,836 --> 00:36:58,636
Speaker 3: I'm probably about to have grandchildren. But we wrote that

667
00:36:58,716 --> 00:37:02,076
Speaker 3: song from our heart and experience instead of calculating anything,

668
00:37:02,076 --> 00:37:04,676
Speaker 3: and those exes and O's that was all about Carol

669
00:37:04,916 --> 00:37:07,676
Speaker 3: signs her letters with x'es and o's, she's got these

670
00:37:07,676 --> 00:37:11,356
Speaker 3: big ribbons in her hair. And we were thinking about

671
00:37:11,396 --> 00:37:14,876
Speaker 3: consciously about Aretha Franklin and Patsy Clin, who make an

672
00:37:14,916 --> 00:37:17,716
Speaker 3: appearance in the song, because we were thinking about our

673
00:37:17,796 --> 00:37:22,596
Speaker 3: life as women writers. And Aretha wrote only a little bit,

674
00:37:22,596 --> 00:37:26,076
Speaker 3: but her sister Carolyn was a great songwriter, and Patsy Klin,

675
00:37:26,196 --> 00:37:28,076
Speaker 3: people may or may not know it, was a great

676
00:37:28,196 --> 00:37:31,596
Speaker 3: letter writer. So we love connecting women's high culture to

677
00:37:31,716 --> 00:37:34,396
Speaker 3: low culture. That women can write songs and women can

678
00:37:34,436 --> 00:37:38,676
Speaker 3: write letters, and all of this informs the music we hear.

679
00:37:39,316 --> 00:37:41,636
Speaker 3: And so we love putting Aretha Franklin and Patsy Clin

680
00:37:41,716 --> 00:37:44,636
Speaker 3: in the same song. We love putting Aretha Franklin first.

681
00:37:44,716 --> 00:37:47,196
Speaker 3: Aretha Franklin loved that even more than we did, and

682
00:37:47,516 --> 00:37:51,716
Speaker 3: it was just something that was ripped literally from our

683
00:37:51,796 --> 00:37:54,636
Speaker 3: life experiences. And I think it didn't take us forty

684
00:37:54,676 --> 00:37:58,676
Speaker 3: some minutes after all those days of writing not writing it.

685
00:37:58,676 --> 00:38:02,196
Speaker 3: It took us forty minutes to write that song, and

686
00:38:02,276 --> 00:38:03,076
Speaker 3: it is endured.

687
00:38:03,796 --> 00:38:06,476
Speaker 2: It's also one of those songs that if you hear

688
00:38:06,516 --> 00:38:08,356
Speaker 2: it on the radio, you're not paying attention. It just

689
00:38:08,356 --> 00:38:11,956
Speaker 2: sounds like a great boppy song about this little girl

690
00:38:11,996 --> 00:38:14,756
Speaker 2: growing up. But then when you when you listen, it's

691
00:38:14,796 --> 00:38:20,956
Speaker 2: about this almost fracture between this very feminine childhood and

692
00:38:20,996 --> 00:38:25,516
Speaker 2: now she has to succeed in this whole other difficult world.

693
00:38:26,076 --> 00:38:28,596
Speaker 2: There's an amazing generational shift.

694
00:38:28,876 --> 00:38:33,796
Speaker 3: Absolutely, and it's about and money, anxiety if you get

695
00:38:33,836 --> 00:38:37,236
Speaker 3: picked all of this anxiety. And it's twelve. Because the

696
00:38:37,356 --> 00:38:39,396
Speaker 3: song was savage, I will still call it. I'll call

697
00:38:39,636 --> 00:38:43,116
Speaker 3: Bob Orman. When it first came out in terms of reviews,

698
00:38:43,516 --> 00:38:45,436
Speaker 3: and you know this whole thing, you know that there's

699
00:38:45,476 --> 00:38:48,116
Speaker 3: just saying it's like a radio hit, that it's just

700
00:38:48,236 --> 00:38:51,876
Speaker 3: this superficial thing. Well, two weeks at number one. From

701
00:38:51,916 --> 00:38:54,396
Speaker 3: the very beginning, women listen to it and they heard

702
00:38:54,476 --> 00:38:56,716
Speaker 3: beneath the surface, and that was part of the black

703
00:38:56,756 --> 00:38:58,876
Speaker 3: part of it. It has code switching. It seems like

704
00:38:58,956 --> 00:39:01,356
Speaker 3: one thing on one level, like yeah, sing along and

705
00:39:01,396 --> 00:39:03,716
Speaker 3: sing along, that's how the Ballad of Aally Hand sounds

706
00:39:03,876 --> 00:39:08,076
Speaker 3: and image one. But this is a deep and I

707
00:39:08,396 --> 00:39:11,596
Speaker 3: like that because I like making things accessible. That's what

708
00:39:11,636 --> 00:39:15,756
Speaker 3: I like about Cowboy Carter. Actually, that song is to

709
00:39:15,836 --> 00:39:20,276
Speaker 3: me is really about life, is it a game. Texas

710
00:39:20,316 --> 00:39:22,396
Speaker 3: Hold Him is a card game. Texas Hold Him is

711
00:39:22,436 --> 00:39:25,116
Speaker 3: about life, is not a game. It's about redemption, It's

712
00:39:25,116 --> 00:39:27,556
Speaker 3: about real love. It's about a whole lot of things.

713
00:39:28,116 --> 00:39:29,956
Speaker 3: I always thought, I even made the case for Achy

714
00:39:29,996 --> 00:39:33,756
Speaker 3: Breaky Heart. It's about love and death. That's the American sublan.

715
00:39:34,196 --> 00:39:38,636
Speaker 3: All the great songs are about something deeply. We're used

716
00:39:38,636 --> 00:39:41,916
Speaker 3: to those songs that were their poetry and their complexity

717
00:39:42,276 --> 00:39:45,516
Speaker 3: on their surface. But I am the beneficiary of a

718
00:39:45,996 --> 00:39:48,276
Speaker 3: My daughter Caroline is an amazing poet, and she is

719
00:39:48,316 --> 00:39:52,356
Speaker 3: an amazing poet, and she sings the last cut on

720
00:39:52,396 --> 00:39:57,756
Speaker 3: our album, and she deconstructs and reconstructs this word poem

721
00:39:57,836 --> 00:40:03,716
Speaker 3: homage to X's and O's that is X's and O's,

722
00:40:04,476 --> 00:40:08,076
Speaker 3: like if Picasso got a hold of it and fragmented it,

723
00:40:08,276 --> 00:40:12,196
Speaker 3: but showing its greater unities and greater significance. She said

724
00:40:12,396 --> 00:40:14,396
Speaker 3: raised me and how she paid for it, and she

725
00:40:14,596 --> 00:40:17,676
Speaker 3: just excates it all out there. And so I feel

726
00:40:17,716 --> 00:40:20,556
Speaker 3: that she provided all the footnotes and structure for those

727
00:40:20,556 --> 00:40:22,836
Speaker 3: people who did not get what Matraca and I did.

728
00:40:23,156 --> 00:40:27,836
Speaker 3: That my daughter, Tracea's goddaughter, she got the last word

729
00:40:28,236 --> 00:40:32,156
Speaker 3: in a sung literary criticism. She also went to Harvard

730
00:40:32,236 --> 00:40:38,036
Speaker 3: and studied English. We got a song literary defense of her.

731
00:40:39,396 --> 00:40:43,636
Speaker 2: And we should mention Trisha Yearwood because she sang was

732
00:40:43,676 --> 00:40:45,476
Speaker 2: that her first album.

733
00:40:45,436 --> 00:40:49,196
Speaker 3: No, it was her second album, and it was funny.

734
00:40:49,236 --> 00:40:51,396
Speaker 3: She was almost in a little bit of a lull

735
00:40:52,036 --> 00:40:54,436
Speaker 3: when she came. So the rest of that story, which

736
00:40:54,436 --> 00:40:57,716
Speaker 3: I did not tell you, is everybody wanted to sing

737
00:40:57,756 --> 00:41:00,196
Speaker 3: that song because it was going to be the theme song,

738
00:41:00,316 --> 00:41:02,356
Speaker 3: and everyone could feel it felt like a hit. I

739
00:41:02,396 --> 00:41:04,356
Speaker 3: will not nickname to the people who didn't get to

740
00:41:04,436 --> 00:41:06,996
Speaker 3: do it, except the person who did get to get

741
00:41:06,996 --> 00:41:10,396
Speaker 3: to it. Originally was not Tricia. It was why Nona.

742
00:41:11,116 --> 00:41:13,356
Speaker 3: And so we go in the studio with Whyona. We

743
00:41:13,396 --> 00:41:16,396
Speaker 3: got all the A players. It is like Willie Weeks.

744
00:41:16,476 --> 00:41:19,396
Speaker 3: It is just fire. She does an extraordinary job. She

745
00:41:19,476 --> 00:41:21,516
Speaker 3: just has to come back up to the tiniest little

746
00:41:21,556 --> 00:41:24,796
Speaker 3: overdubs what the network needs. And we come back to

747
00:41:24,836 --> 00:41:26,836
Speaker 3: the studio and we wait for Wyona, and we wait

748
00:41:26,836 --> 00:41:29,236
Speaker 3: for Whyona and we wait for Winona, and why Noa

749
00:41:29,356 --> 00:41:32,196
Speaker 3: does not show up. It's down to about one hour

750
00:41:32,676 --> 00:41:35,076
Speaker 3: in the day. She's come and come and doesn't come.

751
00:41:35,596 --> 00:41:39,356
Speaker 3: That's another story. But I knew where Tricia was in

752
00:41:39,396 --> 00:41:43,556
Speaker 3: the studios recording her second album with Guardfunds A small town.

753
00:41:43,796 --> 00:41:47,476
Speaker 3: I barely drop. I literally run into the room where

754
00:41:47,476 --> 00:41:49,636
Speaker 3: they are recording, and they weren't physically recording, they were

755
00:41:49,716 --> 00:41:54,556
Speaker 3: talking at that moment, but into the actual room and

756
00:41:54,756 --> 00:41:56,716
Speaker 3: I just said, I remember I think the first words

757
00:41:56,716 --> 00:41:58,596
Speaker 3: I said to her. We know each other, back to

758
00:41:58,636 --> 00:42:02,476
Speaker 3: our first marriages. This is my last chance. Whyona is

759
00:42:02,516 --> 00:42:04,796
Speaker 3: not shown up? We've got those tracks. Everyone knew the

760
00:42:04,796 --> 00:42:07,116
Speaker 3: song was out there. All we have time to do

761
00:42:07,276 --> 00:42:11,276
Speaker 3: is pull why Nona's voice off and put your voice on?

762
00:42:11,796 --> 00:42:14,396
Speaker 3: Because it was so late in the day, Please come,

763
00:42:14,796 --> 00:42:19,756
Speaker 3: And she said yes. That generous, extraordinary woman left her

764
00:42:19,876 --> 00:42:23,916
Speaker 3: own stassion. It still makes me cry, left everything there

765
00:42:24,556 --> 00:42:29,636
Speaker 3: to come and sing on that record in not good circumstances.

766
00:42:29,756 --> 00:42:31,756
Speaker 2: I was going to ask you what it was like

767
00:42:32,676 --> 00:42:34,916
Speaker 2: to be working as hard as you were in Nashville

768
00:42:35,236 --> 00:42:38,436
Speaker 2: and suddenly you have a number one. But it seems

769
00:42:38,436 --> 00:42:41,956
Speaker 2: that even before it was a number one, everybody wanted

770
00:42:41,956 --> 00:42:44,516
Speaker 2: a piece of that. Did everybody want your next song?

771
00:42:44,556 --> 00:42:48,916
Speaker 3: Then you know I ended up quitting not long after

772
00:42:49,196 --> 00:42:49,796
Speaker 3: X's and O's.

773
00:42:49,996 --> 00:42:50,116
Speaker 2: Now.

774
00:42:50,156 --> 00:42:51,796
Speaker 3: Part of it was I wanted to get to the

775
00:42:51,876 --> 00:42:54,196
Speaker 3: number one spot, and once I achieved it, I was

776
00:42:54,236 --> 00:42:58,116
Speaker 3: looking on for a new challenge, and part of it was,

777
00:42:58,956 --> 00:43:01,156
Speaker 3: you know, they call it the music business for a reason.

778
00:43:02,396 --> 00:43:06,316
Speaker 3: I was never just in it for the business. You

779
00:43:06,356 --> 00:43:08,596
Speaker 3: make money when you connect to audiences, and I always

780
00:43:08,636 --> 00:43:11,316
Speaker 3: wanted to to larger audiences. I was trying to do

781
00:43:11,356 --> 00:43:15,436
Speaker 3: something esoteric for me, but I was very committed to

782
00:43:15,476 --> 00:43:20,796
Speaker 3: the art, and so it did feel, like I've said,

783
00:43:20,956 --> 00:43:24,076
Speaker 3: having a number one song sort of puts a target

784
00:43:24,116 --> 00:43:26,116
Speaker 3: on your back. Everybody wants a piece of you, but

785
00:43:26,156 --> 00:43:28,916
Speaker 3: not for the good reasons. Before this, people wanted to

786
00:43:28,916 --> 00:43:30,916
Speaker 3: write with me because they knew my ideas were so

787
00:43:31,076 --> 00:43:34,356
Speaker 3: original and my work ethic was so strong, and that

788
00:43:34,396 --> 00:43:36,516
Speaker 3: I had really great chaste in music that I knew

789
00:43:36,516 --> 00:43:40,756
Speaker 3: so many songs all along the way because I knew

790
00:43:40,796 --> 00:43:45,756
Speaker 3: so much, I knew the country canon of recorded country music,

791
00:43:46,036 --> 00:43:49,356
Speaker 3: and I had what other people recognize, this good taste

792
00:43:49,356 --> 00:43:53,716
Speaker 3: about songs, what song is really amazing. There was a

793
00:43:53,756 --> 00:43:56,916
Speaker 3: decent amount of respect and engagement. My big breakthy was

794
00:43:56,956 --> 00:43:59,596
Speaker 3: actually getting those songs and that the title song and

795
00:43:59,636 --> 00:44:02,476
Speaker 3: the thing call Love. Because all the big songwriters that

796
00:44:02,596 --> 00:44:06,436
Speaker 3: competed for that and I just went out and got it.

797
00:44:06,476 --> 00:44:08,556
Speaker 3: I didn't know the man who was doing it. But

798
00:44:08,596 --> 00:44:11,796
Speaker 3: it's also interesting how much wasn't noticed until this album

799
00:44:11,836 --> 00:44:15,236
Speaker 3: and Fiona Prine until a few years ago. People I

800
00:44:15,316 --> 00:44:19,396
Speaker 3: got these songs recorded, but people never noticed that I

801
00:44:19,516 --> 00:44:23,276
Speaker 3: had had multiple chart hits. People would assume that someone

802
00:44:23,396 --> 00:44:25,596
Speaker 3: like you know, Steve Girl has more cuts than me. Well,

803
00:44:25,596 --> 00:44:27,916
Speaker 3: I have more cuts in terms of if you look

804
00:44:27,956 --> 00:44:31,636
Speaker 3: at things he didn't record himself in country. I actually

805
00:44:31,756 --> 00:44:36,236
Speaker 3: have had quite a significant career in country. I don't

806
00:44:36,236 --> 00:44:40,596
Speaker 3: think anyone noticed until a few years ago, because I

807
00:44:40,636 --> 00:44:45,116
Speaker 3: think they insisted on looking at each individual song. Many

808
00:44:45,156 --> 00:44:49,156
Speaker 3: people as a one off, just anomaly, but in fact

809
00:44:49,756 --> 00:44:52,716
Speaker 3: it was a big pattern, and it was with known

810
00:44:52,836 --> 00:44:55,916
Speaker 3: artists and non non artists. Some of these things girls

811
00:44:55,996 --> 00:44:58,516
Speaker 3: ride Horses too made Judy Robin. It wasn't the other

812
00:44:58,516 --> 00:45:00,876
Speaker 3: way around. A lot of times. The one these really

813
00:45:00,916 --> 00:45:04,076
Speaker 3: one weird songs was elevating the artists. Then you get

814
00:45:04,076 --> 00:45:06,436
Speaker 3: someone like a Glen Campbell, who's heard hundreds of songs.

815
00:45:06,436 --> 00:45:08,436
Speaker 3: One of the greatest thousands of songs. One of the

816
00:45:08,436 --> 00:45:11,236
Speaker 3: greatest compliments I've ever had is it in the studio

817
00:45:11,356 --> 00:45:14,116
Speaker 3: he kneeled down to my little Girl and said that

818
00:45:14,276 --> 00:45:18,396
Speaker 3: this one is Galveston Strong, that this song Galveston was

819
00:45:18,436 --> 00:45:21,876
Speaker 3: such an important anti war song, and at this time

820
00:45:21,876 --> 00:45:25,356
Speaker 3: in his life he was interested in Christianity is a

821
00:45:25,356 --> 00:45:30,836
Speaker 3: positive social influence, and he understood that singing about environmental justice.

822
00:45:30,876 --> 00:45:34,116
Speaker 3: He came in the studio and there was no entourage,

823
00:45:34,236 --> 00:45:37,076
Speaker 3: just musicians and him and me and my little girl,

824
00:45:37,796 --> 00:45:43,356
Speaker 3: and he sang that song so beautifully, the vocal on it.

825
00:45:44,996 --> 00:45:46,756
Speaker 1: After one last break, we'll be back with the rest

826
00:45:46,796 --> 00:45:49,556
Speaker 1: of Bruce Hedlm's conversation with Alice Randall.

827
00:45:54,036 --> 00:45:56,076
Speaker 2: I'm going to ask you for a little Nashville gossip.

828
00:45:56,436 --> 00:45:59,156
Speaker 2: Who were the writers you worked with, because you worked

829
00:45:59,196 --> 00:46:02,276
Speaker 2: with so many that really knocked you out when you

830
00:46:02,316 --> 00:46:02,836
Speaker 2: sat down to.

831
00:46:02,836 --> 00:46:03,436
Speaker 1: Work with them.

832
00:46:05,076 --> 00:46:08,076
Speaker 3: Well, one would be steebral I love Steve is an

833
00:46:08,116 --> 00:46:13,676
Speaker 3: amazing songwriter, a syllable and sound, so that was very important.

834
00:46:14,716 --> 00:46:17,356
Speaker 3: Another would be Bobby Braddock. I'm very thrilled that you

835
00:46:17,396 --> 00:46:19,876
Speaker 3: know he wrote the IVO RC and he stopped loving

836
00:46:19,876 --> 00:46:20,676
Speaker 3: Her Today.

837
00:46:20,436 --> 00:46:22,836
Speaker 2: And which was one of your favorites, he stopped loving

838
00:46:22,996 --> 00:46:23,876
Speaker 2: It's one of my favorites.

839
00:46:23,956 --> 00:46:27,116
Speaker 3: He stopped loving her day. Maybe my arguably my all

840
00:46:27,156 --> 00:46:32,156
Speaker 3: time favorite country song, So Bobby pat Alger, who's very

841
00:46:32,156 --> 00:46:36,156
Speaker 3: subtle melody person. You know, listening to the sweetness of

842
00:46:36,196 --> 00:46:39,676
Speaker 3: his guitar when you sit down to write with Pat

843
00:46:39,716 --> 00:46:43,596
Speaker 3: Alger was a wonderful thing. Obviously, matreesa some people that

844
00:46:43,636 --> 00:46:47,236
Speaker 3: people don't think about anymore that much. Kevin Welch. I

845
00:46:47,276 --> 00:46:50,036
Speaker 3: did some really art songs with Kevin. They're on a

846
00:46:50,076 --> 00:46:53,876
Speaker 3: project called Mother Dixie. Mark Sanders I wrote most of

847
00:46:53,916 --> 00:46:56,916
Speaker 3: my biggest songs with. We were almost like siblings.

848
00:46:57,276 --> 00:47:00,516
Speaker 2: And what was writing like with? Would you throw lines

849
00:47:00,556 --> 00:47:02,236
Speaker 2: back and forth? How did it work?

850
00:47:02,836 --> 00:47:08,476
Speaker 3: So we're very titled driven typically and subject driven, like

851
00:47:08,916 --> 00:47:13,556
Speaker 3: if you'd think girls ride horses too or reckless night

852
00:47:13,636 --> 00:47:17,396
Speaker 3: but young unweed mothers and religious hypocrisy. Small towns are

853
00:47:17,436 --> 00:47:21,596
Speaker 3: smaller for girls. So one we would identify a subject

854
00:47:21,676 --> 00:47:23,996
Speaker 3: we wanted to write about, or often I would bring

855
00:47:23,996 --> 00:47:28,316
Speaker 3: in subjects and titles, and then we would Sometimes the

856
00:47:28,316 --> 00:47:30,396
Speaker 3: other person would have another piece of a lun or

857
00:47:30,396 --> 00:47:33,396
Speaker 3: something from that very beginning, but usually with subjects and titles,

858
00:47:33,436 --> 00:47:37,196
Speaker 3: and then they would suggest some different a groove for it,

859
00:47:37,236 --> 00:47:40,436
Speaker 3: a melody for it. We would start that way. Sometimes

860
00:47:40,476 --> 00:47:44,756
Speaker 3: when we got the music all straightened out Mark would

861
00:47:44,756 --> 00:47:47,476
Speaker 3: be able to write I have my own weird way

862
00:47:47,476 --> 00:47:50,076
Speaker 3: I wanted it was unstressed, stressed. I needed to know

863
00:47:50,556 --> 00:47:53,756
Speaker 3: what kinds of words I needed, and so he would

864
00:47:53,756 --> 00:47:56,276
Speaker 3: write scan it out for me sometimes, or I could

865
00:47:56,316 --> 00:47:58,036
Speaker 3: just do it sitting with the person and they sing

866
00:47:58,076 --> 00:48:00,356
Speaker 3: when I suggest a song and we can see whether

867
00:48:00,396 --> 00:48:03,596
Speaker 3: it works. But Mark is also a great lyricist, so

868
00:48:03,756 --> 00:48:07,996
Speaker 3: he was definitely adding lots of words. I developed a

869
00:48:08,116 --> 00:48:12,196
Speaker 3: very collaborative way of writing songs. I think the exception

870
00:48:12,276 --> 00:48:14,556
Speaker 3: of one song that's not on the album, a song

871
00:48:14,596 --> 00:48:19,516
Speaker 3: called My Hometown Boy, which was Marie Osmond, I don't

872
00:48:19,516 --> 00:48:21,516
Speaker 3: feel that's the only song that my name is. I

873
00:48:21,516 --> 00:48:24,236
Speaker 3: don't feel that I contributed a lot to And as

874
00:48:24,276 --> 00:48:26,596
Speaker 3: you can even just see across who I've written with,

875
00:48:27,636 --> 00:48:30,356
Speaker 3: there are themes like this girl thing is a big theme,

876
00:48:31,396 --> 00:48:38,076
Speaker 3: certain kinds of gothic situations, death, murder, certain kinds of injustices.

877
00:48:38,436 --> 00:48:41,076
Speaker 3: I have a whole I call a cowboy suite. My

878
00:48:41,236 --> 00:48:44,196
Speaker 3: cowboy songs sound a lot whether I'm writing with Rodney

879
00:48:44,196 --> 00:48:48,876
Speaker 3: Foster or Kevin because they are my cowboy songs. So

880
00:48:48,916 --> 00:48:51,036
Speaker 3: I think that one of the things that is interesting

881
00:48:51,076 --> 00:48:54,396
Speaker 3: about this project and this album is because I co

882
00:48:54,476 --> 00:48:57,116
Speaker 3: write a lot and I do co write, and because

883
00:48:57,116 --> 00:48:59,436
Speaker 3: I don't perform, it's been harder for some times for

884
00:48:59,476 --> 00:49:02,556
Speaker 3: people to see or question are you an artist? Are

885
00:49:02,556 --> 00:49:06,156
Speaker 3: you a songwriter? Ar you as opposed to some kind

886
00:49:06,196 --> 00:49:09,716
Speaker 3: of artisan a lot of times as opposed to thinking

887
00:49:09,756 --> 00:49:12,836
Speaker 3: of it as being art and is self expressive? They

888
00:49:12,836 --> 00:49:16,796
Speaker 3: think if you're co writing, it's craft, it's not about

889
00:49:16,876 --> 00:49:21,036
Speaker 3: self expression. But in fact, all of my work has

890
00:49:21,076 --> 00:49:23,156
Speaker 3: been very much I would I've never said this before

891
00:49:23,156 --> 00:49:26,476
Speaker 3: out loud, but it's a kin to cycle analysis. It's

892
00:49:26,636 --> 00:49:29,916
Speaker 3: my story that their biss is very much facilitating it,

893
00:49:30,956 --> 00:49:32,956
Speaker 3: and maybe they are un being the there bis for

894
00:49:33,036 --> 00:49:35,716
Speaker 3: them so to some degree, and they're also telling their story.

895
00:49:35,796 --> 00:49:38,316
Speaker 3: That's what the greatest thing. But it was wonderful about

896
00:49:38,316 --> 00:49:40,596
Speaker 3: this album that I don't even think is so much

897
00:49:40,876 --> 00:49:44,596
Speaker 3: a tribute album as my Grandma Moses Immersion as an

898
00:49:44,756 --> 00:49:48,756
Speaker 3: artist album that you can see what the art, the

899
00:49:48,756 --> 00:49:52,596
Speaker 3: themes of Alice Randall's songwriting body is.

900
00:49:53,236 --> 00:49:55,516
Speaker 2: We should talk a bit about the album. There's other

901
00:49:55,556 --> 00:49:57,516
Speaker 2: things I want to get to. But the sort of

902
00:49:57,556 --> 00:50:01,156
Speaker 2: marquee names here are like Rhanne Giddens, who does an

903
00:50:01,156 --> 00:50:05,356
Speaker 2: amazing job on the Ballot of Sally Anne. You mentioned

904
00:50:05,396 --> 00:50:08,516
Speaker 2: I think in your biography that you were really influenced

905
00:50:08,556 --> 00:50:12,676
Speaker 2: by Joe as his ballad book, and that just this

906
00:50:12,796 --> 00:50:14,196
Speaker 2: song takes me sort of back to that.

907
00:50:14,716 --> 00:50:17,876
Speaker 3: I listen to that album over, and I mean hundreds

908
00:50:17,876 --> 00:50:21,316
Speaker 3: of talks. I mean I used to know every song

909
00:50:21,396 --> 00:50:24,076
Speaker 3: on it. So I think when I internalize that it's

910
00:50:24,116 --> 00:50:27,476
Speaker 3: part of my artistic DNA. But it even the Ballad

911
00:50:27,556 --> 00:50:31,796
Speaker 3: of Sallyent references that directly. Sallyanne is also an old

912
00:50:31,796 --> 00:50:34,996
Speaker 3: folk and black fiddle tune. But the Ballad of sally Ane,

913
00:50:34,996 --> 00:50:36,996
Speaker 3: as far as we know, was never put together that

914
00:50:37,036 --> 00:50:40,436
Speaker 3: phrase and that and as I've noticed that those songs

915
00:50:40,876 --> 00:50:43,676
Speaker 3: are a lot about death, A mother dear I cannot tell,

916
00:50:43,716 --> 00:50:48,636
Speaker 3: but go dig my grave, both long and wide and deep,

917
00:50:48,716 --> 00:50:51,356
Speaker 3: and marvel head, you know what my head had and feet,

918
00:50:51,396 --> 00:50:53,596
Speaker 3: and tell the world I died of love. They found

919
00:50:53,636 --> 00:50:56,276
Speaker 3: her hanging on vi a rope like it has. Death

920
00:50:56,876 --> 00:50:59,636
Speaker 3: has all kinds of young women's trauma in it, a

921
00:50:59,636 --> 00:51:06,236
Speaker 3: lot of around love and domestic violences of different kinds, betrayals,

922
00:51:06,316 --> 00:51:09,716
Speaker 3: intimate betrayals of different kinds. So I think those songs

923
00:51:10,436 --> 00:51:16,276
Speaker 3: really went into my artistic DNA, and really they prepared

924
00:51:16,276 --> 00:51:18,356
Speaker 3: me to be a country songwriter because I had also

925
00:51:18,436 --> 00:51:21,436
Speaker 3: all this black music wealth in me and I had

926
00:51:21,436 --> 00:51:27,036
Speaker 3: my Detroit Lutheran and Baptist Sunday School, so I had

927
00:51:27,116 --> 00:51:32,396
Speaker 3: the Celtic ballad forms, I had the African influences, and

928
00:51:32,436 --> 00:51:35,676
Speaker 3: I had the evangelical Christianity, So I was set up

929
00:51:35,756 --> 00:51:36,756
Speaker 3: to be a country sunger.

930
00:51:38,196 --> 00:51:41,076
Speaker 2: Another song, another version I thought was so impressive was

931
00:51:41,116 --> 00:51:42,516
Speaker 2: I'll Cry for Yours.

932
00:51:42,756 --> 00:51:45,996
Speaker 3: I love the Miko Marx that we did a video

933
00:51:46,036 --> 00:51:49,516
Speaker 3: of that one. I think that's just heartbreakingly beautiful, and

934
00:51:50,236 --> 00:51:52,436
Speaker 3: so I hope that one still becomes a theme song

935
00:51:52,516 --> 00:51:53,116
Speaker 3: for this time.

936
00:51:54,076 --> 00:51:57,956
Speaker 2: A beautiful brass arrangement. And it's really unexpected that.

937
00:51:58,116 --> 00:52:01,996
Speaker 3: Ebany Smith, she's brilliant. No one expected those horns on

938
00:52:02,396 --> 00:52:04,796
Speaker 3: the ballat of Sally Ann either and they're married or no.

939
00:52:05,036 --> 00:52:08,396
Speaker 3: To me, they've reminded us that lynching happened into the

940
00:52:08,436 --> 00:52:13,116
Speaker 3: age of as and those horns. That's also our homage

941
00:52:13,236 --> 00:52:16,796
Speaker 3: to Louis Armstrong playing on Blue Yodel number nine. Their

942
00:52:16,796 --> 00:52:18,316
Speaker 3: horns on Blue Yoda number nine.

943
00:52:18,396 --> 00:52:20,516
Speaker 2: You know, we've avoided talking about it, so we have

944
00:52:20,596 --> 00:52:24,956
Speaker 2: to talk about it. Most people don't know that Jimmy Rodgers,

945
00:52:24,996 --> 00:52:28,076
Speaker 2: who's supposed to be the father of country music, played

946
00:52:28,076 --> 00:52:31,916
Speaker 2: a version of Blue Yodel Number nine with Lil Hard

947
00:52:32,076 --> 00:52:33,556
Speaker 2: and Louis Armstrong.

948
00:52:33,636 --> 00:52:36,596
Speaker 3: The one that was the million seller. The right, yes, yes,

949
00:52:36,676 --> 00:52:38,996
Speaker 3: and they only say on the label and orchestra, but

950
00:52:39,076 --> 00:52:40,036
Speaker 3: the orchestra.

951
00:52:39,876 --> 00:52:40,236
Speaker 1: Was that right?

952
00:52:40,276 --> 00:52:41,996
Speaker 2: They didn't list. But this is nineteen and.

953
00:52:42,676 --> 00:52:45,156
Speaker 3: In fact it was fought until recently, as late as

954
00:52:45,196 --> 00:52:48,276
Speaker 3: when I worked on the ken Burns documentary Country Music,

955
00:52:48,596 --> 00:52:51,116
Speaker 3: and ken Burns has been supportive of my book, but

956
00:52:51,876 --> 00:52:55,676
Speaker 3: other scholars they just debated and fought with me. It

957
00:52:55,756 --> 00:52:59,476
Speaker 3: took so much work to get Louis Armstrong mentioned as

958
00:52:59,516 --> 00:53:02,356
Speaker 3: part of the jew and Me Rogers story. Ultimately, even

959
00:53:02,396 --> 00:53:04,196
Speaker 3: though I was able to prove it and prove it

960
00:53:04,236 --> 00:53:07,476
Speaker 3: to everyone's satisfaction, sheet I didn't find it. But the

961
00:53:07,556 --> 00:53:10,636
Speaker 3: sheet music has been found and it's been authenticated by

962
00:53:10,676 --> 00:53:13,636
Speaker 3: Jimmy Rogers scholars that then Jimmy Rogers' own hand that

963
00:53:13,756 --> 00:53:18,156
Speaker 3: he wrote after the session, and Louie's wife lil played piano.

964
00:53:18,356 --> 00:53:21,956
Speaker 3: But up until the time it was that Literally, it's

965
00:53:21,996 --> 00:53:24,076
Speaker 3: only been the twenty first century we've been able to

966
00:53:24,156 --> 00:53:27,676
Speaker 3: prove that, and people denied it. But what's wild is

967
00:53:28,436 --> 00:53:32,356
Speaker 3: Lil Harden was alive when I was alive. She knew

968
00:53:32,396 --> 00:53:34,956
Speaker 3: whether or not she played on Blue YOLDA number nine,

969
00:53:34,996 --> 00:53:38,436
Speaker 3: and so it required not believing her. But what's wild

970
00:53:38,556 --> 00:53:42,116
Speaker 3: is Roy Acuff knew it too. Everybody knew it because

971
00:53:42,196 --> 00:53:43,996
Speaker 3: it wasn't a secret at the time. That's why they

972
00:53:43,996 --> 00:53:46,796
Speaker 3: had to go out. They recorded in LA. Did you

973
00:53:46,836 --> 00:53:48,916
Speaker 3: think Jimmy Rogers didn't say, I just put on this

974
00:53:48,956 --> 00:53:53,356
Speaker 3: big session with Louis Armstrong and Lil Harden Armstrong. These

975
00:53:53,356 --> 00:53:56,036
Speaker 3: are two of the top jazz players of that day.

976
00:53:57,116 --> 00:53:59,636
Speaker 3: But it was hidden. So that's a little bit sad.

977
00:54:00,556 --> 00:54:06,156
Speaker 2: Louis Armstrong is one of those characters who is so accessible,

978
00:54:06,236 --> 00:54:09,836
Speaker 2: including to white Americans, Like why with the fact that

979
00:54:09,876 --> 00:54:14,076
Speaker 2: he performed with Louis Armstrong be an issue because then

980
00:54:14,116 --> 00:54:17,076
Speaker 2: it then became less authentic. What was the what was

981
00:54:17,116 --> 00:54:19,156
Speaker 2: the thinking? I'm asking you to think about the other

982
00:54:19,196 --> 00:54:20,716
Speaker 2: side here. I realized, that's unfair.

983
00:54:21,396 --> 00:54:24,716
Speaker 3: Well, we don't first, I never think I know what

984
00:54:24,756 --> 00:54:27,276
Speaker 3: other people are thinking. And to wonder what Jimmy Rogers

985
00:54:27,316 --> 00:54:29,836
Speaker 3: was thinking in nineteen thirty one, and couldn't it could

986
00:54:29,836 --> 00:54:31,916
Speaker 3: have been not his idea. He could have just wanted

987
00:54:31,916 --> 00:54:33,876
Speaker 3: to play with Louis a Lil and it had to

988
00:54:33,916 --> 00:54:36,516
Speaker 3: do with the people who are marketing the record. That part.

989
00:54:36,676 --> 00:54:39,076
Speaker 3: There have been arguments made that part of the way

990
00:54:39,356 --> 00:54:42,836
Speaker 3: that country music was marketed was that part of the

991
00:54:42,956 --> 00:54:47,196
Speaker 3: value you got, like when you buy armez scarf, you're

992
00:54:47,236 --> 00:54:49,716
Speaker 3: buying into an image of yourself of luxury or this

993
00:54:49,836 --> 00:54:52,236
Speaker 3: or that. Does this not just the silk scarf from

994
00:54:52,236 --> 00:54:55,796
Speaker 3: the pattern, that part of what was being marketed with

995
00:54:55,916 --> 00:55:00,636
Speaker 3: country music was quote unquote white identity, and that that's

996
00:55:00,756 --> 00:55:03,716
Speaker 3: part of what people were buying when they got it,

997
00:55:03,796 --> 00:55:06,036
Speaker 3: and so that's what they wanted to see. So you

998
00:55:06,156 --> 00:55:09,876
Speaker 3: see in the early thirties they are examples of that

999
00:55:09,996 --> 00:55:12,916
Speaker 3: were actually integrated bands, but when they made pictures of them,

1000
00:55:13,436 --> 00:55:16,756
Speaker 3: they would take out the black member and put in

1001
00:55:16,836 --> 00:55:19,756
Speaker 3: a white person, sometimes a manager or some other person

1002
00:55:20,156 --> 00:55:23,356
Speaker 3: as if that was the band. And we know for

1003
00:55:23,476 --> 00:55:25,716
Speaker 3: sure because he talked about it. When Charlie Pridde was

1004
00:55:25,796 --> 00:55:29,996
Speaker 3: originally being broken in the industry, they did not send

1005
00:55:29,996 --> 00:55:33,196
Speaker 3: out any pictures of him or indicate to radio when

1006
00:55:33,196 --> 00:55:37,156
Speaker 3: they were getting him established that he was black. They

1007
00:55:37,236 --> 00:55:39,916
Speaker 3: hid that because they thought it would make it more

1008
00:55:39,956 --> 00:55:42,916
Speaker 3: difficult to sell. And we know that that had happened

1009
00:55:43,036 --> 00:55:47,276
Speaker 3: with earlier artists that people have thought were white that

1010
00:55:47,396 --> 00:55:50,596
Speaker 3: we now know for sure were black, and that their

1011
00:55:50,636 --> 00:55:52,756
Speaker 3: images were replaced at an earlier time.

1012
00:55:53,276 --> 00:55:55,916
Speaker 2: That was not always the case with country music. You

1013
00:55:55,996 --> 00:55:59,436
Speaker 2: talk a lot about DeFord Bailey, who was the most

1014
00:55:59,476 --> 00:56:02,676
Speaker 2: popular star on the on the Grand Old Operay when

1015
00:56:02,716 --> 00:56:06,116
Speaker 2: it started. Was there a particular moment when it went

1016
00:56:06,156 --> 00:56:09,156
Speaker 2: from being this art form that had a lot of

1017
00:56:09,196 --> 00:56:15,036
Speaker 2: different contributors to being this representative of white culture.

1018
00:56:16,596 --> 00:56:19,996
Speaker 3: I think the same way that African influences have been

1019
00:56:19,996 --> 00:56:24,676
Speaker 3: in country music since its birth, the erasure of Black

1020
00:56:25,156 --> 00:56:29,316
Speaker 3: contributions to country music have been there since the beginning

1021
00:56:29,356 --> 00:56:32,036
Speaker 3: of it. It's the same. I think it comes out

1022
00:56:32,036 --> 00:56:34,716
Speaker 3: of the idea of you owning people's bodies, and you're

1023
00:56:34,756 --> 00:56:38,676
Speaker 3: owning their labor, and you're owning their creation. So I

1024
00:56:38,716 --> 00:56:42,876
Speaker 3: think that there's a very complicated history that it's only

1025
00:56:42,996 --> 00:56:48,396
Speaker 3: right now that we're seeing open collaboration and accrediting of

1026
00:56:48,396 --> 00:56:52,116
Speaker 3: what black contributions a country have been. Because even it's

1027
00:56:52,196 --> 00:56:54,556
Speaker 3: recently as the Lil nas X thing, one of the

1028
00:56:55,556 --> 00:56:58,996
Speaker 3: quote unquote controversies with this first song Old Town wrote

1029
00:56:59,516 --> 00:57:02,356
Speaker 3: with people you would see all over the internet versions

1030
00:57:02,396 --> 00:57:07,916
Speaker 3: of this. Our culture isn't your costume. But what they

1031
00:57:07,916 --> 00:57:11,236
Speaker 3: didn't know is that at least twenty percent of cowboys

1032
00:57:11,236 --> 00:57:14,436
Speaker 3: were black and brown. Some people estimate as highest thirty percent.

1033
00:57:14,876 --> 00:57:17,356
Speaker 3: These people actually don't know this because it's a raised

1034
00:57:17,436 --> 00:57:21,316
Speaker 3: history that when we look at another long term contribution

1035
00:57:21,396 --> 00:57:26,116
Speaker 3: to country music is cowboy songs and the whole wealth

1036
00:57:26,116 --> 00:57:28,796
Speaker 3: of them. And we know that Thorpe I write about this,

1037
00:57:28,916 --> 00:57:31,516
Speaker 3: the guy first in the teens who collected the first

1038
00:57:31,556 --> 00:57:34,636
Speaker 3: cowboy songs and put them in a book. Well, people

1039
00:57:34,676 --> 00:57:36,876
Speaker 3: don't realize that the first cowboy camp he went to,

1040
00:57:36,996 --> 00:57:38,676
Speaker 3: because it's been a race from the story, was a

1041
00:57:38,716 --> 00:57:41,716
Speaker 3: black cowboy camp. That a lot of songs come from

1042
00:57:41,756 --> 00:57:44,316
Speaker 3: black cowboys. I don't even think people are lying or

1043
00:57:44,356 --> 00:57:46,716
Speaker 3: repressing that. I think most people just don't even know

1044
00:57:46,756 --> 00:57:51,036
Speaker 3: that any and so it's a distorted story of the

1045
00:57:51,076 --> 00:57:53,716
Speaker 3: past that distorts our potential for the future.

1046
00:57:54,596 --> 00:57:57,836
Speaker 2: Or the other you know, the other great source of

1047
00:57:58,756 --> 00:58:02,276
Speaker 2: country music, Appalachia. People don't And I think you might

1048
00:58:02,316 --> 00:58:05,436
Speaker 2: mention this in your book, just huge number of African

1049
00:58:05,476 --> 00:58:07,476
Speaker 2: American foundations in coal miners.

1050
00:58:07,556 --> 00:58:11,556
Speaker 3: Yeah, yes, A large, A large amount of co owners

1051
00:58:11,676 --> 00:58:14,716
Speaker 3: are black. Bill Withers, who I love, who I think

1052
00:58:14,716 --> 00:58:17,996
Speaker 3: of as a country artist. Grandma's hands, wonderful country songs.

1053
00:58:18,636 --> 00:58:21,276
Speaker 3: He kissed. His grandfather was a coal miner. They're black,

1054
00:58:21,356 --> 00:58:27,356
Speaker 3: So Appalachian music is influenced by the presence of black people.

1055
00:58:27,716 --> 00:58:27,956
Speaker 3: M H.

1056
00:58:28,276 --> 00:58:33,636
Speaker 2: And you'd always have some performers would release. The Pointer

1057
00:58:33,716 --> 00:58:37,076
Speaker 2: Sisters released a country album. I think one a.

1058
00:58:36,996 --> 00:58:41,716
Speaker 3: Great a huge single fairy Tale that Elvis Presley would

1059
00:58:41,716 --> 00:58:45,516
Speaker 3: cover and they that was a big single and that

1060
00:58:45,796 --> 00:58:52,156
Speaker 3: family winning duel. We've always said Ray Charles, the Pointer Sisters.

1061
00:58:51,596 --> 00:58:52,556
Speaker 2: Tina Turner did one.

1062
00:58:52,636 --> 00:58:56,036
Speaker 3: Jana Turner had amazing Tina Turns a country on. But

1063
00:58:56,196 --> 00:58:59,116
Speaker 3: one of my other memories is my nineteen sixty four

1064
00:58:59,436 --> 00:59:02,876
Speaker 3: five with the Supremes played the Copa Cabana for the

1065
00:59:02,916 --> 00:59:06,276
Speaker 3: first time and I was there and they sang a

1066
00:59:06,316 --> 00:59:09,636
Speaker 3: country song. They sang Queen of the House and that

1067
00:59:09,756 --> 00:59:11,676
Speaker 3: song became country song of the Year, and they were

1068
00:59:11,716 --> 00:59:13,596
Speaker 3: part of putting that song in that place.

1069
00:59:14,116 --> 00:59:18,716
Speaker 2: And Al Green did did great versions of He did

1070
00:59:19,476 --> 00:59:21,516
Speaker 2: blunsome I could cry, He did.

1071
00:59:21,516 --> 00:59:22,076
Speaker 1: A bunch of way.

1072
00:59:22,116 --> 00:59:24,596
Speaker 3: He had a whole country album about that. I love.

1073
00:59:25,116 --> 00:59:29,436
Speaker 3: I love the Grand Tour by George Jones. That it

1074
00:59:29,636 --> 00:59:32,436
Speaker 3: equally interesting is aaron Nevills.

1075
00:59:32,796 --> 00:59:36,276
Speaker 2: I have to confess I like Grand Tour a little

1076
00:59:36,316 --> 00:59:38,076
Speaker 2: bit better than he stopped loving Her today.

1077
00:59:38,796 --> 00:59:41,996
Speaker 3: Well waite until you hear this other one. Grand touris

1078
00:59:42,036 --> 00:59:44,316
Speaker 3: are just a sad song about the divorce and that.

1079
00:59:44,676 --> 00:59:48,996
Speaker 3: But he' stop living today. To me, in terms of criticism,

1080
00:59:50,156 --> 00:59:55,236
Speaker 3: is about what I call dynamic stasis, stasis frozenness. In

1081
00:59:55,436 --> 00:59:57,956
Speaker 3: Western literature and Western art, one of the things we

1082
00:59:58,036 --> 01:00:02,076
Speaker 3: look for is the hero evolving, changing, becoming more. But

1083
01:00:02,116 --> 01:00:05,036
Speaker 3: in real life we know most people don't change. People

1084
01:00:05,076 --> 01:00:07,756
Speaker 3: get very set. What I love in country there is

1085
01:00:07,796 --> 01:00:11,956
Speaker 3: a dynamic that I have labeled dynamic stasis. We're a

1086
01:00:12,036 --> 01:00:16,396
Speaker 3: frozen character. The narrator moves around them like that line

1087
01:00:16,476 --> 01:00:19,076
Speaker 3: he stopped loving her today. Soon they'll they'll hang a

1088
01:00:19,116 --> 01:00:22,116
Speaker 3: reef upon his door. He stop loving her day. The

1089
01:00:22,276 --> 01:00:26,436
Speaker 3: change is death. When you see the price of dynamic

1090
01:00:26,516 --> 01:00:29,876
Speaker 3: stasis for being frozen, that you may die, you may

1091
01:00:29,916 --> 01:00:32,876
Speaker 3: have a life that mounts to nothing. It actually can

1092
01:00:32,916 --> 01:00:36,156
Speaker 3: provoke you to change. That's why I love he stopped

1093
01:00:36,156 --> 01:00:40,156
Speaker 3: loving her Today, because it's about what the penalty of

1094
01:00:40,236 --> 01:00:43,276
Speaker 3: not moving on is and that could be from a

1095
01:00:43,436 --> 01:00:46,556
Speaker 3: success or a failure in work life, Like we all

1096
01:00:46,636 --> 01:00:49,116
Speaker 3: need to be reminded that we do not want to

1097
01:00:49,156 --> 01:00:51,076
Speaker 3: be the person who's going back and saying he had

1098
01:00:51,196 --> 01:00:54,676
Speaker 3: underlined and read every single I love you like all

1099
01:00:54,756 --> 01:00:58,116
Speaker 3: these people's death, scrolling and commenting on other people's lives

1100
01:00:58,156 --> 01:01:01,316
Speaker 3: instead of doing something that's the equivalent of he had

1101
01:01:01,476 --> 01:01:03,956
Speaker 3: underlined and read every single I love you.

1102
01:01:04,476 --> 01:01:07,116
Speaker 2: Okay, I love that. I love that theory. I think

1103
01:01:07,116 --> 01:01:08,716
Speaker 2: we're going to end on that because that is so.

1104
01:01:08,756 --> 01:01:13,476
Speaker 3: Great dynamic stasis. I'm a stritter, but I'm a critic

1105
01:01:13,596 --> 01:01:15,796
Speaker 3: of the form, and I love this form when it's

1106
01:01:15,836 --> 01:01:18,556
Speaker 3: at its best, and it's an Afro Celtic form. I

1107
01:01:18,596 --> 01:01:21,596
Speaker 3: love great journalists like you that give us a chance

1108
01:01:22,196 --> 01:01:24,996
Speaker 3: to put the footouts on and complete the story.

1109
01:01:25,596 --> 01:01:27,476
Speaker 2: Well, we're going to talk the next time you do

1110
01:01:27,556 --> 01:01:29,556
Speaker 2: something then, because this has been just fabulous.

1111
01:01:30,316 --> 01:01:32,356
Speaker 3: Thank you so much. I appreciate you.

1112
01:01:35,276 --> 01:01:37,596
Speaker 1: Thanks to Alice Randall for walking us through her professional

1113
01:01:37,676 --> 01:01:41,076
Speaker 1: history and her many projects around black country music. You

1114
01:01:41,116 --> 01:01:43,596
Speaker 1: can hear her new album My Black Country The Songs

1115
01:01:43,596 --> 01:01:46,116
Speaker 1: of Alice Randall, as well as other songs she's written

1116
01:01:46,156 --> 01:01:49,516
Speaker 1: on a playlist at broken record podcast dot com. You

1117
01:01:49,516 --> 01:01:52,116
Speaker 1: can subscribe to our YouTube page at YouTube dot com

1118
01:01:52,116 --> 01:01:55,636
Speaker 1: slash broken Record Podcast to watch all of our video interviews,

1119
01:01:56,036 --> 01:01:58,116
Speaker 1: and be sure to follow us on Instagram at the

1120
01:01:58,156 --> 01:02:01,196
Speaker 1: Broken Record Pod. You can follow us on Twitter at

1121
01:02:01,316 --> 01:02:05,356
Speaker 1: broken Record. Broken Record is produced and edited by Leah Rose,

1122
01:02:05,436 --> 01:02:08,556
Speaker 1: with marketing help from Eric Sandler and Jordan McMillan. Our

1123
01:02:08,596 --> 01:02:12,356
Speaker 1: engineer is Ben Tolliday. Broken Record is a production of

1124
01:02:12,476 --> 01:02:16,316
Speaker 1: Pushkin Industries. If you love this show and others from Pushkin,

1125
01:02:16,476 --> 01:02:20,676
Speaker 1: consider subscribing to Pushkin Plus. Pushkin Plus is a podcast

1126
01:02:20,716 --> 01:02:23,756
Speaker 1: subscription that offers bonus content and a free listening for

1127
01:02:23,876 --> 01:02:27,156
Speaker 1: four ninety nine a month. Look for Pushkin Plus on

1128
01:02:27,196 --> 01:02:31,156
Speaker 1: Apple podcast subscriptions. And if you like this show, please

1129
01:02:31,196 --> 01:02:34,156
Speaker 1: remember to share, rate, and review us on your podcast app.

1130
01:02:34,436 --> 01:02:37,196
Speaker 1: Our theme music's by Kenny Beats. I'm justin Richmond.