Dave sent me a lyric from a Doc Watson song, something about a muskrat stinking up the farmer's house and eating up his food. I believe this may be what passes for a love note when you've been married for 20 years. I couldn't find a video of the muskrat song, but here's the man doing Deep River Blues
In the course of cruising around Youtube, I also found great video of Pete Townshend playing a song inspired by Marty Robbins. It's a very mystical song, but Townshend can pull that off, and I love the fact that he messes up a couple of times. Everything we hear these days is so tweaked and perfect, it's a pleasure to hear a great musician sound like a human being. The embedding on the video has been disabled, so to see it, click here.
I had no idea Townshend admired Marty Robbins. Robbins had the most amazing effect on people. My mother, who is a singer herself and a rather finicky listener, absolutely adored Marty Robbins. She grieved when he died, and she is not the hysterical fan type. Jim MacGuire, the photographer I blogged about a while back, always speaks of Robbins as one of the great gentlemen of the country music world, as well as a great performer. Here's a video of early Marty, singing a pretty ballad.
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6 comments:
I Never knew that either - Pete Townshend just went up a notch in my estimation. I LOVED Marty Robbins, my whole family did. When we were kids we could not get enough of his cowboy ballads; I think that's what really set him apart from the other country singers, other than his amazing voice. I cried when he died as well. There was something about him that just made you feel happy to be alive.
Oh my god, Marty Robbins. My parents have some old record albums of his from waaaaaay back in the early 50's. They were stationed in Hawaii back then when Dad was in the Navy, and they bought his album, "Song of the Islands": I used to stare at the cover when I was a kid, because I thought those girls in Hawaiian skirts around him were the most gorgeous things I'd ever seen. (The music was great too!) Wow, now I need to go hunt down some Marty Robbins music. As for Pete...I love him, but always been pretty egotistical. He does have the chops to back it up though.
See, everybody loves Marty! It's interesting to note how many of the comments on Townshend's video referred to Robbins as somebody they never heard of--but if you look at Robbins' videos, they all have a huge number of hits. Generational thing, I guess.
"Deep River Blues" is one of my earliest memories, and "she walks like a water fowl" is one of my favorite all-time blues lines. Haven't heard it in years, and nobody does it like Doc.
What I liked best about Marty Robbins was the way he would close the Opry at about 11:30 sitting down at "The Marty Robbins Piano," all by himself, and singing, "Don't Worry 'Bout Me." He seemed to be having a ball, and everyone else certainly was too.
What wonderful memories, Bozo. I wish I could have seen MR in his glory that way. I don't think moments like that happen at today's Opry very often.
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