Songs That Tell Stories

Johny CAsh could always sing a story or two.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DhtcaRRngcw

good song/atrocious video

I love Johnny Cash songs.

I think he was Bob Dylans more creative brother.

I love them both. (But I can't listen to Dylan's last albums).

I loved those Everest LPs. I never saw an album where Sonny Terry was without Brownie McGhee.
Cool
Here's a New Orleans type version by Cookie & the Cupcakes.

Simon has been making pronouncements on the matter but I am not interested in her or what she has to say.

There's a Dylan song, "What Was It You Wanted," that Dylan does that is also covered by Chris Smither and Willie Nelson. Hard to tell whose version is better.

Speaking of Chris Smither . . . here is his "Origin of the Species.'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpNoQaB2LT0

I love Smither. His "I Feel The Same" is a wonderful Bonnie Raitt song.

Trisha does a classic story-telling song about a young woman's love. Walkaway Joe


Momma told her baby, girl take it real slow
Girl told her momma hey I really gotta go
He's waitin' in the car
Momma said girl you won't get far
Thus are the dreams of an average jane
Ninety miles an hour down a lovers lane
On a tank of dreams
Oh if she could've only seen
But fates got cards that it don't want to show
And that boy's just

A walkaway joe
Born to be a leaver
Tell you from the word go, destined to deceive her
He's a wrong kinda paradise
She's gonna know it in a matter of time
That boy's just a walkaway joe

There are several versions of Betty and Dupree that I like. The ones by Chuck Willis and Harry Belafonte are, to me, worth mentioning also.

I could not understand the words on the recording:

ORIGIN OF SPECIES

Well, Eve told Adam
Snakes? I've had 'em!
Let's get outta here!
Go raise this family someplace outta town.

They left the garden just in time
With the landlord cussin' right behind.
They headed East,
and they finally settled down.

One thing led to another:
A bunch of sons,
One killed his brother
And they kicked him out with nothin' but his clothes.

And the human race survived
'Cause all those brothers found wives
But where they came from
Ain't nobody knows.

Then came the flood
Go figure...
Just like New Orleans only bigger.
No one who couldn't swim would make it through.

The lucky ones were on a boat
Think "circus"
And then make it float
I hope nobody pulls the plug on you!

How they fed that crowd is a mystery.
It ain't down in the history,
but it's a cinch they didn't
live on cakes and jam.

Lions don't eat cabbage
And in spite of that old adage,
I ain't never seen one
Lie down with a lamb.

Well, Charlie Darwin looked so far
Into the way things are.
He caught a glimpse of God's
unfolding plan.

God said: "I'll make some DNA"
They can use it any way they want
From paramecium
Right up to man."

"They'll have sex
And mix up sections of their code
They'll have mutations...
The whole thing works like clockwork over time."

"I'll just sit back in the shade
While everyone gets laid.
That's what I call
Intelligent design."

Yeah, you and your cat named Felix,
Both wrapped up in that double helix,
Is what we call
Intelligent design.

The Walkaway Joe song is also new to me. Very well done.

I was thinking of Harry Belafonte when Lena Horne died. I loved to hear him sing, "Scarlet Ribbons." I associated Harry and Lena with the Ed Sullivan Show.

I heard Chris sing that one live in a little town called Ashfield. How I love Ashfield . . . a place where a grown up and grown old hippie can feel at home. Ashfield is heaven on earth where folks are friendly . . . a sort of left wing Lake Woebegone . . . with a lake!

Some years ago, I heard that the Yellow Rose was not a blonde but a mulatto, a "high yellar" girl.

Harry and Lena did a TV special together, and they recorded an album titled, Porgy and Bess. Belafonte was essentially a singer of world folk songs. He did Jewish tunes, Spanish, Japanese, South African, English, Irish - and so forth. He was the instigator of the recording "We Are the World."