April 06, 2005

THE SALAD BOWL HIGHLY SUGGESTS
YOU GIVE YOUR PROMPT ATTENTION TO...

RobertEarlKeen.jpg
The sign of a great song or a great songwriter, for me, is when your view of the world changes after just one listen.
Lyle Lovett's "If I Had A Boat" did it for me. So did "Smells Like Teen Spirit." I can remember where I was when I heard both of those.
Same thing happened the other day when I heard "The Great Hank," a new song on the upcoming album "What I Really Mean" by Robert Earl Keen.
I pulled this off the freebies table at work, popped it into my CD player and bathed in the weirdness.
I first came in contact with Keen's stuff through Lovett's CD "Step Inside This House," a collection of covers of Lovett's favorite Texas songwriters. Keen and Lovett were roommates at Texas A&M back in the day. They even co-wrote the song "This Old Porch," which is featured on Porch.
Anyway, Keen is known for writing some twisted scenerios into his music. So it was with great satisfaction that I tripped over "The Great Hank." [Click here for an unsatisfying sample of the tremendously long, horse-trot-rhythm intro.]
Here's how he describes the album and the song:
Generally, it's a little bit more on country side. It's got a lot more steel guitar on it, but in some ways it's a lot more wacky and colorful. For instance, I've got a song on there called, 'The great Hank Williams' which is about me going into this bar and seeing a guy up on stage that is a transvestite dressed up as Hank Williams with lipstick and singing his songs and he's got this whole commentary on Hank Williams and country music. It's really fun. We did it in this really great traditional country style with a 'from beyond the grave' voiceover and it's unbelievable. It probably won't ever get played on the radio two times, and I'm not asking anybody to, but it's damned interesting."
Posted by Jeff at April 6, 2005 08:20 AM
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