Kenny Rogers made the song “Oh Ruby, Don’t Take Your Love To Town” a popular hit in 1968. It is a wonderful song for many reasons - it has a nice melody, a solid verse-chorus-verse structure, and suits Roger’s voice well. This is back when country was still country instead of the pop crap it is today. What I love about it most though is the tuneful melody that belies the downright shocking subject matter of the song.
The song is about a Vietnam War vet “whose legs are bent and paralyzed” and whose wife has taken to running around on him. He isn’t just some down-on-his-luck fella who is unlucky in love, he’s actually physically incapable of satisfying his wife.
The wife, for her part, may be one of the most rotten people ever portrayed in a country song, for she seems to feel no remorse for her actions. She “paints up her lips, rolls and curls her tinted hair”, and “contemplates going out somewhere”. Poor guy, we think, isn’t love a bitch? But in the final verse we get this:
She's leaving now cause
I just heard the slamming of the door
The way I know I've heard it
Some 100 times before
And if I could move I'd get my gun
And put her in the ground
Oh Ruby
Don't take your love to town
Wait a minute! What was that last part? Right before the chorus? Jesus Christ! I thought I was listening to a little ditty about a lovelorn broken-down man, but this is turning into a scene from Full Metal Jacket.
I love it though, because it doesn’t try to candy-coat reality. This is what art should do, convey genuine emotion within the realm of the accepted forms of expression. Kind of like putting an aspirin into a lil’ smokey and feeding it to your dog. The fact that Kenny Rogers is singing it just blasts it off the charts in my book.
Another fine example exists with the song “Goodnight Irene”, a folk song performed by many but made famous by Leadbelly in a 1950 rendition. At first blush, it appears to be about a man who is infatuated with a young girl. When he can’t have her in the real world, he decides he can at least “get you in my dreams.”
This all seems innocuous enough, though there are some definite overtones of a Lolita complex. It’s the next stanza, however we learn that his inability to have her has led to some desperate thoughts:
Sometimes I live in the country
Sometimes I live in the town
Sometimes I have a great notion
To jump into the river and drown
This sounds like a verse written by someone with a depressive illness. Still it appears he may be merely prone to exaggeration, as many of us can be in love, and the chorus is still pretty:
Irene Goodnight, Irene Goodnight
Goodnight Irene, Goodnight Irene
I get you in my dreams.
In the third verse we find out that man is actually married, and he is advised to go home to his family instead of spending all of his time out drinking and gambling. This is already pretty dark territory for a folk song, but it’s the final verse that caps it off:
I love Irene God knows I do
Love her till the sea run dry
And if Irene turns her back on me
I’m gonna take morphine and die
Now this was a popular song, mind you. It probably sold tens of thousands of records, and yet it is about a married man, with children, whose is so infatuated with a young girl that he is suicidal, and furthermore wouldn’t mind indulging in his morphine habit to finish himself off. I don’t know about you, but the first time I actually understood the lyrics this became one of the greatest songs ever.
The last song I want to talk about deals with a subject matter lighter in tone, though still heavier that what the music implies. The song is “Do you know the way to San Jose?” written by Burt Bacharach and sung by Dionne Warwick. This is one of the happiest melodies ever - almost saccharine to the point where you can’t possibly like the song. But listen to the lyrics, and you realize she’s not just directionally challenged about her home town so much as she’s royally ragging on Los Angeles:
L.A. is a great big freeway
Put a hundred down and buy a car
In a week, maybe two, they'll make you a star
Weeks turn into years, how quick they pass
And all the stars that never were
Are parking cars and pumping gas
Bum bum bum-bum bum bum bum-bum bum bahhhh! A little bitter here, not that I blame her. In the second verse she sings about how nice San Jose is by comparison and how she can find “piece of mind” there. Then in the third verse we get this:
Fame and fortune is a magnet
It can pull you far away from home
With a dream in your heart you're never alone
Dreams turn into dust and blow away
And there you are without a friend
You pack your car and ride away
Basically the song is saying “Fuck LA, the people are assholes, everyone thinks they’re talented but most of them suck, I’d much rather go back home where at least people know me.” If she only knew the dystopian nightmare post Silicon Valley era San Jose has become. Just kidding, San Jose.
BTW, Dionne, if you’re reading this, from San Francisco you can just take 101 South about 50 miles.
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I know which song you are talking about, but I think it's Harry Chapin. I found the lyrics:
It was raining hard in 'Frisco,
I needed one more fare to make my night.
A lady up ahead waved to flag me down,
She got in at the light.
Oh, where you going to, my lady blue,
It's a shame you ruined your gown in the rain.
She just looked out the window, and said
"Sixteen Parkside Lane".
Something about her was familiar
I could swear I'd seen her face before,
But she said, "I'm sure you're mistaken"
And she didn't say anything more.
It took a while, but she looked in the mirror,
And she glanced at the license for my name.
A smile seemed to come to her slowly,
It was a sad smile, just the same.
And she said, "How are you Harry?"
I said, "How are you Sue?
Through the too many miles
and the too little smiles
I still remember you."
It was somewhere in a fairy tale,
I used to take her home in my car.
We learned about love in the back of the Dodge,
The lesson hadn't gone too far.
You see, she was gonna be an actress,
And I was gonna learn to fly.
She took off to find the footlights,
And I took off to find the sky.
Oh, I've got something inside me,
To drive a princess blind.
There's a wild man, wizard,
He's hiding in me, illuminating my mind.
Oh, I've got something inside me,
Not what my life's about,
Cause I've been letting my outside tide me,
Over 'till my time, runs out.
Baby's so high that she's skying,
Yes she's flying, afraid to fall.
I'll tell you why baby's crying,
Cause she's dying, aren't we all.
There was not much more for us to talk about,
Whatever we had once was gone.
So I turned my cab into the driveway,
Past the gate and the fine trimmed lawns.
And she said we must get together,
But I knew it'd never be arranged.
And she handed me twenty dollars,
For a two fifty fare, she said
"Harry, keep the change."
Well another man might have been angry,
And another man might have been hurt,
But another man never would have let her go...
I stashed the bill in my shirt.
And she walked away in silence,
It's strange, how you never know,
But we'd both gotten what we'd asked for,
Such a long, long time ago.
You see, she was gonna be an actress
And I was gonna learn to fly.
She took off to find the footlights,
And I took off for the sky.
And here, she's acting happy,
Inside her handsome home.
And me, I'm flying in my taxi,
Taking tips, and getting stoned,
I go flying so high, when I'm stoned.
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