Rich Hall's Countrier Than You

0:00:02 > 0:00:06This programme contains some strong language.

0:00:06 > 0:00:10"OK, Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton, Gram Parsons, blah blah blah..."

0:00:10 > 0:00:13No! This is the story of how country music

0:00:13 > 0:00:18constantly has to reinvent itself, to adapt to a changing culture.

0:00:21 > 0:00:25The reason country music survives is because someone always comes along,

0:00:25 > 0:00:29takes what's been done before and adds something original,

0:00:29 > 0:00:32something unique. This is what it's all about,

0:00:32 > 0:00:33the musicians who made a difference,

0:00:33 > 0:00:38who gave us great songs that stand the test of time.

0:00:38 > 0:00:41You see, people, if you're going to write a hit song,

0:00:41 > 0:00:44you have to find your target audience.

0:00:44 > 0:00:46Fortunately, I have found mine.

0:00:46 > 0:00:49Am I right, ladies? Thanks for coming out tonight.

0:00:50 > 0:00:53This one is just for you.

0:00:53 > 0:00:56It's called The Border Collie Song. Are you ready?

0:00:56 > 0:00:58Show's up here, ladies.

0:01:00 > 0:01:03# I'm ready to work, I'm ready to work, I'm ready to work, let's go!

0:01:03 > 0:01:06# What's the hold-up? I am ready to work, let's go

0:01:06 > 0:01:08# I am ready to work, I'm ready to herd

0:01:08 > 0:01:10# I'm ready to go, just say the word

0:01:10 > 0:01:13# In case you dogs have not heard, I'm a working dog

0:01:15 > 0:01:19# Now I've got issues, I'll admit, I basically don't know when to quit

0:01:19 > 0:01:22# My one and only occupation, keep those herds in a tight formation

0:01:22 > 0:01:25# Missing heifers, wayward strays, it tends to put a damper on my day

0:01:25 > 0:01:27# It's in my blood, what can I say?

0:01:27 > 0:01:29# I'm a goddamn working dog

0:01:29 > 0:01:31# Boys, get out of my way

0:01:31 > 0:01:35# I'm a goddamn working dog. #

0:01:38 > 0:01:43# I've been drinking all day long, taking in the town

0:01:44 > 0:01:50# I've done spent my whole pay cheque just a honky-tonkying round

0:01:50 > 0:01:52# I don't have enough to pay my rent

0:01:52 > 0:01:56# I ain't going to worry, though

0:01:56 > 0:01:58# I got time for one more round

0:01:58 > 0:02:03# And a six-pack to go... #

0:02:03 > 0:02:05How could he not afford to pay his rent?

0:02:05 > 0:02:08The guy's got a hit song on the radio.

0:02:08 > 0:02:13You see, this is the glaring contradiction in country music -

0:02:13 > 0:02:17a lot of rich guys and girls singing about how hard their lives are.

0:02:17 > 0:02:20That's why a lot of people don't like country music.

0:02:20 > 0:02:23They think it's phoney. But here's what you need to understand,

0:02:23 > 0:02:28a country song is never about the singer, it's about the listener,

0:02:28 > 0:02:32because a country song evokes the life of the blue-collar worker.

0:02:32 > 0:02:35You know who I'm talking about, that heavy-equipment-lifting,

0:02:35 > 0:02:40Dodge-Ram-2500-driving, beer-drinking, critter-hunting,

0:02:40 > 0:02:43frustrated-with-the-government good old boy.

0:02:43 > 0:02:47# Please, bartender, I want a six-pack to go

0:02:47 > 0:02:50# I been drinking all day long... #

0:02:50 > 0:02:54Country music is the music of working-class America.

0:02:54 > 0:02:57Why? Because it speaks to the heart of rural existence,

0:02:57 > 0:02:59and embraces a simpler life.

0:02:59 > 0:03:03A good country song is only believable when it's authentic.

0:03:03 > 0:03:05# One six-pack to go. #

0:03:09 > 0:03:12Now, most folks will tell you that country music's origins consist of

0:03:12 > 0:03:15ballads and dance tunes with very simple chord structures

0:03:15 > 0:03:18played mostly by stringed instruments.

0:03:25 > 0:03:28It's influenced by the Scots, the English, Irish,

0:03:28 > 0:03:32Scandinavian and European immigrants who settled in the Appalachian parts

0:03:32 > 0:03:36of Virginia, Tennessee and Kentucky.

0:03:39 > 0:03:41# Way down, way down... #

0:03:41 > 0:03:44What you have in the Appalachian South

0:03:44 > 0:03:48is a mixture of those ballad traditions.

0:03:48 > 0:03:52You have fiddling traditions,

0:03:52 > 0:03:55you've got the German influence of folks coming to Pennsylvania

0:03:55 > 0:03:57and then migrating down.

0:03:57 > 0:04:01You've got African-American influences in the region,

0:04:01 > 0:04:05and you've got Native American influences. So the culture of that

0:04:05 > 0:04:08was created from this interconnection of a lot of

0:04:08 > 0:04:12different people, created music traditions that are a little bit

0:04:12 > 0:04:14different from other parts of the country.

0:04:20 > 0:04:23I think it's way too easy to assume that country music just trickled

0:04:23 > 0:04:27down from the hills of Virginny, or came up from Deliverance country.

0:04:27 > 0:04:31The music that Americans brought over from the old country was

0:04:31 > 0:04:35incredibly diverse. There were gospel songs and parlour songs

0:04:35 > 0:04:37and fiddle dance tunes

0:04:37 > 0:04:40and minstrel songs, and even comedy novelty songs,

0:04:40 > 0:04:44and every one of those styles had many, many variations.

0:04:44 > 0:04:47Let's just take, for instance, one instrument - the fiddle.

0:04:52 > 0:04:54Now, what is that?

0:04:54 > 0:04:56Is that a French quadrille? Is that a German waltz?

0:04:56 > 0:05:00Is that an Irish air, is that a Scottish reel?

0:05:00 > 0:05:03Why, only an old-timer like Ivy could tell you.

0:05:05 > 0:05:09Fiddle music essentially came from the Shetland Islands, or Norway,

0:05:09 > 0:05:12where even today one in three schoolchildren plays one.

0:05:12 > 0:05:16That music flowed south, through the British Isles,

0:05:16 > 0:05:17across the ocean to Newfoundland,

0:05:17 > 0:05:20and then drifted south through Dixie and into Texas,

0:05:20 > 0:05:23so it stands to reason there must have been a lot of riverboat workers

0:05:23 > 0:05:26playing the thing. It was portable and floatable,

0:05:26 > 0:05:28and at every stop in the rivers, folks picked it up,

0:05:28 > 0:05:30screeched the bow across the strings

0:05:30 > 0:05:33and eventually managed to coax a tune out of it.

0:05:33 > 0:05:36Fiddling was actually like a regional dialect. Heck, you could

0:05:36 > 0:05:38tell where people were from by their style of fiddling.

0:05:38 > 0:05:40That's why Appalachian fiddling

0:05:40 > 0:05:43is different than Texas double stop fiddling.

0:05:47 > 0:05:51I'd say you were from about 30 miles north of Nashville.

0:05:53 > 0:05:57So, with all these fiddle tunes and blues ballads floating around

0:05:57 > 0:06:00the South, what was needed was someone to record it.

0:06:00 > 0:06:03A few rudimentary commercial recordings had been made

0:06:03 > 0:06:07in the early 1900s, but in 1927 a record producer named Ralph Peer

0:06:07 > 0:06:10arrived in a small town called Bristol

0:06:10 > 0:06:13on the Tennessee-Virginia border. He set up his equipment

0:06:13 > 0:06:15and the songs he recorded

0:06:15 > 0:06:18became known as the big bang of country music.

0:06:18 > 0:06:21That is the genesis of country music as we know it today.

0:06:21 > 0:06:25Ralph Peer paid folks 50

0:06:25 > 0:06:29a side for their recordings, plus royalties.

0:06:29 > 0:06:32So, at the time, that was unprecedented.

0:06:32 > 0:06:35It felt very lucrative for the people who came and made records,

0:06:35 > 0:06:38especially the Carter family, and Jimmie Rodgers.

0:06:38 > 0:06:42Jimmie Rodgers was known as The Singing Brakeman.

0:06:42 > 0:06:45Ralph Peer saw the potential in his music, and later, in 1927,

0:06:45 > 0:06:48invited him to make further recordings.

0:06:48 > 0:06:51One of those recordings was called Blue Yodel,

0:06:51 > 0:06:55and though the word "hit" wasn't really an applicable term to music

0:06:55 > 0:06:58in those days, that's exactly what Blue Yodel was.

0:06:58 > 0:07:02It made Jimmie Rodgers the first recognisable country star.

0:07:02 > 0:07:05# T for Texas

0:07:05 > 0:07:10# T for Tennessee-hee

0:07:10 > 0:07:14# T for Texas, T for Tennessee... #

0:07:14 > 0:07:17Rodgers' career was tragically short.

0:07:17 > 0:07:21In 1933, at the age of 35, he died of respiratory failure,

0:07:21 > 0:07:25but his legacy and his music would live on, cementing his importance

0:07:25 > 0:07:30not only to country music but to the entire American song book.

0:07:30 > 0:07:34# And T for Thelma

0:07:34 > 0:07:37# The gal that made a wreck of me... #

0:07:37 > 0:07:39HE YODELS

0:07:48 > 0:07:50CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

0:07:53 > 0:07:55# T for Texas

0:07:55 > 0:07:58# Gimme a T for Tennessee... #

0:07:58 > 0:08:01Often a song will go through many reincarnations before it finds

0:08:01 > 0:08:04its perfect musical bed. With my song Working Dog

0:08:04 > 0:08:07I thought I'd give it the bluegrass spin,

0:08:07 > 0:08:11because bluegrass is up-tempo and manic, just like a Border collie.

0:08:15 > 0:08:18'So I rounded up a handful of the finest bluegrass musicians

0:08:18 > 0:08:20'Nashville has to offer.'

0:08:20 > 0:08:23Is this the essence of Bluegrass here, to play round one mic?

0:08:23 > 0:08:24A lot of people do.

0:08:24 > 0:08:28- Yep.- I'll just play through my crap version of it,

0:08:28 > 0:08:32and then you guys will make it sound stunning, all right?

0:08:32 > 0:08:33So...

0:08:38 > 0:08:41# I'm ready to work, I'm ready to work, I'm ready to work, let's go!

0:08:43 > 0:08:46# What's the hold-up? I am ready to work, I'm ready to herd

0:08:46 > 0:08:48# I am ready to go, just say the word

0:08:48 > 0:08:51# In case you dogs have not heard, I'm a working dog... #

0:08:56 > 0:09:01So if anybody has any arrangement ideas, feel free to throw them in.

0:09:01 > 0:09:03But that's just... that's the crux of it.

0:09:03 > 0:09:05You want to...

0:09:05 > 0:09:08Maybe kind of like a swingy type of kick-off thing into it?

0:09:08 > 0:09:11So let him do that, and then you come, like...da-ri-ri-ri-ri.

0:09:11 > 0:09:13You know? Just follow.

0:09:29 > 0:09:33Yeah. Does that sound... Is that bluegrass?

0:09:33 > 0:09:36Bluegrassy, yes. Does it sound like what you want?

0:09:36 > 0:09:40Is it encapsulating the thinking of a Border collie?

0:09:40 > 0:09:43This is a manic, a manic, hyperactive Border collie.

0:09:43 > 0:09:46- I guess... - Over the same chord structure,

0:09:46 > 0:09:48so you end up doing something like that.

0:09:48 > 0:09:50HE RIFFS

0:09:53 > 0:09:57# Ready to go, I'm ready to go, I'm ready to go, hey!

0:09:59 > 0:10:02# What's the hold-up? I am ready to work, I'm ready to herd

0:10:02 > 0:10:04# I'm ready to go, just say the word

0:10:04 > 0:10:07# In case you dogs have not heard, I'm a working dog... #

0:10:38 > 0:10:41Was that good? I think we got it, right?

0:10:42 > 0:10:47The enthusiasm for bluegrass music often seems to rise and fall

0:10:47 > 0:10:50on the release of Southern-themed films, like Deliverance,

0:10:50 > 0:10:53or the Coen brothers' O Brother, Where Art Thou?

0:10:53 > 0:11:00# I am a man of constant sorrow

0:11:00 > 0:11:06# I've seen trouble all my days... #

0:11:06 > 0:11:09Set in 1937 in rural Mississippi,

0:11:09 > 0:11:11it features scenes where George Clooney

0:11:11 > 0:11:15and his Soggy Bottom Boys play their requested hit on the radio.

0:11:15 > 0:11:18The soundtrack from the film sold millions.

0:11:18 > 0:11:21# The place where he

0:11:21 > 0:11:24# Was born and raised... #

0:11:24 > 0:11:28Scores of people suddenly rediscovered America's truest

0:11:28 > 0:11:31and oldest form of country music.

0:11:31 > 0:11:35The only problem is this is complete bullshit.

0:11:35 > 0:11:39Bluegrass music hadn't even been invented in 1937.

0:11:39 > 0:11:41It didn't come along until the early '40s,

0:11:41 > 0:11:44when Bill Monroe joined the Grand Ole Opry and needed to create

0:11:44 > 0:11:47a sound that would make acoustic instruments relevant,

0:11:47 > 0:11:50because electric instruments were starting to take over.

0:11:54 > 0:11:57Monroe borrowed from the endless catalogue of traditional folk

0:11:57 > 0:12:02and gospel songs, songs about momma and the old country church,

0:12:02 > 0:12:05and the watering hole and the one-room schoolhouse -

0:12:05 > 0:12:07stock Americana images -

0:12:07 > 0:12:10and he ramped them up to 4/4 time with a double stop fiddle

0:12:10 > 0:12:12and a tub-thumping bassline.

0:12:22 > 0:12:24No-one called it bluegrass.

0:12:24 > 0:12:27That term didn't even come in until the 1950s.

0:12:27 > 0:12:29It was just fast hillbilly music

0:12:29 > 0:12:32designed to get people at the Grand Ole Opry to tap their feet.

0:12:32 > 0:12:37So when somebody who's been newly slobbering over bluegrass' balls

0:12:37 > 0:12:40because they watched a George Clooney film

0:12:40 > 0:12:44sits down and tries to tell you it's America's truest and purest form

0:12:44 > 0:12:47of music because it's always played clean and unamplified

0:12:47 > 0:12:49and sung in a high,

0:12:49 > 0:12:53lonesome hog-pitched voice...

0:12:53 > 0:12:55punch that person in the epiglottis,

0:12:55 > 0:12:58and the sound that comes out of their throat will be an authentic

0:12:58 > 0:13:00hillbilly whine.

0:13:00 > 0:13:02"Ahh."

0:13:12 > 0:13:15One of the strange things about America in the '20s and '30s

0:13:15 > 0:13:19was there was complete segregation of schools and churches

0:13:19 > 0:13:21and restaurants and public transport, but music

0:13:21 > 0:13:25was the one thing that flowed across cultural lines,

0:13:25 > 0:13:28because both blacks and whites sang gospel in churches.

0:13:28 > 0:13:32# Are you lonesome tonight?

0:13:32 > 0:13:35# Do you miss me tonight?

0:13:35 > 0:13:41# Are you sorry we drifted apart? #

0:13:41 > 0:13:45Some of these songs would become future top 40 hits.

0:13:45 > 0:13:48Are You Lonesome To-night? - 1960 Elvis Presley hit.

0:13:48 > 0:13:50Well, grandma was singing it back in the '20s,

0:13:50 > 0:13:52sitting on the front porch,

0:13:52 > 0:13:55playing a little Martin parlor guitar, drinking mint juleps.

0:13:55 > 0:13:59But when the mint juleps were done and the moonshine came out,

0:13:59 > 0:14:01things got a lot darker.

0:14:01 > 0:14:05There are a lot of different kinds of songs, you know, in these early

0:14:05 > 0:14:08recordings, and if you really look at the content of them...

0:14:10 > 0:14:14..you can see how people are singing about, you know,

0:14:14 > 0:14:18things that are important to them or emotional to them or whatever.

0:14:18 > 0:14:21But you also see a lot of songs that are about...

0:14:21 > 0:14:26disasters and current events, and a lot of songs about betrayal,

0:14:26 > 0:14:29and, yeah, murder ballads.

0:14:30 > 0:14:33People were fascinated with any song that told a morbid tale,

0:14:33 > 0:14:37and murder ballads made up a notable portion of traditional music.

0:14:37 > 0:14:42One of the most famous was made popular by Fiddlin' John Carson.

0:14:42 > 0:14:45Carson recorded a song called Little Mary Phagan,

0:14:45 > 0:14:49about a girl killed in a pencil factory. The song was based on

0:14:49 > 0:14:52a sensational murder trial taking place at the time in Georgia,

0:14:52 > 0:14:56and the convicted killer was a Jewish man named Leo Frank.

0:14:56 > 0:15:00In the song, Carson accuses the Governor of Georgia of taking

0:15:00 > 0:15:03a million-dollar bribe from a New York bank

0:15:03 > 0:15:07to have Frank's sentence commuted from life in prison to lynching.

0:15:07 > 0:15:12So the Governor of Georgia had Carson thrown in jail for slander.

0:15:14 > 0:15:19# Little Mary Phagan, she went to town one day

0:15:19 > 0:15:24# She went to the pencil factory to get her little pay

0:15:24 > 0:15:26# She left her home at seven

0:15:26 > 0:15:29# She kissed her mother goodbye

0:15:29 > 0:15:35# Not one time did the poor child think that she was going to die... #

0:15:35 > 0:15:39This is the contradictory basis of all country music - good versus bad,

0:15:39 > 0:15:41piety versus hedonism,

0:15:41 > 0:15:45rambling versus home, family versus individuality.

0:15:45 > 0:15:50# He sneaked along behind her till she reached the metal room

0:15:50 > 0:15:56# He laughed and said, Little Mary, you've met your fatal doom... #

0:15:56 > 0:15:59Every country song is a three-minute soap opera.

0:15:59 > 0:16:04Oh, it might be sweet on the outside but it's bleeding on the inside.

0:16:04 > 0:16:06So if you're a country artist

0:16:06 > 0:16:09and you're trying to put out an album with 12 songs on it in a year,

0:16:09 > 0:16:12you've got exactly one month to get drunk,

0:16:12 > 0:16:17depressed or heartbroke to find your inspiration.

0:16:17 > 0:16:20Leave me or I'll find someone who will.

0:16:20 > 0:16:22That's the motto of country music.

0:16:22 > 0:16:29# Oh, he taught me to love him and promised to love

0:16:29 > 0:16:35# And he cherished me over all others above

0:16:35 > 0:16:40# How my heart is now wondering no misery can tell

0:16:40 > 0:16:46# He's left me no warning, no words of farewell... #

0:16:46 > 0:16:50After recording for Ralph Peer at the Bristol sessions in 1927,

0:16:50 > 0:16:53the Carter Family were an instant sensation.

0:16:53 > 0:16:56They would go on to be the most influential group

0:16:56 > 0:16:58in country music history.

0:16:58 > 0:17:03# Oh, I long to see him and regret the dark hour

0:17:03 > 0:17:11# He's gone and neglected this pale wildwood flower. #

0:17:11 > 0:17:15The wholesome crinoline and orchids image of the Carter Family

0:17:15 > 0:17:17belied the darkness of a lot of their music.

0:17:17 > 0:17:21Wildwood Flower, the most enduring country song ever written,

0:17:21 > 0:17:23was about waking up to find out you've been dumped.

0:17:26 > 0:17:28If you know anything about country music,

0:17:28 > 0:17:31you're aware that the Carter lineage stretches from old AP,

0:17:31 > 0:17:35through Maybelle, Sara, June Carter, Johnny Cash, Nick Lowe,

0:17:35 > 0:17:36Carlene Carter,

0:17:36 > 0:17:40more probably being incubated somewhere in Tennessee right now.

0:17:40 > 0:17:43The Carter family instilled all the virtues on the surface

0:17:43 > 0:17:47of country music - purity, decency, domesticity and, most importantly,

0:17:47 > 0:17:49they projected the idea that country music

0:17:49 > 0:17:52is a family participation exercise.

0:17:52 > 0:17:55And like so many musical families that would follow, you know,

0:17:55 > 0:17:58the Jacksons, the Beach Boys,

0:17:58 > 0:18:02perceived unity generally hides a nest of domestic abuse.

0:18:02 > 0:18:04AP and Sara Carter pretended to be married,

0:18:04 > 0:18:06even though they lived separately.

0:18:06 > 0:18:11AP served as a kind of musical director, hand-picking the songs,

0:18:11 > 0:18:15controlling their schedules, often taking credit for composing a song,

0:18:15 > 0:18:19you know, generally inflating his own sense of self-importance.

0:18:19 > 0:18:22But the real beauty of the Carters was in their music, their vocals,

0:18:22 > 0:18:24their singing arrangements.

0:18:24 > 0:18:28Oh, God, people love to hear about those green hills of Virginny,

0:18:28 > 0:18:31and that little poplar log house,

0:18:31 > 0:18:33and that big home in heaven waiting for them,

0:18:33 > 0:18:37where there is always 50 miles of elbow room.

0:18:37 > 0:18:40# I'm going where

0:18:40 > 0:18:43# There's no depression

0:18:43 > 0:18:46# To the lovely land

0:18:46 > 0:18:49# That's free from cares... #

0:18:49 > 0:18:52In the cities of America, the Great Depression had arrived,

0:18:52 > 0:18:55suddenly and devastatingly. But country folks had been living out

0:18:55 > 0:18:59the Great Depression for the last hundred years, and the music

0:18:59 > 0:19:01of the Carter Family seemed to shield them

0:19:01 > 0:19:03from the evils of the big bad world.

0:19:04 > 0:19:07But for a big chunk of their career,

0:19:07 > 0:19:11the Carters were singing those songs about the green hills of Virginny

0:19:11 > 0:19:14while actually living in Del Rio, Texas,

0:19:14 > 0:19:19broadcasting from a seedy border town radio station called XERA.

0:19:19 > 0:19:22And it was stations like this that played a vital role in bringing

0:19:22 > 0:19:26country music to a wider audience.

0:19:26 > 0:19:29The music of Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family and Bradley Kincaid,

0:19:29 > 0:19:33country music's pioneers, was very limited and very regional,

0:19:33 > 0:19:35and it was broadcast over low watt stations

0:19:35 > 0:19:37throughout the Appalachians.

0:19:37 > 0:19:41How it earned a wider listenership is a very bizarre story,

0:19:41 > 0:19:43but here it goes.

0:19:43 > 0:19:45This guy, JR Brinkley,

0:19:45 > 0:19:47a quack doctor from North Carolina

0:19:47 > 0:19:49who had been systematically ran out of every state

0:19:49 > 0:19:51he ever attempted to practise in.

0:19:51 > 0:19:55He'd never earned a medical diploma, never been to medical school,

0:19:55 > 0:19:57never owned a licence to practise.

0:19:57 > 0:19:59He was a snake oil salesman.

0:19:59 > 0:20:02Brinkley moved to a small town called Milford, Kansas,

0:20:02 > 0:20:06and set up a practice with a phoney mail order diploma.

0:20:06 > 0:20:09One day, a patient came in and complained that he was impotent.

0:20:09 > 0:20:13Brinkley had a great idea. See, he'd been observing these goats

0:20:13 > 0:20:16and noticed how randy they got when they were mating.

0:20:16 > 0:20:19He suggested to the patient that if he had a goat's libido,

0:20:19 > 0:20:22he could drive the ladies wild.

0:20:22 > 0:20:25For some reason, the patient thought this was a stonking good idea,

0:20:25 > 0:20:30and agreed to have Brinkley insert goat's testicles into his scrotum.

0:20:30 > 0:20:33Brinkley performed the operation with home-made anaesthesia

0:20:33 > 0:20:37and unsterilized equipment, and sure enough, two weeks later,

0:20:37 > 0:20:41the guy came back to announce that he was now a bona fide stud.

0:20:41 > 0:20:44Pretty soon, Brinkley was inserting goat testicles into dozens

0:20:44 > 0:20:49of patients, claiming that it cured prostate cancer, flatulence,

0:20:49 > 0:20:52catarrh, headaches, impotence,

0:20:52 > 0:20:53and to broaden his appeal

0:20:53 > 0:20:57he purchased a 50,000W radio station, KFKB,

0:20:57 > 0:21:01and started advertising goat gland treatments on the radio.

0:21:01 > 0:21:04- ON RADIO:- You men, you're holding back, many of you, right now,

0:21:04 > 0:21:07listening to me, and you know you're sick. You know your prostate's

0:21:07 > 0:21:11infected and diseased, and you know that unless some relief comes to you

0:21:11 > 0:21:15that you're going to be in the undertaker's parlour,

0:21:15 > 0:21:19on the old cold slab, being embalmed for a funeral. Come at once to

0:21:19 > 0:21:23the Brinkley Hospital before it's everlastingly too late.

0:21:23 > 0:21:26In between infomercials he played country music,

0:21:26 > 0:21:28both live and recorded.

0:21:28 > 0:21:32Because of this frankly irresistible mix of country music and goat ball

0:21:32 > 0:21:34testimony, KFKB soon became

0:21:34 > 0:21:37the Midwest's most listened to radio station.

0:21:37 > 0:21:40But then the Kansas State Medical Board decided to investigate

0:21:40 > 0:21:44Brinkley, and soon discovered he wasn't remotely qualified

0:21:44 > 0:21:45to be a doctor.

0:21:45 > 0:21:50Then the Federal Radio Commission retracted his licence to broadcast.

0:21:50 > 0:21:54Brinkley left Kansas and he moved to Del Rio, Texas.

0:21:54 > 0:21:56Then he bought a 50,000W Mexican radio station

0:21:56 > 0:22:00right across the border in a village called Villa Acuna,

0:22:00 > 0:22:03and cos there were no regulations in Mexico about signal strength,

0:22:03 > 0:22:07he upped the wattage to one million watts.

0:22:07 > 0:22:10Then he invited the Carter Family down from Virginia and more or less

0:22:10 > 0:22:13made them the house band.

0:22:13 > 0:22:16To give you an idea of how powerful one million watts is,

0:22:16 > 0:22:21birds were flying past the XERA transmission tower and exploding.

0:22:21 > 0:22:24You didn't need a radio to listen to XERA,

0:22:24 > 0:22:27you could hear it off an electric fence, or the head of a shovel.

0:22:27 > 0:22:30People were walking around with metal fillings in their teeth

0:22:30 > 0:22:31listening to the Carter Family

0:22:31 > 0:22:34sing Wildwood Flower inside their craniums.

0:22:34 > 0:22:38XERA and its line-up of Texas musicians could be heard throughout

0:22:38 > 0:22:40a good portion of the United States,

0:22:40 > 0:22:44and that is how regional country music spread through

0:22:44 > 0:22:48this great country of ours. True story, hand to God.

0:22:58 > 0:23:04# The sign says welcome to Nashville

0:23:04 > 0:23:08# From whatever road you've been down... #

0:23:08 > 0:23:11Nashville, Tennessee.

0:23:11 > 0:23:14People call it the country music capital of the world.

0:23:14 > 0:23:16Music City.

0:23:16 > 0:23:19Home to the Country Music Hall of Fame,

0:23:19 > 0:23:22annual Country Music Awards Festival, and, of course,

0:23:22 > 0:23:24the Grand Ole Opry.

0:23:24 > 0:23:29# Where idols and legends have stood... #

0:23:29 > 0:23:33The greatest musicians, the greatest producers, the greatest studios,

0:23:33 > 0:23:36the greatest songwriters are in Nashville, Tennessee, still today.

0:23:36 > 0:23:40# Hollywood

0:23:40 > 0:23:44# But it's lonely at sundown in Nashville... #

0:23:44 > 0:23:47You can't get away from Nashville and country music. It's not just

0:23:47 > 0:23:50where the business is, but it's where so many great players are.

0:23:50 > 0:23:54# Each evening at sundown in Nashville

0:23:54 > 0:23:59# They sweep broken dreams off the street... #

0:23:59 > 0:24:03So how did Nashville become country music USA?

0:24:03 > 0:24:05In 1932, it was just a sleepy

0:24:05 > 0:24:09southern town with a church on every corner, and its biggest industry

0:24:09 > 0:24:12was printing bibles and gospel sheet music, but it did have one thing

0:24:12 > 0:24:16going for it - it was home to one of the largest radio stations in

0:24:16 > 0:24:21America, one of the few that could compete with border blaster XERA -

0:24:21 > 0:24:23WSM.

0:24:23 > 0:24:2550,000W.

0:24:25 > 0:24:27A month after it began broadcasting,

0:24:27 > 0:24:32WSM ripped off a show outright from WLS in Chicago, called Barn Dance,

0:24:32 > 0:24:35and aired it live on Saturday nights.

0:24:35 > 0:24:40If you wanted to hear Patsy Montana, Red Foley, Hank Snow or Roy Rogers,

0:24:40 > 0:24:42you tuned into Barn Dance,

0:24:42 > 0:24:46and the WSM Barn Dance is the main reason that Nashville - not Atlanta,

0:24:46 > 0:24:49not Bristol, not Shreveport - Nashville -

0:24:49 > 0:24:52became the centre of commercial country music in America,

0:24:52 > 0:24:56especially after the show changed its name to the Grand Ole Opry.

0:24:56 > 0:24:59In 1940 the Opry was the only show in town,

0:24:59 > 0:25:03and its biggest star was Mr Roy Acuff.

0:25:03 > 0:25:07# From the great Atlantic Ocean to the wide Pacific shores

0:25:07 > 0:25:10# From the queen of flowing mountains

0:25:10 > 0:25:12# To the south belles by the shore... #

0:25:12 > 0:25:16Champion fiddler with a big booming voice, he would stride out on

0:25:16 > 0:25:19the Opry stage and sing about the Wabash Cannonball.

0:25:19 > 0:25:22# As she rolled into the station

0:25:22 > 0:25:25# You could hear all the people say

0:25:25 > 0:25:28# There's a girl from Tennessee

0:25:28 > 0:25:32# She's long and she's tall

0:25:32 > 0:25:34# She came down from Birmingham

0:25:34 > 0:25:38# On the Wabash Cannonball... #

0:25:38 > 0:25:41At this point, there were more songs

0:25:41 > 0:25:44about trains in America than actual trains.

0:25:44 > 0:25:47The Wabash Cannonball invoked the Great Depression,

0:25:47 > 0:25:50when destitute men rode the rails. That mythical Cannonball would

0:25:50 > 0:25:54transport them to the land of milk and honey. Roy Acuff made a fortune

0:25:54 > 0:25:58singing about poverty, and he was a very astute businessman.

0:26:00 > 0:26:04I think the beginning of Nashville

0:26:04 > 0:26:07as a true music recording centre

0:26:07 > 0:26:12comes with the establishment of Acuff-Rose in 1942.

0:26:12 > 0:26:16Roy Acuff went to Fred Rose and said something to the effect of,

0:26:16 > 0:26:19"I've got some money that I've saved up that I want to invest,

0:26:19 > 0:26:23"I want to start a publishing company and I'd like you to run it."

0:26:23 > 0:26:27The Acuff-Rose partnership reinvented the publishing game.

0:26:27 > 0:26:30Instead of just selling the sheet music songs were printed on,

0:26:30 > 0:26:34Acuff and Rose sold the songs themselves - in other words,

0:26:34 > 0:26:38they copyrighted their own music and chose who they wanted to record it.

0:26:38 > 0:26:41They set up an office on 8th Ave South in Nashville.

0:26:41 > 0:26:43One day Fred and his son Wesley

0:26:43 > 0:26:46were engaged in a fierce game of ping-pong

0:26:46 > 0:26:51when a gangly, near-sighted man from Montgomery, Alabama, walked in.

0:26:51 > 0:26:54That man's name was Hiram King Williams,

0:26:54 > 0:26:56or as he called himself, Hank.

0:26:56 > 0:26:59# Say, hey, good lookin'

0:26:59 > 0:27:02# What you got cookin'?

0:27:02 > 0:27:07# How's about cookin' something up with me?

0:27:07 > 0:27:12# Say, hey, sweet baby, don't you think maybe... #

0:27:12 > 0:27:14Now, when I was a kid and would hear Hank on the radio,

0:27:14 > 0:27:17I always thought I was listening to a 60-year-old man singing,

0:27:17 > 0:27:20because his songs reeked of alienation, drifters, love,

0:27:20 > 0:27:23the fear of God and sometimes just good-looking ladies.

0:27:23 > 0:27:26But he sang hard, pushing the inherent limits of country music

0:27:26 > 0:27:28as far as it would go.

0:27:28 > 0:27:30# So if you want to have fun, come along with me

0:27:30 > 0:27:33# Say, hey, good lookin'

0:27:33 > 0:27:36# What you got cookin'?

0:27:36 > 0:27:41# How's about cookin' something up with me? #

0:27:41 > 0:27:45When Hank came along, that was a whole different story.

0:27:45 > 0:27:49Hank was a tough character to deal with when he was drinking,

0:27:49 > 0:27:52but he sold huge numbers of records.

0:27:52 > 0:27:57# So how's about saving all your time for me? #

0:27:57 > 0:28:00For all the mythology surrounding Hank Williams,

0:28:00 > 0:28:02one crucial thing is often overlooked.

0:28:02 > 0:28:06Up to this point, most artists did not write their own songs.

0:28:06 > 0:28:09They had very little control over what they recorded,

0:28:09 > 0:28:13pretty much up to the behest of the producers and the publishers,

0:28:13 > 0:28:16but not Hank Williams. He was a true singer-songwriter.

0:28:16 > 0:28:20That's why he had a very direct influence on his audiences.

0:28:20 > 0:28:21It's hard to explain the sway

0:28:21 > 0:28:23that Hank Williams held over his audience,

0:28:23 > 0:28:26because, you know, the guy didn't sway.

0:28:26 > 0:28:29He wasn't one of those hip-shakers like Elvis,

0:28:29 > 0:28:31who would come along later.

0:28:31 > 0:28:34He just stood there and sang.

0:28:34 > 0:28:38# I try so hard, my dear

0:28:38 > 0:28:44# To show that you're my every dream... #

0:28:44 > 0:28:47Most of his songs were written in perfect metre.

0:28:47 > 0:28:50In fact, they were so meticulously constructed that when one day,

0:28:50 > 0:28:52out of the blue, he announced he wanted to record a song

0:28:52 > 0:28:57called Lovesick Blues, Acuff and Rose were thrown for a loop.

0:28:57 > 0:28:59Lovesick Blues was written by

0:28:59 > 0:29:02a couple of Tin Pan Alley-type songwriters,

0:29:02 > 0:29:06and Hank's singing that song as part of his repertoire,

0:29:06 > 0:29:09and every time he'd do it, the crowd went wild.

0:29:09 > 0:29:13I think they really just loved, you know...

0:29:13 > 0:29:15# I got a feelin' called the blues... #

0:29:15 > 0:29:19# I got a feeling called the blues

0:29:19 > 0:29:23# Oh, Lord, since my baby said goodbye... #

0:29:23 > 0:29:25Hank was determined to cut the song

0:29:25 > 0:29:28because he thought this thing could be tremendous,

0:29:28 > 0:29:30so they were cutting in Cincinnati.

0:29:30 > 0:29:33They had about half an hour to go

0:29:33 > 0:29:37and Hank says, "Let's cut that Lovesick Blues thing,"

0:29:37 > 0:29:42and Fred was not interested in it, or Fred didn't like the song.

0:29:42 > 0:29:44Fred said, you know, it's all out of metre,

0:29:44 > 0:29:48and he and Fred really argued over it.

0:29:48 > 0:29:52He said, "I get encore after encore down at the Hayride,

0:29:52 > 0:29:54"they love this."

0:29:54 > 0:29:58Fred finally gave in. I think Fred understood either he was going to

0:29:58 > 0:30:01cut another song on this session or he was going to argue for

0:30:01 > 0:30:05a half-hour with Hank for the rest of the session.

0:30:05 > 0:30:08Lovesick Blues was the song that

0:30:08 > 0:30:12made the first country superstar a superstar.

0:30:12 > 0:30:17# I got the lovesick blues. #

0:30:17 > 0:30:20See, when it comes to writing a hit song,

0:30:20 > 0:30:21nobody knows a god dammed thing.

0:30:21 > 0:30:24Lovesick Blues shot right to number one,

0:30:24 > 0:30:27catapulted Hank Williams into the superstar strata,

0:30:27 > 0:30:30and in his short career he had over 30 hit singles,

0:30:30 > 0:30:3311 of which went to number one.

0:30:33 > 0:30:36More importantly, a lot of them crossed over into other genres

0:30:36 > 0:30:39when more mainstream artists recorded them.

0:30:39 > 0:30:42# Hey, good lookin'

0:30:42 > 0:30:44# What you got cookin'? #

0:30:44 > 0:30:46Hey Good Lookin',

0:30:46 > 0:30:48Cold Cold Heart,

0:30:48 > 0:30:50Your Cheating Heart,

0:30:50 > 0:30:54Jambalaya, all became hits for big-time top 40 artists.

0:30:54 > 0:30:58They were all window dressed and slicker than snot on a door knob,

0:30:58 > 0:31:00but they were originally written as a modest country ballad.

0:31:00 > 0:31:03Now, not every country song can transcend to other genres,

0:31:03 > 0:31:06but any song can be countrified.

0:31:06 > 0:31:09# I think it's gonna be a long, long time

0:31:09 > 0:31:12# Till touchdown brings me round again to find

0:31:12 > 0:31:15# I'm not the man they think I am at home

0:31:15 > 0:31:18# Oh, no, no, no

0:31:18 > 0:31:21# I'm a rocket man

0:31:21 > 0:31:26# Rocket man, burning out his fuse up here alone... #

0:31:31 > 0:31:34The saddest thing about Hank Williams is how his tragic

0:31:34 > 0:31:36lifestyle always seems to overshadow

0:31:36 > 0:31:38his incredible contribution to music.

0:31:38 > 0:31:42He is often cited as the first proto-rocker, because, you know,

0:31:42 > 0:31:44he was a road warrior, and an adulterer,

0:31:44 > 0:31:47and an alcoholic since teenage,

0:31:47 > 0:31:50and because he suffered from spina bifida, often imbibed in a triple

0:31:50 > 0:31:53cocktail of morphine, chloral hydrate and whisky.

0:31:53 > 0:31:56He died on New Year's Eve 1953

0:31:56 > 0:32:00at the age of 29 in the back seat of a Cadillac

0:32:00 > 0:32:02on the way to a gig in Ohio.

0:32:02 > 0:32:05On the floor, they found empty liquor bottles and some lyrics

0:32:05 > 0:32:08to an unfinished song, and a strange bruise on his head

0:32:08 > 0:32:11that no-one's ever been able to explain.

0:32:11 > 0:32:13It was a stupid, mundane way to die,

0:32:13 > 0:32:16no matter how you try to romanticise it.

0:32:16 > 0:32:20In fact, in 2016, a British actor by the name of Tom Hiddleston

0:32:20 > 0:32:25made the disastrous decision to try and portray Hank's life on screen,

0:32:25 > 0:32:29somehow convincing himself that his astute RADA training could capture

0:32:29 > 0:32:32the essence of a pain-wracked, hard-lived,

0:32:32 > 0:32:35morally-ambiguous Alabama troubadour.

0:32:35 > 0:32:37Oh, Hiddleston plumbed the depths

0:32:37 > 0:32:42and nuances of Hank's life in a way not seen since Dick Van Dyke's

0:32:42 > 0:32:47total immersion into Cockney culture in Mary Poppins.

0:32:47 > 0:32:49The film was called I Saw The Light,

0:32:49 > 0:32:51and indeed I did,

0:32:51 > 0:32:56after five minutes, and the light read "exit".

0:32:56 > 0:33:01# You killed all the love I ever had... #

0:33:01 > 0:33:04When you're listening to those classic songs of early Nashville,

0:33:04 > 0:33:07songs like Bye Bye Love by the Everly Bros,

0:33:07 > 0:33:09or Oh, Pretty Woman by Roy Orbison,

0:33:09 > 0:33:13chances are it was owned by Roy Acuff and Fred Rose.

0:33:13 > 0:33:16They were the kingpins of Nashville publishing.

0:33:16 > 0:33:18And because it always begins with a song,

0:33:18 > 0:33:21the writers are the true spine of country music.

0:33:21 > 0:33:26# Well, I've been hounding her for such a long time

0:33:26 > 0:33:29# Trying to impress her with my hillbilly whine

0:33:29 > 0:33:33# But she told me I was barking up the wrong tree

0:33:33 > 0:33:37# She liked every kind of music but country... #

0:33:37 > 0:33:41In Nashville, songwriting is built around the idea of a hit.

0:33:41 > 0:33:46You want to have something that is compact, that is very succinct

0:33:46 > 0:33:48and that has hooks in it.

0:33:48 > 0:33:51Nashville songwriting tends to happen in teams.

0:33:51 > 0:33:54You really can't get a hit in Nashville any more

0:33:54 > 0:33:57unless you've co-written that song with somebody.

0:33:57 > 0:34:00# She said listening to music was her favourite pastime

0:34:00 > 0:34:04# But she told me I was trying to swim upstream

0:34:04 > 0:34:07# She liked every kind of music but country... #

0:34:07 > 0:34:10How many albums did you make in Nashville?

0:34:10 > 0:34:11I guess two and a half.

0:34:11 > 0:34:15And were you pressurised into, like, sitting down with other songwriters?

0:34:15 > 0:34:18Totally. They introduce you to people

0:34:18 > 0:34:23who are strangers, and you sit in a room, and one guy goes...

0:34:23 > 0:34:25Like, one of the first guys I got paired up with took a copy

0:34:25 > 0:34:28of Time magazine, and the cover said Flying Blind.

0:34:28 > 0:34:31He said, "That's a good phrase, let's write Flying Blind today."

0:34:31 > 0:34:34"And how does that relate to a relationship?"

0:34:34 > 0:34:36"OK, she has, uh...

0:34:36 > 0:34:40"She's strayed from the marriage and now he's flying blind,

0:34:40 > 0:34:43"but he wants to fly back to the runway where..."

0:34:43 > 0:34:46And you just, like, build on a metaphor,

0:34:46 > 0:34:48a romantic metaphor, and it's,

0:34:48 > 0:34:52I mean, it's an amusement, a bit like a crossword puzzle,

0:34:52 > 0:34:58but, you know, as you can probably see from that illustration,

0:34:58 > 0:35:02the authentic emotion is quickly drained from that exercise,

0:35:02 > 0:35:05as you sit with a stranger and bounce words around.

0:35:05 > 0:35:07Try to come up with a hook.

0:35:07 > 0:35:10# She liked everything about me 'cept for one thing

0:35:10 > 0:35:14# She liked every kind of music but country

0:35:14 > 0:35:19# Yeah, she liked everything about me 'cept for one thing. #

0:35:25 > 0:35:27- Do you have a dog?- Yeah.

0:35:27 > 0:35:31- What kind?- It's a pit bull.- OK, this is not a song about a pit bull.

0:35:31 > 0:35:34It's a song about a Border collie.

0:35:34 > 0:35:36# Fuck you, poodles, toys and schnauzers

0:35:36 > 0:35:38# Round these parts I wear the trousers

0:35:38 > 0:35:39# You want to fight me, get in line

0:35:39 > 0:35:41# I'd kick your butt but I ain't got time

0:35:41 > 0:35:43# Go fetch a stick and lick your balls

0:35:43 > 0:35:46# I bet you squat to pee because you don't know what it's like at all

0:35:46 > 0:35:48# To be a goddamn working dog

0:35:48 > 0:35:52# Off my porch, get out of my way, I'm a goddamn working dog. #

0:35:56 > 0:36:00That comes from experience, that tune.

0:36:00 > 0:36:03I'm thinking of giving it to Ray Wylie Hubbard,

0:36:03 > 0:36:05I think he would record.

0:36:05 > 0:36:09I think you would have to throw some dirtier words into it

0:36:09 > 0:36:10than simply "fuck", but, yes,

0:36:10 > 0:36:13I think Ray would be interested in that.

0:36:13 > 0:36:17And then there's...what's her name? Taylor Swift might, I can hear.

0:36:17 > 0:36:19No, no, I'm thinking of country artists.

0:36:19 > 0:36:24- Oh, God, country, you should have said!- Yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:36:24 > 0:36:25# I'm a goddamn working dog. #

0:36:25 > 0:36:28# Crazy... #

0:36:28 > 0:36:32"Everything is cyclical" has become a common refrain,

0:36:32 > 0:36:35especially when referring to artists who believe in the traditions

0:36:35 > 0:36:38of country music. Country music always wears its influences

0:36:38 > 0:36:41on its sleeve, and it doesn't try to hide it.

0:36:41 > 0:36:45When someone says, "Oh, that gal, that guy is an original,"

0:36:45 > 0:36:48they probably haven't looked hard enough.

0:36:48 > 0:36:50What a country artist does is finds

0:36:50 > 0:36:54a wellspring and diverts it to his own backyard.

0:36:54 > 0:36:58Hank Williams walked into that ping-pong match and he demanded

0:36:58 > 0:37:00that Roy Acuff listen to his music

0:37:00 > 0:37:03because Roy Acuff was his childhood hero.

0:37:03 > 0:37:04He had the Roy Acuff syndrome,

0:37:04 > 0:37:07and Roy was flattered and offered to record Hank Williams,

0:37:07 > 0:37:11and then Hank took what Roy did and took it further.

0:37:11 > 0:37:14He sang harder and he partied...

0:37:14 > 0:37:16more darkly.

0:37:16 > 0:37:19Now, somewhere that lineage is expanding -

0:37:19 > 0:37:20a place called Littlefield, Texas,

0:37:20 > 0:37:25a contemporary of the great Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings.

0:37:25 > 0:37:29High school dropout, part-time juvenile delinquent is succumbing

0:37:29 > 0:37:31to the Hank Williams syndrome.

0:37:31 > 0:37:35You see how this all links together?

0:37:35 > 0:37:37# Somebody told me

0:37:37 > 0:37:39# When I first got to Nashville

0:37:39 > 0:37:43# You've finally got it made

0:37:43 > 0:37:44# Ol' Hank made it here

0:37:44 > 0:37:46# We're all sure that you will

0:37:46 > 0:37:49# But I don't think Hank done it this way

0:37:49 > 0:37:53# I don't think Hank done it this way... #

0:37:56 > 0:38:00Waylon was always going to have a major influence on country music.

0:38:00 > 0:38:03He had the demeanour, he had the authenticity,

0:38:03 > 0:38:06and as a kid he used to sneak into a black blues joint in Littlefield

0:38:06 > 0:38:09called Jaybirds. Do drop in.

0:38:09 > 0:38:11The man who called himself Chuck Berry Junior,

0:38:11 > 0:38:15who wasn't Chuck Berry, taught Waylon how to play Lovesick Blues,

0:38:15 > 0:38:17but with the emphasis on the blues part.

0:38:17 > 0:38:20He told Waylon to replace the top E string of his guitar with a banjo

0:38:20 > 0:38:22string to bend it easier,

0:38:22 > 0:38:25and to shave down the frets on his guitar to get a lower action,

0:38:25 > 0:38:28and that is where Waylon got his unique sound from.

0:38:40 > 0:38:44Once he discovered the wonders of a phase shift and a drummer who played

0:38:44 > 0:38:47slightly behind the beat, his style became even more pronounced,

0:38:47 > 0:38:51but his lifestyle was channelling Hank,

0:38:51 > 0:38:56right down to the drug addiction and the lonesome and mean persona.

0:38:56 > 0:38:58# I've always been crazy

0:38:58 > 0:39:02# And the trouble that it's put me through

0:39:04 > 0:39:11# I've been busted for things that I didn't do... #

0:39:11 > 0:39:14So, this lineage of influence just continues.

0:39:14 > 0:39:17For instance, today a lot of people might say that a fellow named

0:39:17 > 0:39:21Sturgill Simpson is a Waylon doppelganger.

0:39:21 > 0:39:24# Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran

0:39:24 > 0:39:27# North Korea, tell me where does it end?

0:39:27 > 0:39:30# The bodies keep piling up with every day

0:39:30 > 0:39:33# How many more are they gonna send... #

0:39:33 > 0:39:34Sturgill has a very literate style,

0:39:34 > 0:39:38and damn if he doesn't have that Waylon timbre in his voice.

0:39:38 > 0:39:40# Well, son, I hope you don't grow up

0:39:40 > 0:39:43# Believing that you've got to be a puppet to be a man... #

0:39:43 > 0:39:46But he's not Waylon, he just sounds a bit like him,

0:39:46 > 0:39:50and in country music, a little bit of connectivity goes a long way.

0:39:50 > 0:39:53The secret is to replicate, not regurgitate.

0:39:53 > 0:39:56Hey, I'm not going to lie to you, folks, there's a heck of a lot of

0:39:56 > 0:39:59regurgitation going on in Nashville right now. This town goes through

0:39:59 > 0:40:02phases of creativity and stagnation, and right now,

0:40:02 > 0:40:04woo, it's stinkin'!

0:40:04 > 0:40:08A lot of fake hillbillies singing about what they think country people

0:40:08 > 0:40:09want to hear about.

0:40:09 > 0:40:12# You can buy me a boat

0:40:12 > 0:40:16# You can buy me a truck to pull it

0:40:16 > 0:40:18# You can buy me a Yeti 110

0:40:18 > 0:40:22# Iced down with some silver bullets... #

0:40:22 > 0:40:25Pretty much the inspiration for any modern country song can be found at

0:40:25 > 0:40:28your average dry goods store.

0:40:28 > 0:40:30Come on, pick a row, any row.

0:40:30 > 0:40:33# You turn me on

0:40:33 > 0:40:35# Girl, you know you do

0:40:35 > 0:40:38# But you tear me up

0:40:38 > 0:40:42# Even better than the blues. #

0:40:42 > 0:40:46# I ain't cut out to high line poles but

0:40:46 > 0:40:49# I'm pretty good at drinking beer. #

0:40:49 > 0:40:55# Just look for the girl in the blue bandana... #

0:40:55 > 0:40:58A lot of the songs I hear on the radio, whether it's Texas

0:40:58 > 0:41:01or Nashville today, I can't tell what artist it is.

0:41:01 > 0:41:05When we were coming up, if Waylon came on the radio,

0:41:05 > 0:41:08you didn't have to wait for the DJ to say that was Waylon Jennings,

0:41:08 > 0:41:10you knew it was a Waylon song.

0:41:10 > 0:41:15But nowadays, to me, the production is just so middle-of-the-road safe

0:41:15 > 0:41:17that you can't always tell.

0:41:17 > 0:41:19# Hey, get rhythm

0:41:19 > 0:41:22# When you get the blues

0:41:22 > 0:41:24# Come on, get rhythm

0:41:24 > 0:41:26# When you get the blues... #

0:41:26 > 0:41:30The current creative deficit in Nashville is nothing new.

0:41:30 > 0:41:34Back in 1964, it was Johnny Cash and Buck Owens keeping this town alive,

0:41:34 > 0:41:38that was it. There were no new Brenda Lees or Elvis Presleys

0:41:38 > 0:41:40or Everly brothers coming along,

0:41:40 > 0:41:44and worse, The Beatles had invaded. Yeah, The Beatles.

0:41:44 > 0:41:47You'd probably imagine Nashville would consider four floppy-haired

0:41:47 > 0:41:51Liverpudlians singing homolytic triads of "yeah yeah yeahs" to be

0:41:51 > 0:41:55a bit of a joke, but by the end of the year, when The Beatles had

0:41:55 > 0:41:58nine of the top 100 songs in America,

0:41:58 > 0:42:02Nashville knew they needed someone to match The Beatles in terms of

0:42:02 > 0:42:04musical articulation.

0:42:04 > 0:42:08And that man, of course, was Roger Miller.

0:42:08 > 0:42:10# Well, atta boy, girl

0:42:10 > 0:42:13# Atta way to make me cry

0:42:13 > 0:42:17# Atta boy, boy, you make me wish I could die... #

0:42:17 > 0:42:21Roger Miller had been hanging around Nashville as a songwriter for years.

0:42:21 > 0:42:25He'd scored some modest hits for Jim Reeves and Ray Price,

0:42:25 > 0:42:29and he had a reputation in Nashville as a brilliant lyricist.

0:42:29 > 0:42:31Often, songwriters would be in a bind, and they would call up

0:42:31 > 0:42:35old Roger, and he would quote them a killer lyric right on the spot.

0:42:35 > 0:42:39# All you do is make me sit around feelin' blue

0:42:39 > 0:42:42# Atta boy, girl, atta way to hurt my pri-ide... #

0:42:42 > 0:42:46The only thing was, he had no real passion for country music.

0:42:46 > 0:42:48He wanted to move to California and be an actor.

0:42:48 > 0:42:52He had a small recording contract with Mercury Records, and he asked

0:42:52 > 0:42:55for an advance of 1,600 so he could move to Los Angeles.

0:42:55 > 0:42:57The head of Mercury said,

0:42:57 > 0:43:00"Yeah, I'll give you the money if you'll give me 16 songs."

0:43:00 > 0:43:01So Miller went into a studio

0:43:01 > 0:43:04and cranked out 16 songs that were primarily

0:43:04 > 0:43:09syncopated gibberish, titles like Chug-a-Lug, Do-Wacka-Do and Dang Me.

0:43:09 > 0:43:12# Dang me, dang me

0:43:12 > 0:43:14# They oughta take a rope and hang me

0:43:14 > 0:43:17# High from the highest tree

0:43:17 > 0:43:21# Woman, would you weep for me? #

0:43:21 > 0:43:24Dang Me shot to number one on the charts and stayed there

0:43:24 > 0:43:27for six weeks. Later on, Chug-a-Lug became a massive hit,

0:43:27 > 0:43:31not just on the country chart, on the pop charts as well.

0:43:31 > 0:43:33# Bllll-bbbb, I done a double back flip

0:43:33 > 0:43:35# Chug-a-lug, chug-a-lug

0:43:35 > 0:43:38# Make you want to holler hi-de-ho

0:43:38 > 0:43:41# Burns your tummy, don'tcha know

0:43:41 > 0:43:43# Chug-a-lug, chug-a-lug

0:43:43 > 0:43:46# Tacka-ticka-tacka-waaaah. #

0:43:46 > 0:43:50See, one man had made Nashville relevant again,

0:43:50 > 0:43:53and just to prove that he wasn't just a series of do-wacka-dos

0:43:53 > 0:43:56and dippy-lippy-do-dos, a year later

0:43:56 > 0:44:00he recorded the greatest drunk-proof karaoke song ever -

0:44:00 > 0:44:03King Of The Road, a song that anyone can sing,

0:44:03 > 0:44:06no matter how smashed they are.

0:44:06 > 0:44:09That was the genius of Roger Miller.

0:44:41 > 0:44:43Look, I don't want to get pedantic or anything,

0:44:43 > 0:44:46but the essence of any great country song is always the lyrics.

0:44:46 > 0:44:48There has to be a narrative,

0:44:48 > 0:44:51something that explores the, I don't know,

0:44:51 > 0:44:54the fragility of life, family, relationships,

0:44:54 > 0:44:58the fact that there is no easy solution to the contradictions

0:44:58 > 0:45:01of life, rural values or dogs.

0:45:01 > 0:45:06When country music gets away from that essence, those core values,

0:45:06 > 0:45:10it sucks. Roger Miller's lyrics were basically sending up the banality

0:45:10 > 0:45:13of country music at the time, but he wasn't a novelty act.

0:45:13 > 0:45:16He'd written great songs, brilliant songs,

0:45:16 > 0:45:19songs like Husbands And Wives, or It Only Hurts When I Cry.

0:45:19 > 0:45:22And he knew a good song when he heard one, which is why in 1969

0:45:22 > 0:45:25he recorded a song by a young songwriter named

0:45:25 > 0:45:27Kris Kristofferson,

0:45:27 > 0:45:30who was hanging out here at the Exit/In on Elliston Place.

0:45:30 > 0:45:33He'd only just arrived in Nashville, and he'd written a song called

0:45:33 > 0:45:35Me And Bobby McGee.

0:45:35 > 0:45:38# Feeling good was easy, Lord

0:45:38 > 0:45:41# When Bobby sang the blues

0:45:41 > 0:45:44# Feeling good was good enough for me

0:45:47 > 0:45:52# Good enough for me and Bobby McGee... #

0:45:52 > 0:45:56Kristofferson was one of those prodigal golden children who always

0:45:56 > 0:46:00seemed to show up in Nashville when they need him the most.

0:46:00 > 0:46:03# Bobby shared the secrets of my soul... #

0:46:03 > 0:46:04When Johnny Cash recorded

0:46:04 > 0:46:07Kristofferson's Sunday Morning Coming Down

0:46:07 > 0:46:10it immediately went to number one, and when he started telling anyone

0:46:10 > 0:46:13who would listen that Kris Kristofferson and

0:46:13 > 0:46:16Mickey Newbury were the two hot new songwriters in town,

0:46:16 > 0:46:19then Kris Kristofferson was anointed.

0:46:19 > 0:46:20Do you understand?

0:46:20 > 0:46:24Patronage is a very, very important part of country music's endurance -

0:46:24 > 0:46:26people support each other.

0:46:26 > 0:46:30You don't get those knock-down, drag-out feuds that always involve

0:46:30 > 0:46:35Taylor Swift and Kanye West, or Taylor Swift and Nicki Minaj,

0:46:35 > 0:46:38or Taylor Swift and every boyfriend who's ever dumped her.

0:46:38 > 0:46:41The point I'm making is that nowhere,

0:46:41 > 0:46:43by any stretch of the imagination,

0:46:43 > 0:46:46in any realm, in this or any other universe,

0:46:46 > 0:46:49is Taylor Swift a country artist.

0:46:49 > 0:46:54# There's a road in Oklahoma... #

0:46:54 > 0:46:58Kristofferson and a group of friends - Willy Nelson, Waylon,

0:46:58 > 0:47:01Jessi Colter, Tompall Glaser and Billy Joe Shaver - had taken to

0:47:01 > 0:47:05viewing themselves as rebels within Nashville's music immunity.

0:47:05 > 0:47:08By rebels, I mean that their stuff wasn't exactly flying out of

0:47:08 > 0:47:10the record bins, but they had cultivated an outlaw image,

0:47:10 > 0:47:13and that brought in a whole new fan base,

0:47:13 > 0:47:16made up of some of the more marginalised members of society.

0:47:16 > 0:47:19# I pushed that load

0:47:19 > 0:47:22# From here to someday... #

0:47:22 > 0:47:26The outlaw image was poles apart from that Carter Family

0:47:26 > 0:47:28wholesome country music. It was a reaction

0:47:28 > 0:47:32to the slick Nashville sound, but the irony was that

0:47:32 > 0:47:35Nashville itself was about to cash in on the movement.

0:47:35 > 0:47:38The head of RCA Nashville, Jerry Bradley,

0:47:38 > 0:47:43was about to get shit-canned. He wasn't selling any country albums,

0:47:43 > 0:47:46but he did own a back catalogue of Willie, Waylon,

0:47:46 > 0:47:48Jessi and Tompall material,

0:47:48 > 0:47:51so he thumbed through a Time Life book on the Old West and found

0:47:51 > 0:47:55a wanted poster, took it into RCA's design department and said,

0:47:55 > 0:47:59"Hey, let's put Willie and Waylon on a wanted poster."

0:47:59 > 0:48:04Then he chucked on 11 songs that he just kind of had laying around.

0:48:04 > 0:48:07The album had all the production values of a blown speaker

0:48:07 > 0:48:11in the back of a Mexican Chevy, but wouldn't you know,

0:48:11 > 0:48:13it would become the biggest selling album in the history

0:48:13 > 0:48:15of country music.

0:48:15 > 0:48:19# Mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys

0:48:21 > 0:48:24# Don't let 'em pick guitars or drive them old trucks

0:48:24 > 0:48:27# Make 'em be doctors and lawyers and such... #

0:48:27 > 0:48:31That album and its follow-up, which featured Willie and Waylon

0:48:31 > 0:48:34singing Mommas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboys,

0:48:34 > 0:48:37created a new legion of country converts.

0:48:37 > 0:48:40# Even with someone they love... #

0:48:40 > 0:48:43Never mind that this scheme was cooked up by RCA,

0:48:43 > 0:48:46pretty much the quintessential embodiment of corporate thinking,

0:48:46 > 0:48:49it didn't matter. These guys were selling records,

0:48:49 > 0:48:52so they played up the image to the hilt.

0:48:52 > 0:48:57There's still no-one that I'd rather introduce than my musical comrades,

0:48:57 > 0:48:59Kris Kristofferson,

0:48:59 > 0:49:03Waylon Jennings, and the baby-faced kid from Texas named Willie Nelson.

0:49:03 > 0:49:05They call us The Highwaymen.

0:49:10 > 0:49:12# I was a highwayman

0:49:12 > 0:49:15# Along the coach roads I did ride

0:49:17 > 0:49:20# With sword and pistol by my side... #

0:49:22 > 0:49:26The distinction of original bad boy, of course, belongs to Johnny Cash,

0:49:26 > 0:49:29who would team up with Willie, Waylon and Kris to form

0:49:29 > 0:49:31The Highwaymen, a country supergroup

0:49:31 > 0:49:34that took the outlaw motif to its natural conclusion.

0:49:34 > 0:49:37Now, Cash didn't actively promote a bad boy image,

0:49:37 > 0:49:38but neither did he try to deny it.

0:49:38 > 0:49:40There were rumours he'd been in prison.

0:49:40 > 0:49:44Not true. The only brushes he'd ever had with the law was when his

0:49:44 > 0:49:47Winnebago somehow accidentally set a camp ground on fire,

0:49:47 > 0:49:50and once for possession of painkillers,

0:49:50 > 0:49:53but to America he was The Man In Black.

0:49:53 > 0:49:56Again, not to evince an aura of bad-assness,

0:49:56 > 0:49:58he just wanted to dress like one of his heroes,

0:49:58 > 0:50:02the human rights activist and calypso singer Harry Belafonte.

0:50:02 > 0:50:06# Perhaps I may become a highwayman again

0:50:08 > 0:50:12# Or I may simply be a single drop of rain

0:50:14 > 0:50:16# But I will remain

0:50:17 > 0:50:22# And I'll be back again, and again and again and again and again... #

0:50:22 > 0:50:25In the homogenised world of country music,

0:50:25 > 0:50:28Johnny Cash will always stand alone.

0:50:28 > 0:50:33He sang in that deep baritone, he married into a pedigree family,

0:50:33 > 0:50:36he is revered in folk circles as much as the Nashville scene.

0:50:36 > 0:50:40In fact, people who hate country music love Johnny Cash.

0:50:40 > 0:50:43Love him! And Dolly Parton.

0:50:43 > 0:50:46People would love country music a lot more if it would maintain

0:50:46 > 0:50:49some kind of constant standard, but it never does.

0:50:49 > 0:50:53In the 1980s, one man single-handedly reduced

0:50:53 > 0:50:57country music to a bovine cesspool of boot-scooting,

0:50:57 > 0:50:59line-dancing vulgaria.

0:50:59 > 0:51:03That man's name was John Travolta.

0:51:03 > 0:51:06Hey. How you doing?

0:51:06 > 0:51:10- Fine!- Anything I can do for you? - Not yet.

0:51:12 > 0:51:14Are you a real cowboy?

0:51:16 > 0:51:19Well, that depends on what you think a real cowboy is.

0:51:19 > 0:51:23The movie Urban Cowboy came along and just really screwed it up,

0:51:23 > 0:51:28cos then it wasn't about the music, it was about mechanical bulls,

0:51:28 > 0:51:32you know? Like a country disco, you know, line dancing and all that.

0:51:32 > 0:51:36It just... It kind of ruined it, I thought.

0:51:37 > 0:51:41Country music had become a backing track for scores of big-haired

0:51:41 > 0:51:45secretaries and weekend Wyatt Earps to join together in a drunken

0:51:45 > 0:51:48lockstep, and slip and slide through puddles of Margarita,

0:51:48 > 0:51:50while Johnny Lee sang.

0:51:50 > 0:51:55# I was looking for love in all the wrong places

0:51:55 > 0:51:59# Looking for love in too many faces... #

0:51:59 > 0:52:02Nashville desperately needed to get back to its roots.

0:52:02 > 0:52:07Ricky Skaggs, a musical prodigy with the fingers of Bill Monroe

0:52:07 > 0:52:08and the head of Conway Twitty,

0:52:08 > 0:52:12believed that country music needed to pay more attention to its elders,

0:52:12 > 0:52:15to dance with the one that brung you, so to speak.

0:52:15 > 0:52:18# Well, these Highway Forty blues

0:52:18 > 0:52:22# I've walked holes in both my shoes

0:52:22 > 0:52:26# Counted the days since I've been gone

0:52:26 > 0:52:29# And I'd love to see the lights of home... #

0:52:29 > 0:52:32It was a combination of vintage stylings, carefully crafted vocals,

0:52:32 > 0:52:36and, most importantly, superb musicianship.

0:52:36 > 0:52:39The country acts who followed in the late '80s - Vince Gill,

0:52:39 > 0:52:42Randy Travis, George Strait - were a new generation of musicians who had

0:52:42 > 0:52:45grown up in the age of rock and roll. They didn't strum guitars,

0:52:45 > 0:52:48they played the everlasting shit out of them.

0:52:48 > 0:52:49FAST RIFF

0:52:54 > 0:52:56But if you put in the time and the shoe leather,

0:52:56 > 0:52:59eventually you may find yourself on stage with Albert Lee,

0:52:59 > 0:53:01one of the greatest country guitarist ever,

0:53:01 > 0:53:04who just happens to be English.

0:53:04 > 0:53:06At that point, you've been benighted.

0:53:16 > 0:53:18If there's one certainty in this world,

0:53:18 > 0:53:20it's that Nashville will always survive.

0:53:20 > 0:53:23It has a formula and it sticks to it,

0:53:23 > 0:53:27but the best country music hasn't been coming from Nashville.

0:53:27 > 0:53:30It's been coming from a place 850 miles west of Nashville.

0:53:30 > 0:53:34# Screw you, we're from Texas

0:53:34 > 0:53:37# Screw you, we're from Texas... #

0:53:37 > 0:53:41Austin, Texas, calls itself the live music capital of the world,

0:53:41 > 0:53:45and since the 1970s it's really become an alternative to Nashville.

0:53:45 > 0:53:47# We're from Texas

0:53:47 > 0:53:49# We're from Texas

0:53:49 > 0:53:51# Ah, screw you... #

0:53:51 > 0:53:54We tend to think of Nashville songwriters as being craftsmen,

0:53:54 > 0:53:57and we tend to think of Texas songwriters as being poets.

0:53:57 > 0:54:00# Now don't get me wrong, I love the USA and the other states

0:54:00 > 0:54:03# Yeah, they're OK... #

0:54:03 > 0:54:07Texas is very much a conservative state,

0:54:07 > 0:54:09but Austin is very much a liberal bastion.

0:54:09 > 0:54:15# We got Willie and Jackie and Jack, Robert Earle

0:54:15 > 0:54:18# And a whole lot more So screw you... #

0:54:18 > 0:54:20Austin is really probably

0:54:20 > 0:54:23a more important music town than Nashville now.

0:54:23 > 0:54:27# Screw you, we're from Texas

0:54:27 > 0:54:31# We're from Texas, screw you... #

0:54:31 > 0:54:34What does a town need to become musically vital?

0:54:34 > 0:54:36It needs a lot of competing styles, that's what.

0:54:36 > 0:54:40In and around Austin in the 1960s, you could hear folk, honky-tonk,

0:54:40 > 0:54:45bluegrass, Cajun, zydeco, Tejano, and even some rocking German oompah.

0:54:45 > 0:54:49If that sounds like an impossible stew of cacophony, it is.

0:54:49 > 0:54:52One of the great things about being a Texas songwriter is that you have

0:54:52 > 0:54:56the wellspring of Texas tradition to draw from, always, right,

0:54:56 > 0:54:59and so if things seemed to get to be a little too commercial

0:54:59 > 0:55:01or a little too out of touch with reality,

0:55:01 > 0:55:05you can always go back and dig into cowboy songs and cowboy mythology,

0:55:05 > 0:55:10or go back to the blues roots to reinvent your work,

0:55:10 > 0:55:13or to reinvent the music that's coming out of that community.

0:55:13 > 0:55:17The whole thing about the Texas thing is there's this whole

0:55:17 > 0:55:20independent history of Texas, you know, being very independent,

0:55:20 > 0:55:22"don't tell us what to do."

0:55:22 > 0:55:26You know, like, we didn't have to depend on a record label saying,

0:55:26 > 0:55:29"Yes, we'll give you a deal, and here's the money," you just did it.

0:55:29 > 0:55:32And that's the great thing about

0:55:32 > 0:55:35a lot of the songwriters and musicians that come down here.

0:55:35 > 0:55:39They have this incredible freedom to write.

0:55:39 > 0:55:43- I've written a song for you.- OK. - You want to hear it?- Yeah.

0:55:43 > 0:55:46You're going to like this, you're going to want to record this.

0:55:46 > 0:55:51- OK.- It's called The Border Collie Song.

0:55:51 > 0:55:52That's a good title.

0:55:55 > 0:55:58# I'm ready to work, I'm ready to work, I'm ready to work, let's go!

0:56:01 > 0:56:03# What's the hold-up? I am ready to work, I'm ready to herd

0:56:03 > 0:56:05# I'm ready to go, just say the word

0:56:05 > 0:56:08# In case you dogs have not heard I'm a goddamn working dog

0:56:08 > 0:56:11HE LAUGHS

0:56:11 > 0:56:14# Working dog, you son of a bitch I take my bath in a drainage ditch

0:56:14 > 0:56:17# Wait one second Let me scratch this itch

0:56:17 > 0:56:18# I'm back

0:56:18 > 0:56:19# Yippee-ki-oh, yippie-ki-yay

0:56:19 > 0:56:22# I can do this all damn day, get off of my porch, get out of my way

0:56:22 > 0:56:24# I'm a goddamn working dog

0:56:24 > 0:56:26# Off my porch, get out of my way,

0:56:26 > 0:56:29# I'm a goddamn working dog. #

0:56:33 > 0:56:37- I like it.- It's yours!

0:56:37 > 0:56:40# I'm a rolling stone from Texas

0:56:40 > 0:56:44# Rolling stone from the plains... #

0:56:44 > 0:56:47Texas has always been an incredibly conservative state.

0:56:47 > 0:56:51It's Republican ground zero, but Austin has two things going for it -

0:56:51 > 0:56:55it's the state capital, and it's home to the University of Texas,

0:56:55 > 0:56:58so if there was ever going to be any semblance of progressive thinking

0:56:58 > 0:57:01in the Lone Star State, it was going to be in Austin.

0:57:01 > 0:57:04Every time there's a new generation of young people coming to town,

0:57:04 > 0:57:05there's a new musical revolution,

0:57:05 > 0:57:08there's always something new, something fresh.

0:57:12 > 0:57:15And this is the reason Austin was able to develop a music scene

0:57:15 > 0:57:16that was different to Nashville.

0:57:16 > 0:57:20In the late '60s, it was attracting hippies, activists, baby boomers,

0:57:20 > 0:57:23people looking for an artistic oasis.

0:57:23 > 0:57:25They had to build their own scene in Austin,

0:57:25 > 0:57:27so that they could have long hair

0:57:27 > 0:57:30and smoke a little marijuana and listen to the music

0:57:30 > 0:57:33that they cared about, and still be safe doing it.

0:57:33 > 0:57:38# My baby... #

0:57:38 > 0:57:40Now, in the early '60s,

0:57:40 > 0:57:45listening to counterculture music in Texas consisted of coming down here,

0:57:45 > 0:57:48tapping your penny loafers to a sizzling hot folk trio

0:57:48 > 0:57:50at Threadgill's.

0:57:50 > 0:57:53In 1933, this place had been a gas station,

0:57:53 > 0:57:55and a fellow named Kenneth Threadgill worked there.

0:57:55 > 0:57:57He pumped enough gas to eventually buy the joint

0:57:57 > 0:58:00and turn it into a hootenanny tavern.

0:58:00 > 0:58:03After World War II, he started running open mic nights,

0:58:03 > 0:58:06basically so he could get up and yodel with the musicians.

0:58:06 > 0:58:09There was no stage. The musicians just sat amongst each other

0:58:09 > 0:58:12and played, and then old Kenny would wander over and start yodelling.

0:58:12 > 0:58:17HE YODELS

0:58:17 > 0:58:21This literally was the beginning of the Austin scene.

0:58:21 > 0:58:25A little dive bar kind of on the outskirts of town that had been open

0:58:25 > 0:58:28since the '30s, it was the first place to get a beer license

0:58:28 > 0:58:30after Prohibition, and they have these things,

0:58:30 > 0:58:35they called them hootenannies, and they would sing folk songs,

0:58:35 > 0:58:37and they would trick cheap beer and eat cheap hamburgers

0:58:37 > 0:58:40and have a nice time a couple of days a week.

0:58:40 > 0:58:44And you had people who were, you know, aspiring folk singers,

0:58:44 > 0:58:46people who were interested in Jimmie Rodgers' songs,

0:58:46 > 0:58:49going all the way back to the beginnings of country music,

0:58:49 > 0:58:53and people who were interested in the blues.

0:58:55 > 0:58:59But all these styles emphasised a point. This was music about

0:58:59 > 0:59:03Lone Star heritage, played by Texans for Texans.

0:59:03 > 0:59:05In the mid-1960s, two musicians

0:59:05 > 0:59:08from a band called Hootenanny Hoots were on their way here to perform.

0:59:08 > 0:59:11They picked up a scruffy hitchhiker along the way,

0:59:11 > 0:59:13and she accompanied them to Threadgill's.

0:59:13 > 0:59:16Notably, as so many hitchhikers did at the time,

0:59:16 > 0:59:18she was carrying an autoharp.

0:59:18 > 0:59:22# Don't you know that you're nothing more than a one-night stand... #

0:59:22 > 0:59:26She was a University of Texas student with a relaxed approach

0:59:26 > 0:59:29to personal hygiene and a fondness for Pearl beer.

0:59:29 > 0:59:33At UT, she had actually been voted Ugliest Man On Campus.

0:59:33 > 0:59:36Her name was Janis Joplin.

0:59:36 > 0:59:39Wednesday night at Threadgill's, and that's where everybody heard

0:59:39 > 0:59:42Janis Joplin sing in public regularly for the first time.

0:59:42 > 0:59:43And that was right here?

0:59:43 > 0:59:46And that was right here in this little space.

0:59:46 > 0:59:51# Don't you know that you're nothing more than a one-night stand... #

0:59:51 > 0:59:55Soon people were packing Threadgill's on a Wednesday night

0:59:55 > 0:59:57to watch Janis perform. She would

0:59:57 > 0:59:59of course go on to become the pre-eminent blues rock singer

0:59:59 > 1:00:03of the '60s, Queen of the West Coast psychedelic movement,

1:00:03 > 1:00:04and when she OD'd in 1970,

1:00:04 > 1:00:07kind of a poster child for rock and roll excess.

1:00:07 > 1:00:11She's not really associated with the Texas music scene,

1:00:11 > 1:00:13but that was the thing about Kenny Threadgill -

1:00:13 > 1:00:17he would let anybody who wanted to, perform.

1:00:17 > 1:00:20The general consensus is that her excessive lifestyle

1:00:20 > 1:00:23is what led to Janis's demise, but actually that is not true.

1:00:23 > 1:00:27Her autopsy confirmed that so many little pieces of her heart

1:00:27 > 1:00:31had been taken that she could no longer function.

1:00:31 > 1:00:32# Take it

1:00:32 > 1:00:36# Take another little piece of my heart now, baby

1:00:36 > 1:00:38# Break it

1:00:38 > 1:00:41# Break another little bit of my heart now, darling, yeah, yeah... #

1:00:41 > 1:00:44Tragic, just tragic.

1:00:45 > 1:00:48This was the crazy thing about the emerging Austin scene.

1:00:48 > 1:00:50There was such an eclectic mix of people and music,

1:00:50 > 1:00:53no-one could quite define what it was.

1:00:53 > 1:00:56In the late '60s, Texas music had a problem

1:00:56 > 1:00:58converting rednecks into hippies.

1:00:58 > 1:01:01See, rock and psychedelia were sweeping the coast,

1:01:01 > 1:01:03but Texas was resistant,

1:01:03 > 1:01:07and the Threadgill's vibe needed a bigger format, a place to expand.

1:01:07 > 1:01:11# There's a place every one of us can go to

1:01:13 > 1:01:17# Maybe you have been there once or twice... #

1:01:17 > 1:01:20This place would be the Armadillo World Headquarters.

1:01:20 > 1:01:24Struggling promoter Eddie Wilson opened its doors in 1973

1:01:24 > 1:01:28to anyone who wanted good music and cheap beer.

1:01:28 > 1:01:32Our job was to find a place to play so that we could have a payday

1:01:32 > 1:01:36every now and then. And I had discovered a huge, empty building,

1:01:36 > 1:01:39it looked like a National Guard armoury.

1:01:39 > 1:01:40We set out to try to fill it up,

1:01:40 > 1:01:45and it stayed empty most of the time for the first couple of years.

1:01:45 > 1:01:49It was lonely and miserable, and...

1:01:49 > 1:01:51I felt sorry for myself.

1:01:51 > 1:01:53But then gradually people heard about it,

1:01:53 > 1:01:57- and then they sought it out.- Were you a fan of music at this time?

1:01:57 > 1:02:00Did you know what you were doing, did you know who you were booking,

1:02:00 > 1:02:02- or could anybody play? - I didn't know anything at all

1:02:02 > 1:02:05about the contemporary music scene.

1:02:05 > 1:02:09It was an education by submersion,

1:02:09 > 1:02:12and luckily I came up before I drowned.

1:02:12 > 1:02:18# The doorman winks at you on your way out... #

1:02:18 > 1:02:20The Armadillo World Headquarters

1:02:20 > 1:02:23would have a huge effect on Texas music.

1:02:23 > 1:02:26It was a venue where the world of the hippie and the world of

1:02:26 > 1:02:29the redneck collided, for better or worse, and the artists who were

1:02:29 > 1:02:34looking for an alternative to Nashville started drifting there.

1:02:34 > 1:02:35One singer-songwriter

1:02:35 > 1:02:38forever associated with this town would write a song

1:02:38 > 1:02:42that somehow brought it all together.

1:02:42 > 1:02:47In 1972, a Dallas-born musician named Michael Martin Murphey sat on

1:02:47 > 1:02:51a rooftop in New York City and composed the song Cosmic Cowboy.

1:02:51 > 1:02:54When I left Los Angeles,

1:02:54 > 1:02:58I had been through a lot, and I said,

1:02:58 > 1:03:04# Burial grounds and merry-go-rounds are all the same to me. #

1:03:04 > 1:03:07I'd been living close to Disneyland,

1:03:07 > 1:03:11and a lot of my friends were dying, from drugs. So...

1:03:11 > 1:03:18# Burial grounds and merry-go-rounds are all the same to me

1:03:18 > 1:03:22# Horses on posts and kids and ghosts

1:03:22 > 1:03:26# The spirits they all are set free... #

1:03:26 > 1:03:28Now, he was homesick for Texas,

1:03:28 > 1:03:30he was clearly fed up with the music recording business,

1:03:30 > 1:03:32and he was probably stoned,

1:03:32 > 1:03:36but the song envisioned a mythical place where a musician can thrive

1:03:36 > 1:03:39free of competition and creative restraints,

1:03:39 > 1:03:42you know, a place where he can ride and rope and hoop.

1:03:42 > 1:03:48# I just wanna be a cosmic cowboy

1:03:48 > 1:03:53# I just want to ride and rope and hoop... #

1:03:56 > 1:04:00My second album was based on trying to describe this movement

1:04:00 > 1:04:03that was beginning to come together.

1:04:03 > 1:04:06Jerry Jeff Walker, Kris Kristofferson,

1:04:06 > 1:04:10we had a cosmic perspective, and it was very poetic.

1:04:10 > 1:04:13So that's why I called them the Cosmic Cowboys.

1:04:13 > 1:04:16CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

1:04:26 > 1:04:29You had the cosmic cowboy hippie thing going on,

1:04:29 > 1:04:31and then the country thing,

1:04:31 > 1:04:36and when they kind of meshed, you had these long-haired, you know,

1:04:36 > 1:04:40dope-smoking hippies wearing cowboy hats and cowboy boots, you know?

1:04:40 > 1:04:42And it was very cool.

1:04:49 > 1:04:51Now, Murphey had grown up on cowboy songs,

1:04:51 > 1:04:54so he was very enamoured with the imagery of the south-west,

1:04:54 > 1:04:57and he worked it into a modern scenario,

1:04:57 > 1:04:58that of a frustrated musician

1:04:58 > 1:05:02going back to an earlier time in a simpler place.

1:05:02 > 1:05:05He invoked a lot of very specific Austin references,

1:05:05 > 1:05:09like Hippie Hollow, which is a local skinny-dipping spot,

1:05:09 > 1:05:12or Lone Star beer, Armadillo World Headquarters.

1:05:12 > 1:05:16In other words, he made Austin both specific and mythical,

1:05:16 > 1:05:20and he recorded a song with a very imprecise, spontaneous background

1:05:20 > 1:05:25that kind of rejected the Nashville slick style sound.

1:05:39 > 1:05:42It wasn't Murphey's intention to galvanise the subculture,

1:05:42 > 1:05:43but that's kind of what happened.

1:05:43 > 1:05:47Now, if you were a Baptist-raised, backsliding Texan

1:05:47 > 1:05:51who'd somehow succumbed to the wiles of grade A weed,

1:05:51 > 1:05:55you had a name to call yourself - Cosmic Cowboy.

1:05:55 > 1:05:57Murphey struck a blow of independence for

1:05:57 > 1:06:00all those songwriters looking to avoid Nashville,

1:06:00 > 1:06:04and scores of Texas-born musicians took up the mantle.

1:06:04 > 1:06:08Guys like BW Stevenson and Jerry Jeff Walker showed up

1:06:08 > 1:06:10from California. Others, like Gary P Nunn's

1:06:10 > 1:06:13Lost Gonzo Band, had never left Texas.

1:06:13 > 1:06:16The underlying theme of so much of this early Austin music

1:06:16 > 1:06:19was homesickness, and wistfulness, and escape.

1:06:19 > 1:06:21Even if you've never been to Texas,

1:06:21 > 1:06:23guys like Michael Martin Murphey

1:06:23 > 1:06:26and Gary P Nunn made you feel like you are missing out on something

1:06:26 > 1:06:28if you weren't here. They were creating a shit-kicking,

1:06:28 > 1:06:32freewheeling oasis in a sea of Richard Nixon conservatism.

1:06:32 > 1:06:34You only have to go up north to Oklahoma

1:06:34 > 1:06:38to realise that country music was still the domain of conservatives.

1:06:38 > 1:06:40One of the most popular songs at the time

1:06:40 > 1:06:43was Okie From Muskogee by Merle Haggard.

1:06:43 > 1:06:48# Leather boots were still in style for manly footwear

1:06:50 > 1:06:54# Beads and Roman sandals won't be seen

1:06:56 > 1:07:01# And football's still the roughest thing on campus

1:07:03 > 1:07:08# And the kids here still respects the college dean

1:07:09 > 1:07:14# And I'm proud to be an Okie from Muskogee... #

1:07:14 > 1:07:18Nixon's America really cottoned on to Okie From Muskogee.

1:07:18 > 1:07:21It was a backlash to all those commie pinko hippies

1:07:21 > 1:07:24protesting the Vietnam War. But there's always been speculation

1:07:24 > 1:07:26that Haggard wrote the song as a joke,

1:07:26 > 1:07:30an accusation he's chosen not to clarify when interviewed.

1:07:30 > 1:07:32You didn't have any tremendous inspiration,

1:07:32 > 1:07:35- or motivation behind writing that song at the time?- No.- Of course,

1:07:35 > 1:07:38you know it was controversial at the time,

1:07:38 > 1:07:41and some people probably still hold it against you.

1:07:41 > 1:07:43Yeah, I don't know,

1:07:43 > 1:07:46maybe they do, I'll argue the point with them.

1:07:46 > 1:07:50You know, I think what they were actually...

1:07:52 > 1:07:57The main bitch during the time at which Okie From Muskogee came out

1:07:57 > 1:08:00was the right to do whatever the hell you wanted to do.

1:08:00 > 1:08:04I jumped out there and did it and they jumped on me.

1:08:04 > 1:08:06Think about that a minute.

1:08:06 > 1:08:09Whether Haggard meant it as a joke or not, a few years later

1:08:09 > 1:08:12Ray Wylie Hubbard answered the song

1:08:12 > 1:08:14with Up Against The Wall Redneck Mother,

1:08:14 > 1:08:18a satire about rednecks who enjoy inflicting copious amounts

1:08:18 > 1:08:20of whoop-ass on peace-loving hippies.

1:08:20 > 1:08:24# He was born in Oklahoma... #

1:08:24 > 1:08:27The song was alternately performed by Hubbard and another

1:08:27 > 1:08:30influential Texas songwriter, Jerry Jeff Walker.

1:08:30 > 1:08:35# It's up against the wall, redneck mother

1:08:35 > 1:08:37HE YODELS

1:08:37 > 1:08:40# Mother who has raised her son so well

1:08:40 > 1:08:42- # So well - So well

1:08:42 > 1:08:46# He's 34 and drinkin' in a honky-tonk

1:08:48 > 1:08:51# Kickin' hippies' asses and raisin' hell... #

1:08:51 > 1:08:54He thinks Johnny Gimble hung the moon.

1:09:03 > 1:09:08In August of 1973, Walker recorded his Viva Terlingua album

1:09:08 > 1:09:11entirely in this small Texas hill town

1:09:11 > 1:09:14with intermittent electricity called Luckenbach.

1:09:14 > 1:09:17He wanted to reject the formal approach to making albums,

1:09:17 > 1:09:20so he invited a lot of musical friends, and they showed up with

1:09:20 > 1:09:23some half-thought-out ideas and rough musical sketches, and about

1:09:23 > 1:09:2518,000 gallons of sangria.

1:09:25 > 1:09:28To me, like I said, that Viva Terlingua album

1:09:28 > 1:09:31is still the definitive progressive country album.

1:09:31 > 1:09:35- Did you record on that? - No, I didn't, I got lost.

1:09:35 > 1:09:38I couldn't get down to Luckenbach that day, but they called me up,

1:09:38 > 1:09:40and Bob called me up and said,

1:09:40 > 1:09:42"Hey, man, Jerry Jeff is down here cutting this album,

1:09:42 > 1:09:45"and we want to do the song Up Against The Wall Redneck Mother."

1:09:45 > 1:09:48I go, "You've got to be kidding me?" He goes, "No, they want to do it."

1:09:48 > 1:09:50And he said, "But we need a second verse."

1:09:50 > 1:09:53So I said, "Well, he sure likes to drink...Falstaff beer,"

1:09:53 > 1:09:58so I wrote the second verse over the phone, with kind of what I was...

1:09:58 > 1:10:00"He likes to drink it with Wild Turkey liquor" -

1:10:00 > 1:10:04I just kind of looked around, and saw what was around me at the time.

1:10:04 > 1:10:09# Sure does like to drink his old beer

1:10:09 > 1:10:12# Chasing that down with Turkey Bourbon liquor

1:10:12 > 1:10:15# Gobble, gobble, gobble... #

1:10:15 > 1:10:17It was progressive, what they were doing,

1:10:17 > 1:10:18cos nobody was really doing that.

1:10:18 > 1:10:24I mean, Jerry Jeff really kind of meshed that country rock and roll.

1:10:24 > 1:10:27You know, it wasn't just like country rock, it was rock and roll,

1:10:27 > 1:10:28guys, you know, just showing up,

1:10:28 > 1:10:31and just destroying the stage and leaving,

1:10:31 > 1:10:35and just, you know, going crazy, and it was just an incredible band.

1:10:35 > 1:10:42# He's 34 and drinking in the honky-tonk... #

1:10:42 > 1:10:47Call it cosmic cowboy music, or gonzo music, or Armadillo music,

1:10:47 > 1:10:50this emerging sound was like a musical travel brochure

1:10:50 > 1:10:52for the state of Texas, you know,

1:10:52 > 1:10:53full of specific references

1:10:53 > 1:10:56and place names and incestuous name-dropping.

1:10:56 > 1:10:59It was kind of a spontaneous approach to recording.

1:10:59 > 1:11:02Now, Viva Terlingua wasn't some kind of defiant,

1:11:02 > 1:11:06self-produced indie record. Much like The Outlaws' album,

1:11:06 > 1:11:09it was actually financed by a large record company, MCA,

1:11:09 > 1:11:13but they went along with Jerry Jeff's crazy, crazy idea,

1:11:13 > 1:11:14and it was a success,

1:11:14 > 1:11:17in the sense that it was critically well-received.

1:11:17 > 1:11:19All the musicians made a bit of money off of it,

1:11:19 > 1:11:22and it took a place no-one had ever heard of

1:11:22 > 1:11:24and turned it into a household name.

1:11:24 > 1:11:29In 1977, nearly four years after Jerry Jeff's Viva Terlingua album,

1:11:29 > 1:11:33old Waylon Jennings had a hit with his own Luckenbach-inspired song.

1:11:33 > 1:11:36# Let's go to Luckenbach, Texas

1:11:36 > 1:11:40# With Waylon and Willie and the boys... #

1:11:40 > 1:11:43Did Waylon move to Luckenbach? No.

1:11:43 > 1:11:46The guy never even set foot in the place, but Viva Terlingua struck

1:11:46 > 1:11:50a balance between creative freedom and commercial vitality, and it

1:11:50 > 1:11:54showed that Texas music was about the people, not the studios.

1:11:54 > 1:11:57# I've no regrets about the past

1:11:57 > 1:12:01# There's nothing I can change

1:12:01 > 1:12:05# But life's a road you walk just one way down... #

1:12:05 > 1:12:08So this Texas music scene had clearly taken country music into

1:12:08 > 1:12:12a new direction but it still needed something, someone to solidify it,

1:12:12 > 1:12:14to pull it all together.

1:12:14 > 1:12:18Texas has always been conservative, but it's also nonconformist,

1:12:18 > 1:12:22and when these two disciplines meet, something mutant is going to emerge.

1:12:22 > 1:12:25Let me explain it in terms of tribal electric friction.

1:12:25 > 1:12:29If the static object is C, conservative Texas,

1:12:29 > 1:12:33represented by guys with cans of Lone Star beer, Levi's,

1:12:33 > 1:12:37starched white shirts and a Protestant upbringing

1:12:37 > 1:12:41meets D, the drifting force, incense, tie-dye shirts,

1:12:41 > 1:12:44and some pot-infused dream of becoming a cowboy,

1:12:44 > 1:12:49then V is the vector where these farm boys have moved to Houston

1:12:49 > 1:12:52or Dallas, and somehow think that Smokey And The Bandit,

1:12:52 > 1:12:56about two idiot rednecks smuggling beer across state lines,

1:12:56 > 1:12:58is the greatest cinematic achievement ever,

1:12:58 > 1:13:03share a co-efficiency with romantic longhairs who want to get back to

1:13:03 > 1:13:06the land, and think that Up In Smoke by Cheech and Chong

1:13:06 > 1:13:08is the greatest film ever, because

1:13:08 > 1:13:12it's about two idiot hippies smuggling dope across state lines,

1:13:12 > 1:13:15then the result is an electrostatic charge, which,

1:13:15 > 1:13:19when mixed with a flammable vapour, like alcohol and marijuana,

1:13:19 > 1:13:23produces a gaseous cloud called Willie Nelson.

1:13:23 > 1:13:25CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

1:13:29 > 1:13:31# On the road again

1:13:31 > 1:13:34# I just can't wait to get on the road again

1:13:35 > 1:13:38# The life I love is making music with my friends

1:13:38 > 1:13:42# And I can't wait to get on the road again... #

1:13:42 > 1:13:46What Willie did, what was his real genius,

1:13:46 > 1:13:51was that he got the rednecks and the really conservative people together

1:13:51 > 1:13:54with the really liberal people in the hippie generation,

1:13:54 > 1:13:56and they all got along.

1:13:56 > 1:13:59And he put on these events where everybody was there.

1:13:59 > 1:14:02So Willie may not have been to Austin first,

1:14:02 > 1:14:05but he picked up the football and ran,

1:14:05 > 1:14:07when that ball was fumbled many times.

1:14:07 > 1:14:12Back in Nashville in 1971, Willie was drowning in molasses.

1:14:12 > 1:14:14This was a guy who'd written Crazy for Patsy Cline,

1:14:14 > 1:14:17he'd written Funny How Time Slips Away,

1:14:17 > 1:14:18Night Life,

1:14:18 > 1:14:21tunes that would be standards in anyone's American song book,

1:14:21 > 1:14:23but Nashville was killing Willie Nelson.

1:14:23 > 1:14:26Every one of his albums would have two or three self-penned diamonds,

1:14:26 > 1:14:28and then a whole lot of crap.

1:14:28 > 1:14:32Then one day, thankfully, his house caught fire.

1:14:32 > 1:14:36The story goes that he ran inside to salvage a pound of Colombian

1:14:36 > 1:14:37as the house was burning.

1:14:37 > 1:14:39He instructed his nephew to park a beat-up old car

1:14:39 > 1:14:41in the garage so he could claim it

1:14:41 > 1:14:44on insurance and then he headed to Bandera, Texas.

1:14:46 > 1:14:49When he re-emerged, the old sport coat and turtleneck Willie

1:14:49 > 1:14:52had been replaced. He had hippie hair.

1:14:52 > 1:14:56He wore a Native American bandana, Jesus sandals and earrings.

1:14:56 > 1:14:58This guy was appropriating so many conflicting cultures,

1:14:58 > 1:15:01no-one knew what to make of him. And they didn't care,

1:15:01 > 1:15:05because nobody on the planet doesn't love Willie Nelson.

1:15:05 > 1:15:07# On the road again

1:15:08 > 1:15:11# I just can't wait to get on the road again... #

1:15:11 > 1:15:14The new Texas music up to this point was basically a celebration of

1:15:14 > 1:15:15arrested adolescence.

1:15:15 > 1:15:19Willie made it about arrested behaviour of an indeterminate age,

1:15:19 > 1:15:22because nobody knows how old Willie Nelson is.

1:15:22 > 1:15:25Might be 65, he might be 103.

1:15:29 > 1:15:34In 1973, he organised the first Willie Nelson 4th of July picnic

1:15:34 > 1:15:35in Dripping Springs.

1:15:35 > 1:15:39Anyone with a beard and a small kitten was admitted for free.

1:15:39 > 1:15:43The annual 4th of July picnics have become a staple of Texas music and

1:15:43 > 1:15:46over the years, every kind of country musician has played there.

1:15:46 > 1:15:49Which makes the event inclusionary!

1:15:49 > 1:15:51I think I just made that word up.

1:15:51 > 1:15:53So many of the performers are from Texas,

1:15:53 > 1:15:56but because the event is held in Texas and it celebrates Texas,

1:15:56 > 1:16:00it's exclusionary. To mainstream country music, that is.

1:16:00 > 1:16:02You know, Nashville.

1:16:02 > 1:16:09# Now, grab your partner and pat her on the head

1:16:09 > 1:16:13# Jump on a man like a dog on a bone

1:16:13 > 1:16:15# You gotta stay all night, stay a little longer

1:16:15 > 1:16:18# Dance all night, dance a little longer

1:16:18 > 1:16:21# Pull off your coat, throw it in the corner

1:16:21 > 1:16:23# Stay a little longer... #

1:16:23 > 1:16:26Willie Nelson is the absolute embodiment of Texas music.

1:16:26 > 1:16:29He's got one of the greatest voices of all time and that unmistakable

1:16:29 > 1:16:32quicksilver style of singing,

1:16:32 > 1:16:35where he hangs behind the beat and slips right into place like your

1:16:35 > 1:16:37grandmother's favourite slipper.

1:16:37 > 1:16:41But he's more than just a musician. He's his own lifestyle.

1:16:45 > 1:16:50From the moment he emerges from the cloud-filled bus, bandana intact,

1:16:50 > 1:16:51guitar perforated,

1:16:51 > 1:16:55to the end of a raucous show that invariably has the crowd doing

1:16:55 > 1:16:59his backing vocals, Willie exudes a communal vibe. Not many musicians

1:16:59 > 1:17:03can get 10,000 people to show up and help pay his back taxes,

1:17:03 > 1:17:07and when farmers are going broke and transatlantic pipelines

1:17:07 > 1:17:11need to be stopped and towns are blown up in fertilizer explosions

1:17:11 > 1:17:14or schools for impaired children need to be built, Willie shows up.

1:17:14 > 1:17:16Does the show for free.

1:17:16 > 1:17:20For three hours. Everyone has a good time and somewhere,

1:17:20 > 1:17:24Bono squirms just a little bit on that self-righteous cross

1:17:24 > 1:17:26he's nailed himself to.

1:17:38 > 1:17:45# Oklahoma City, you sure look pretty... #

1:17:45 > 1:17:49Now, the other half of the term "country and western" is western.

1:17:49 > 1:17:53And you can't talk about Texas music without mentioning western swing,

1:17:53 > 1:17:58it's a form of country music that dates back to the early '20s.

1:17:58 > 1:18:02During the '70s, while all those cosmic cowboys were doing

1:18:02 > 1:18:05their thing, Ray Benson and Asleep At The Wheel

1:18:05 > 1:18:07were boogying toward Texas from Pennsylvania.

1:18:07 > 1:18:11They wanted to remind the world that Texans had been rocking

1:18:11 > 1:18:15long before those armadillos invaded.

1:18:15 > 1:18:17In western swing music we hear the blues,

1:18:17 > 1:18:21we hear big band arranging, like Count Basie-style stuff,

1:18:21 > 1:18:24and we hear the influence of the Czech polka.

1:18:24 > 1:18:28So, musically speaking, that's where Western swing comes from.

1:18:28 > 1:18:31# On route 60... #

1:18:34 > 1:18:37Western swing music was challenging music. You've got to have

1:18:37 > 1:18:40half a foot in country music and half a foot in jazz.

1:18:40 > 1:18:43Right. Can you show us on the guitar

1:18:43 > 1:18:46the difference between a country progression...

1:18:46 > 1:18:49Yeah, hand me that blonde guitar there, on the wall.

1:18:53 > 1:18:54It's like...

1:18:57 > 1:19:00Well, there's no difference, it's the way it's played.

1:19:00 > 1:19:03- Right.- So take a song like Your Cheating Heart.

1:19:03 > 1:19:05Everybody knows Your Cheating Heart.

1:19:05 > 1:19:07# Your cheatin' heart

1:19:07 > 1:19:09# Will make you weep

1:19:09 > 1:19:10# You'll cry and cry

1:19:10 > 1:19:12# And try to sleep. #

1:19:12 > 1:19:15Well, the western swing would be...

1:19:16 > 1:19:19# Your cheatin' heart

1:19:19 > 1:19:21# Will make you... #

1:19:21 > 1:19:24And Hank Williams had a lot of Western swing in him, but it...

1:19:24 > 1:19:26# And try to... #

1:19:29 > 1:19:31As opposed to...

1:19:34 > 1:19:36So there's different substitute chorus, they'd call it,

1:19:36 > 1:19:38but it's jazz. Swing.

1:19:41 > 1:19:45The king of Western swing, Bob Wills, was really a band leader.

1:19:45 > 1:19:47Sometimes he sang, sometimes he played the fiddle.

1:19:47 > 1:19:51Often, he threw solos to the piano player, the guitarist,

1:19:51 > 1:19:54the steel guitar player or a guest vocalist,

1:19:54 > 1:19:56all the while keeping the whole musical thing afloat.

1:19:56 > 1:20:01# Well, it's all summer

1:20:01 > 1:20:04# Trying to find my

1:20:04 > 1:20:07# Little... #

1:20:07 > 1:20:11But Texas swing has an unmistakable feel to it.

1:20:11 > 1:20:144/4, brush strums, walking bass, double stop fiddle.

1:20:14 > 1:20:17There's nothing else quite as infectious.

1:20:17 > 1:20:20Bob considered himself a big band, like the Dorsey Band,

1:20:20 > 1:20:26like the Miller Band, but with fiddle, steel guitar and guitar.

1:20:26 > 1:20:30But he was a band leader, in that ilk, and then you hired vocalists.

1:20:30 > 1:20:32He patterned himself after the big bands,

1:20:32 > 1:20:35but he was unique in that it was a Western big band.

1:20:35 > 1:20:36- Yeah.- Bob was outrageous.

1:20:36 > 1:20:40Bob was like the Mick Jagger of his time.

1:20:40 > 1:20:43He pranced around on stage like a peacock.

1:20:45 > 1:20:47He was nuts.

1:20:47 > 1:20:50He was jumping around, hollering like this, going like this

1:20:50 > 1:20:54and pointing out and he never did anything the same twice.

1:20:54 > 1:21:00# So deep in love with you. #

1:21:05 > 1:21:09Well, I couldn't leave Austin without channelling the spirit

1:21:09 > 1:21:12of Bob Wills, so, with Ray Benson and Asleep At The Wheel,

1:21:12 > 1:21:16I decided to give the old working dog a Western swing work-out.

1:21:17 > 1:21:20All I would say as musicians is, don't think as musicians,

1:21:20 > 1:21:23think as a border collie.

1:21:23 > 1:21:28If we all get on that border collie page, then the feel will come.

1:21:28 > 1:21:31Do we have to do that thing where they sniff the...?

1:21:31 > 1:21:34- Yeah, yeah.- Get over here!

1:21:34 > 1:21:36Tempo?

1:21:36 > 1:21:38Fast! Fast.

1:21:38 > 1:21:40It's a really hyperactive dog.

1:21:40 > 1:21:43- Let's go.- All right. - We've got shit to do.

1:21:43 > 1:21:45LAUGHTER

1:21:45 > 1:21:48Hey! You can have this song. I'm giving this song to you.

1:21:48 > 1:21:50It's a good one.

1:21:50 > 1:21:52OK, play it and play along and see if you can...

1:21:56 > 1:21:58Like a diminished, but not.

1:22:01 > 1:22:04# I'm ready to work, I'm ready to work, I'm ready to work, let's go!

1:22:06 > 1:22:09# What's the hold up? I am ready to work, I'm ready to herd

1:22:09 > 1:22:11# I'm ready to go, just say the word

1:22:11 > 1:22:14# In case you dogs have not heard I'm a goddamn working dog

1:22:42 > 1:22:44# Now, I've got issues, I'll admit

1:22:44 > 1:22:47# I basically don't know when to quit my one and only occupation

1:22:47 > 1:22:49# Keep those herds in a tight formation

1:22:49 > 1:22:53# Missing heifers, wayward strays, tend to put a damper on my day

1:22:53 > 1:22:56# It's in my blood, what can I say? I'm a goddamn working dog

1:22:56 > 1:22:59# Get off my porch, get outta my way

1:22:59 > 1:23:02# I'm a goddamn

1:23:02 > 1:23:06# Working dog. #

1:23:18 > 1:23:20Excellent! Thank you!

1:23:26 > 1:23:28Asleep At The Wheel are constantly evolving,

1:23:28 > 1:23:32which is exactly what country music needs to do. Because right now,

1:23:32 > 1:23:34Austin is in some kind of tertiary stage where the city

1:23:34 > 1:23:38is moving too fast, but the music is moving too slow.

1:23:38 > 1:23:40It's looking a little ragged.

1:23:41 > 1:23:44All those little musical roads that led to Austin,

1:23:44 > 1:23:48they are now digital corridors. The South by Southwest festival

1:23:48 > 1:23:50started out as a country music festival,

1:23:50 > 1:23:54now it's just full of digital hipsters begging for start-up money.

1:23:54 > 1:23:56The rents are sky-high.

1:23:56 > 1:23:58This is Sixth Street.

1:23:58 > 1:24:02This was supposed to be Austin's answer to Broadway in Nashville.

1:24:02 > 1:24:04I don't mind telling you, folks,

1:24:04 > 1:24:07it's a little bit shit!

1:24:07 > 1:24:10Maybe a certain Texan by the name of Don Henley said it best

1:24:10 > 1:24:15when he said, "Call something paradise, kiss it goodbye."

1:24:15 > 1:24:18Whether your country music comes from Texas or Tennessee,

1:24:18 > 1:24:20one thing is for certain,

1:24:20 > 1:24:24a good country song will always stand the test of time.

1:24:24 > 1:24:26Play, sing or recite a lyric

1:24:26 > 1:24:30that you think is one of the greatest country lyrics...

1:24:30 > 1:24:34Oh, gosh. Hang on one second.

1:24:34 > 1:24:37- No question, I know exactly what I'm...- It can't be yours.

1:24:37 > 1:24:39- Yeah, do you want it to be?- No, I don't want it to be mine.

1:24:39 > 1:24:40It's not mine anyway.

1:24:44 > 1:24:48# I'm a rolling stone

1:24:48 > 1:24:50# All alone and lost

1:24:52 > 1:24:56# For a life of sin

1:24:56 > 1:24:58# I've paid the cost

1:25:00 > 1:25:04# When I walk by

1:25:04 > 1:25:06# All the people say

1:25:08 > 1:25:12# There's another guy

1:25:12 > 1:25:16# On the lost highway. #

1:25:16 > 1:25:20- Hank Williams and Fred Rose.- Yep.

1:25:20 > 1:25:22# It took her down

1:25:22 > 1:25:25# Both her and David

1:25:25 > 1:25:29# I said I'm gonna see you

1:25:29 > 1:25:31# In your grave

1:25:31 > 1:25:34# They laughed at me

1:25:34 > 1:25:38# Until I shot 'em

1:25:38 > 1:25:43# And put their cheatin', schemin' bones in Miller's Cave. #

1:25:43 > 1:25:44So I love that whole song,

1:25:44 > 1:25:48but that verse "they laughed at me until I shot them,"

1:25:48 > 1:25:50I like that a lot.

1:25:50 > 1:25:53To me, one of the best written songs

1:25:53 > 1:25:56I've ever heard was I Wanna Talk About Me.

1:25:56 > 1:25:58"I want to talk about, want to talk about I,

1:25:58 > 1:26:01"want to talk about number one, oh, my oh, my.

1:26:01 > 1:26:05"What I think what I want...

1:26:05 > 1:26:08"I love talking about you, you, you, usually.

1:26:08 > 1:26:11"But occasionally I want to talk about me."

1:26:11 > 1:26:14I think that's absolutely brilliant.

1:26:20 > 1:26:22# Strap 'em kids in, give 'em a

1:26:22 > 1:26:25# Little bit of vodka in a

1:26:25 > 1:26:28# Cherry Coke, we're going to

1:26:28 > 1:26:31# Oklahoma... #

1:26:31 > 1:26:37There's a lot of my favourite lyrics but that comes right off the bat.

1:26:37 > 1:26:39Oh, yeah.

1:26:39 > 1:26:43Willie Nelson. "I'm going to get drunk and I sure do dread it cos

1:26:43 > 1:26:44"I know just what I'm going to do."

1:26:44 > 1:26:47# I'm going to spend my money calling everybody honey

1:26:47 > 1:26:49# And wind up singing the blues

1:26:49 > 1:26:51# Spend my whole pay cheque on some old wreck

1:26:51 > 1:26:53# Brother, I can name you a few

1:26:53 > 1:26:56# I am going to get drunk and I sure do dread it

1:26:56 > 1:26:58# Cos I know just what I'm gonna do. #

1:26:58 > 1:27:00My first musical memory,

1:27:00 > 1:27:02I can remember hearing that on an 8-track tape,

1:27:02 > 1:27:05that my dad had and that, for me,

1:27:05 > 1:27:08that's country music as far as it goes.

1:27:11 > 1:27:14- Yeah, the Dublin Blues by Guy Clark. - OK.

1:27:14 > 1:27:16I think I know this.

1:27:16 > 1:27:21# Well, I wish I was in Austin

1:27:21 > 1:27:24# At the chilly parlour bar

1:27:24 > 1:27:26# Drinkin' Mad Dog Margaritas

1:27:26 > 1:27:30# And not carin' where you are

1:27:30 > 1:27:33# But here I am in Dublin

1:27:33 > 1:27:35# Rollin' cigarettes

1:27:35 > 1:27:38# Holdin' back and chokin' back

1:27:38 > 1:27:40# The shakes with every breath

1:27:40 > 1:27:43# So forgive me all my anger

1:27:43 > 1:27:46# Forgive me all my faults

1:27:46 > 1:27:48# There's no need to forgive me

1:27:48 > 1:27:51# For thinkin' what I thought

1:27:51 > 1:27:53# I loved you from the git go

1:27:53 > 1:27:56# I'll love you till I die

1:27:56 > 1:27:59# I loved you on the Spanish steps

1:27:59 > 1:28:02# The day you said goodbye. #

1:28:02 > 1:28:05Now, that song talks about...

1:28:05 > 1:28:10relationships, it talks about Dublin, about the elite...

1:28:10 > 1:28:13and yet it's as country as can be,

1:28:13 > 1:28:18but yet it's as sophisticated as can be. Guy Clark, the greatest.

1:28:18 > 1:28:20I'll be honest with you, folks.

1:28:20 > 1:28:24I can't cover country music in 90 minutes, it's not enough time.

1:28:24 > 1:28:27I'm sure you've been watching thinking, "Where's Dolly Parton?"

1:28:27 > 1:28:31Trust me, Dolly Parton gets plenty of oxygen. I've been trying to

1:28:31 > 1:28:36convince you that true country music values its roots and its traditions.

1:28:36 > 1:28:40Nobody writing country songs nowadays picks cotton or worked on

1:28:40 > 1:28:43the railroad. It used to be the lifestyle created the music,

1:28:43 > 1:28:46now the music creates the lifestyle.

1:28:46 > 1:28:49But the good stuff stands the test of time.

1:28:49 > 1:28:51It's authentic.

1:28:51 > 1:28:53You know it when you hear it.

1:28:54 > 1:28:57As for Working Dog,

1:28:57 > 1:29:00my CD,

1:29:00 > 1:29:03come on, I'm not going to get a cut, who am I fooling?

1:29:03 > 1:29:07I'll tell you this, I'm not a fan of the term bucket list because that

1:29:07 > 1:29:11implies you're trying to back load an otherwise uneventful life.

1:29:11 > 1:29:14So what, you swam with the dolphins, you saw the Northern Lights,

1:29:14 > 1:29:18who cares? But if someone told me I was going to have the chance to

1:29:18 > 1:29:21record my song with Ray Benson and Asleep At The wheel...

1:29:24 > 1:29:27..take me now, Jesus.

1:29:30 > 1:29:31# Now, I've got issues, I'll admit

1:29:31 > 1:29:34# I basically don't know when to quit my one and only occupation

1:29:34 > 1:29:37# Keep those herds in a tight formation

1:29:37 > 1:29:40# Missing heifers, wayward strays, tends to put a damper on my day

1:29:40 > 1:29:41# It's in my blood, what can I say?

1:29:41 > 1:29:43# I'm a goddamn working dog

1:29:46 > 1:29:48# Yippie-ki-oh, yippie-ki-yip

1:29:48 > 1:29:51# No time to waste, gotta get there quick

1:29:51 > 1:29:53# When the fur starts flying, the dust gets thick

1:29:53 > 1:29:54# I'm nipping hoofs, I'm chasing tails

1:29:54 > 1:29:56# I'm in the groove, the alpha male

1:29:56 > 1:29:57# In case you dogs cannot tell

1:29:57 > 1:29:59# I'm a goddamn working dog

1:30:01 > 1:30:03# Off my porch, get outta my way

1:30:03 > 1:30:07# I'm a goddamn working dog. #