THROWBACK THURSDAY: Happy Birthday Floyd Tillman

Some super songs in Super-Sensitive Sound

Today is the birthday of one of country music's greatest songwriters, Floyd Tillman.

He would have been 102.

He was born in Ryan, Oklahoma, but raised in Post, Texas, According to his official website, "Floyd was drawn to playing music by the fact that two of his brothers were earning $5 a night playing dances at a local skating rink.

"Floyd developed his own style of performing at an early age.  He was always just a little off from the beat of the other musicians.  He would rather sing his own compositions than the common hits of the day."

After years of recording hits and relentless touring, Tillman slowed down on his performing in the early 1950's, his website says, Quoting the artist: "It was a daily rat race. I was sleeping in my car-a bus was out of the question, too expensive-and making $200-$500 a night, more money than I could pay taxes on, and I got tired of it.  I told the band they could go on and keep playin' but I was going to retire.  That kind of life can get to you."

Tillman was inducted into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame in 1971.  And in 1984, Willie Nelson inducted him into the Country Music Hall of Fame.

Tillman died in 2003 at the age of 88.

Here are some of his greatest songs.

Here's Tillman himself singing "I Love You So Much It Hurts Me" in 1948



"They Took the Stars Out of Heaven" was Tillman's first single  in 1944, Here's a 1946 cover by a singer called Boots Faye



According to his website, "Each Night At Nine," a 1944 hit by Tillman, "captured the feelings of lonely servicemen so well that both Axis Sally and Tokyo Rose played it heavily to encourage desertion." Here's a version by one of Tillman's greatest interpreters, Ernest Tubb



Jerry Lee Lewis covers Tillman's "Slippin' Around," known as one of country music's first cheating songs.



Rockabilly star Eddie Bond is one of many to cover Tillman's "This Cold War With You,"



Here's a fairly recent version one of Tillman's most-loved songs, "Drivin' Nails in My Coffin" performed by Rhonda Vincent

WACKY WEDNESDAY: Shotgun Boogie!

Yep, just some songs about the shotgun.

First a hit by Tennessee Ernie Ford



Here's the Park Avenue Hillbilly, Miss Dorothy Shay, whose mother was frightened by a shotgun, they say ...



Some "Shotgun Blues" from the original Sonny Boy Williamson



I just recently became aware of this bitchen soul record by Roy C called "Shotgun Wedding."



And what set me off on this rampage of shotgun songs? This little clip by The Reverend Peyton, of course.

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, Dec. 4, 2016
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell 101.1 FM
Email me during the show! terrel(at)ksfr.org

Here's my playlist :


OPENING THEME: Let It Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Lightning's Girl by Nancy Sinatra
You Let the Dead In by Churchwood
Baby Let Me Bang Your Box by MFC Chicken
Cheap Thrills by Ruben & The Jets
Don't You Just Know It by The Sonics
Action Packed by The Del Moroccos
Devil Dance by The A-Bones
Better to Be Lucky Than Good by The Electric Mess
Cold Line by Nots

Campanas del Mission by De Los Muertos
We Go On by The Come 'N Go
Losing My Mind by Alien Space Kitchen
Don't Lie to Me by Mojo Brothers
Forming by The Germs
Nomads of The Lost by Oh! Gunquit
Zip Code by Deadbolt
Gangsters by The Dustaphonics
Tucson Girls by Gregg Turner

Why Do You Hate Me by Pussycat & The Dirty Johnsons
Persona Non Grata by The Upper Crust
49 Guitars and One Girl by Pere Ubu
White Glove Service by The Grannies
The Flesh is Weak by James Chance & The Contortions
I Would Die For You by The Rockin' Guys
Sunglasses After Dark by Archie & The Bunkers
I'm Alright by Mose Allison

Hound Dog by 68 Comeback
I'm Gonna Have Fun by Jack Lee
Satisfy You by The Seeds
Give  It Back by Sharon Jones
Harry Hippie by Bobby Womack
At the Crossroads by Hickoids
Lili Marleen by Zuch Kazik
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

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THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, Dec. 2, 2016
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell 101.1 FM
Email me during the show! terrel(at)ksfr.org

Here's my playlist :

OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens

Back from the Shadows Again by Firesign Theatre

The Bottle Never Let Me Down by Dale Watson

Apartment 34 by Holly Golightly & The Brokeoffs

Who's Gonna Take Your Garbage Out by Rosie Flores & The Pine Valley Cosmonauts

Saginaw, Michigan by Jimmie Dale Gilmore

James River Blues by Old Crow Medicine Show

Gentlemen by The Handsome Family

Little Pig by Robert Gordon

I Cry, Then I Drink, Then I Cry by Cornell Hurd

 

Highway Queen by Nikki Lane

Lonesome Road Blues by Martha Fields

Midnight Caller by Southern Culture on the Skids

Just Like Geronimo by The Dashboard Saviors

Dolores by T. Tex Edwards & Out on Parole

Bad Times Are Coming Round Again by The Waco Brothers

You Don't Love God (If You Don't Love Your Neighbor) by Rhonda Vincent

My Turn to Howl by Penny Jo Pullus

 

Ain't No Top 40 Song by Terry Allen

I'm a Ramblin' Man by Waylon Jennings

Dirty House Blues by Wayne Hancock

Please Baby Please by Dwight Yoakam

Crawdad Song by Washboard Hank

Jason Fleming by Roger Miller

Milk Shakin' Mama by Dan Hicks & The Hot Licks

Too Many Rivers by Webb Wilder

Buffalo Hunter by J. Michael Combs

 

Over the Mountain by John Hartford

Good Love Shouldn't Feel So Bad by Kris Kristofferson

Opportunity to Cry by Tom Jones

Cold Hard Truth by George Jones

To Get Through This Day by Miss Leslie

Fishing Blues by Jim Kweskin & Geoff Muldaur

CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

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THROWBACK THURSDAY: The Bizarre Saga of Hanging Johnny

A strange character introduces himself: "They call me Hanging Johnny ... But I never hung nobody ..."

But after that little disclaimer Johnny begins bragging about all the people he has hanged. His mother, his brother, his sister Nancy, a robber, a police officer, a friar, his own mates and skippers ..." Different versions include different victims.

It's no wonder this morbid little sea chanty delights me so.

Indeed, "Hanging Johnny" is a classic sea chanty. It's a halyard chanty, a call and response sung by crew members engaged in a long, tedious task like setting the sails on a ship.

According to the liner notes of a 1967 EP titled Chicken on a Raft by a folk group called The Young Tradition:

"Hanging Johnny" is a good example of a shanty that was ready made for stringing out, a trick used by the shantyman for lengthening a song to suit the job in hand. Anyone could be a candidate for Hanging Johnny's rope until he had enough verses to finish the job. 

On her folk ballad site The Contemplator, Lesley Nelson-Burns writes:

There is speculation that "Hanging Johnny" may refer to the eighteenth century hangman, Jack Ketch. In fact "Jack Ketch" was a term used to refer to all hangman, named after a Jack Ketch who was the executioner at Tyburn from 1663-1686.

However, a web page about "Hanging Johnny" in the Traditional Ballad Index on the California State University, Fresno website says:

According to most sources, the "hanging" in this song does not refer to execution. Great Lakes sailor Carl Joys said it referred to the young sailors who went aloft to swing out the halyards when a sail was hoisted. Another account says it referred to a sailor who held a rope lashed to other sailors. If this "hanger" let them go in a bad sea, they would be washed overboard and lost.

I guess that would explain Johnny's claim that he never hung nobody.

Part of "Hanging Johnny" was featured in a scene from the 1962 movie version of Herman Melville's Billy Budd. (UPDATE 6-18-20: I had a clip of the song from the movie, but it's no longer on YouTube. If it somejhow reappers, please let me know!)

Here is a version recorded by ethnographer Sidney Robertson Cowell in  Belvedere, Calif.  Performing are a bunch of sailors -- Captain Leighton Robinson, Alex Barr, Arthur Brodeur, and Leighton McKenzie.



This one's from a 1979 Smithsonian Folkways album Sea Songs: Louis Killen, Stan Hugill and the X Seamen's Institute sing of Cape Horn sailing at the Seattle Chantey Festival

But my favorite is a more recent take on "Hanging Johnny" by Stan Ridgway, which appeared on Hal Wilner's 2006 various artist compilation Rogue's Gallery.



Don't forget to hang, boys, hang.

For more deep dives into songs, check out The Stephen W. Terrell Web Log Songbook