Tom T Hall is God

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8i5k4I1AOEI

"That's How I Got to Memphis" is one of my favorite songs of all time

oh man yeah. best version? is anything fucking w/ the bobby bare version?

I love honest open smiles, kisses from a child, tomatoes on the vine, AND ONIONS

I went to this dude's hometown a couple months ago - Olive Hill, KY. One of those depressing towns where everything's been dead for 40 years. On the way out we noticed someone had changed the sign to read "live ill."

I need to check out his stuff, beyond "Turn It On, Turn It On, Turn It On."

his first five or so LPs are stunning. they always have at least one total dud song on them, though.

Quite possibly my all-time favorite lyric:

It Sure Can Get Cold in Des Moines

The Iowa weather was 13 below
I had come to Des Moines for a radio show
I awoke in the evening from a traveler’s sleep
With notions of something to eat

The old elevator slid down past the floors
My head and my eyes said you should have slept more.
The man at the desk said the restaurant was closed
Outside it was 14 below

The lounge was still open and so I walked in
In place of my food I had two double gins
I looked ’round the room, as a tourist would do
That’s when I saw the girl in the booth

She sat there and cried in the smoky half-dark
The silent type crying that tears out your heart
Her clothes were not cut in the new modern way
And her suitcase had seen better days

Nobody asked her what caused her such pain
Nobody spoke up, yet no one complained
Without even asking, I knew why she cried
Life is just like that sometimes

The man at the desk said, it’s 15 below.
The bellhop said yeah man, that’s cold...that’s cold.
I went back to my room and I wrote down this song
Oh it sure can get cold in Des Moines

Tom T. Hall and John Prine were somewhat doing the same thing. Tom T. Hall is great but he was capable of some real monstrosities like anyone else; this afternoon I saw a film clip of him serenading Kitty Wells (in the '80s, I think) with his godawful song about her music as the queen of country music. Straight out of Altman. You gotta love him for that, and he is also kind of the Garrison Keillor of country music, backdated.

He's the Garrison Keillor of country in that they both have that kind of smug, wistful thing going that can be a bit...saccharine, I guess.

and, expanding as thread calls for, I would say that Tom T. Hall and Guy Clark are similar, as writers, and I already mentioned Prine. Who's the writer also from Kentucky who is well known for advocating going back to the land--a novelist and an essayist? Wendell Berry. Similar to him, too. And any number of liberal Baptists or Presbyterian apostates you have in the south. Tom T. Hall has that about him, especially in his scary film clips; he's like a frightening, just barely controlled uncle with weird views on things sitting at Sunday dinner. Uncle Tom has been, er, travelling, children, and has visited the death house in Kentucky and written a song about it. Tom, could I have a word with you in the kitchen, and Tom T. Hall puts out his cigarette in the mason jar of whiskey he's trying to hide from the dog who is also under the table.

And I would say a guy like John D. Loudermilk--writer of "Break My Mind" and "Tobacco Road" and other class-conscious classix, is a precursor to Tom T. Hall. You could draw a line from the Box Tops doing "Break My Mind" to Gram Parsons doing Hall's "I Can't Dance."

Muttered this over on my blog a while back but check out two recent songs he's got up on his Myspace site:

http://www.myspace.com/therealtomthall

"One of Those Days" and "A Hero In Harlan." (At least I hope they're still there -- the design on the site is a bit ugly...)

At the same time, it seems as if Tom T. Hall is pre-hippie. He was eccentric, yet still a part of another culture and time. He wasn't a "head" like Prine and Clark.

I'm fascinated by those songwriters who built the bridge from Roger Miller to Kristofferson, Prine, Clark, etc. Here I'm talking about Hall, as well as Mickey Newbury and John Hartford.

One of my all-time favorites, too. (Somewhere around here I have the 3000 or so words I wrote on his 2-LP Essential set for the Boston Phoenix in the late '80s.) In Search Of A Song was always my favorite. "Salute to a Switchblade" is the best song that will ever be written about being a soldier stationed in Germany. And I'm not sure whether you'd call it "political" (well, it's about a guy who wouldn't fight in WWII), but "Turn It On, Turn It On, Turn It On" is the best song ever written about capital punishment. And yeah, I cosign whoever recommended "Homecoming" way up above too.

What I wrote about his not-bad 2007 album for Billboard:

http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/content_display/reviews/albums/e3i4e5cfeef7081c5c8bf114a205cae53ea

In general, I'd say he's leaned a bit too much toward his more mawkish tendencies in his later years (i.e., the past three decades or so), but if anybody sees a copy of 1983's Everything From Jesus To Jack Daniels around for a couple bucks, I'd suggest they pick it up.

they played ravishing ruby on the college radio station today.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjiSPjPAVQQ

Have you read any good telephone books lately?
If you ain't then let me recommend one
I've already read that Tulsa telephone book through 13 times
If you don't know any last names it ain't much fun

I was in Tulsa and didn't have anything going
She was in Tulsa and didn't have anything on
She said my name is Shirley I said my name is T
When I woke up the next morning she was gone

Reading that Tulsa telephone book will drive a man insane
Especially when the girl you're looking for has no last name
I got to find and tell her I don't want our love to end
So I'm reading that Tulsa telephone book again

All of the Tulsa operators know my voice now
They must know how long I've been alone
If you meet a girl named Shirley with some ribbons in her hair
Tell her that she's wanted on the phone

Reading that Tulsa telephone book will drive a man insane
Especially when the girl you're looking for has no last name
I got to find and tell her I don't want our love to end
So I'm reading that Tulsa telephone book again

I really can not get enough.

yes, tom t. hall is god:

Tossed and turned the night before in some old motel
Subconsciously recalling some old sinful things I done
My buddy drove the car and those big coal trucks shook us up
As we drove on into Hyden in the early morning sun.

Passed the hound dogs and some dominique chickens
Temporary looking houses with their lean and bashful kids
Every hundred yards a sign proclaimed the Christ was coming soon
And I thought oh man he'd sure be disappointed if he did.

On the way we talked about the forty miners
Of the thirty nine who died and one who lived to tell the tale
We stopped for beans and corn bread at the Ed 'n' Lois Cafe
Then we went to see the sheriff at the Leslie County jail.

They took us to the scene of that disaster
I was so susrprised to not find any sign of death at all
Just another country hillside with some mud holes and some junk
The mines were deadly silent like a rat home in the wall.

It was just like being right inside of a shotgun
The old man coughed and lit a cigarette that he had rolled
Back in town I bought a heavy jacket from the store
It was sunny down in Hyden but somehow the town was cold.

The old man introduced the undertaker
Who seemed refreshed despite the kind of work I knew he did
We talked about the pretty lady from the Grand Ole Opry
We talked about the money she was raising for the kids.

Well, I guess the old man thought we were reporters
He kept reminding me of how his simple name was spelled
Some lady said they worth more money now than when they's a livin'
And I'll leave it there cause I suppose she told it pretty well...

Would rock:
http://i267.photobucket.com/albums/ii317/RabitesAngelatin/tth-tshirt.jpg

Xpost I fucking love that song

Pay No Attention To Alice is one of the most creepy, disturbing songs I've ever heard.

ha, i was just listening to that song/record like 30 minutes ago.

i was actually making a big TTH mix of my favs and was gonna be really obnoxious and make ppl on facebook ysi it from me but now i am falling asleep

LOVE 'pay no attention to alice'

imo the best part is -- alice put your ashes in that ashtray / i swear woman ... you'll burn down the house.

also, she made that apple pie from a memory iirc.

or the bit where she trashed tom's/narrator's car and was like 'nah man be cool i know this guy'

You mean Ben down at the Shell station?

There's some real weird things going on in that song. The bit about the war, how he was a coward. And doesn't the husband seem about as bad as Alice?

^love things like that, these mysterious passing details i think could have been expanded into whole other songs and just leave you to your imagination. maybe someone not tangled by their own limited capacity to describe it knows what i'm trying to say and could do better to praise this one, but anywa that was the bit that sealed alice as a perfect song for me.

Been on a big Tom T. kick lately and just marvel at the economy of his storytelling. Song after song, three minutes of America, time after time.

His last country #1 deserves a modern cover.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9TVutNFUd4

this dude writes the same melody over and over. and it's an awesome melody.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imloYhfxzIc

next band i piece together i'm getting everyone to the first practice locking all the doors and windows and demanding at knife point EVERY MUSICIAN PLAY SOMETHING PHENOMENAL ALL AT ONCE. every instrument ever built is recorded on this one jam did u know that

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V14621hG57o

maybe this blongs in the drunk thread

Pay no attention to Alice..........

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zms7m3PhgGY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sp6I5b1wO1I

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOM T HALL

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHS9PgB2LSc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NW1KPWrQJeI

homecoming is such a sad, heavy song, and so brilliant

very different approach on this version of Homecoming, by Joe Henry. I really like it, but I heard this version before the original. I can imagine that others might not dig it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RSrcoy_Pj4

Yeah I also heard it before the original. I like it, too. But I do think the original hits harder -- it's such a personal song that it's hard to match what you can hear in Hall's voice.

It's not on youtube, but the Sir Douglas Quintet version of "The Homecoming" (from their odds'n'sods set Rough Edges) is great--Sahm misses a couple lyrics but the performance really has that "arriving somewhere at 4 AM" feel fit for the song.

Really want to POLL various versions of “That’s How I Got to Memphis.”

I don't know that much of his stuff, but i'm such a sap that "Pay No Attention to Alice" is instant waterworks for me. The way he draws out certain lines like "she maaaaaaade that apple piiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeee from a memory", delaying the payoff, is just incredible.

The whole song is 3:15 and it paints such a distinctive portrait of a 70s view of "normalized" alcoholism. The realization in the third verse that perhaps Alice is not the only alcoholic is crushing. And it is all done so clear-eyed and closely observed.

Great comments all through this thread---xxpost Sir Doug's version of "The Homecoming" is a bonus track on Acacia's import remaster of Mendocino (beware of the live thing also with that title). And--hate to pimp-ho for Amazon---it's also on The Complete Mercury Masters, in their Digital Store for 35 bucks and change (OOP CD is $399).

The SDQ Mercury Masters set is also on Spotify, as is Hall's Storyteller, Poet, Philosopher box from '95.

He has left us.

https://blog.siriusxm.com/siriusxm-remembers-tom-t-hall-dead-at-85/

No byline, wonder if my neighbor wrote that.

The first time I ever really clicked with Tom T. Hall, who was nowhere near on my radar at that time, was in 2004, when I heard the Drive-By Truckers cover "Mama Bake A Pie (Daddy Kill A Chicken)." What an incredible writer this guy was:

People staring at me as they wheel me
Down the ramp towards my plane
The war is over for me
I've forgotten everything except the pain
Thank you sir, and yes sir, it was worth it
For the ol' red, white and blue
And since I won't be walking
I suppose I'll save some money buying shoes
The bottle hidden underneath the blanket
Over my two battered legs
I can see the stewardess make over me
And ask, "Were you afraid?"
I'll say, "Why no? I'm Superman"
And couldn't find the phone booth quite in time
A GI gets a lot of laughs
He remembers all the funny lines

[Chorus:]
Mama bake a pie
Daddy kill a chicken
Your son is coming home
11:35, Wednesday night

[Verse 2:]
Mama will be crying and daddy's gonna say
"Son, did they treat you good?"
My uncle will be drunk and he'll say
"Boy, they doing some real great things with wood"
The letter that she wrote me said, "Goodbye"
She couldn't wait and lots of luck
The bottle underneath the blanket
Feels just like an old friend to my touch
I know she'll come and see me
But I bet she never once looks at my legs
Now, she'll talk about the weather
And the dress she wore the July 4th parade
Lord, I love her and I don't believe
This bottle's gonna get her off my mind
I see here in the paper
Where they say the war is just a waste of time

never even occurred to me that he might still be alive. rip

No mention of “Harper Valley PTA” in this thread? R.I.P.

The final verse of “I Like Beer”:

Last night I dreamed that I passed from the scene
And I went to a place so sublime
Aw, the water was clear and tasted like beer
Then they turned it all into wine

Btw, on the subject of “political songs” – this one is dense and specific to a remarkable degree.

Here you go. Bill Friskics-Warren on Tom T. https://t.co/OJbagk0WeA

— David Cantwell (@dlcantwell) August 21, 2021

Wow, he wrote “Hello Vietnam”?

Well, I know there's a lotta big preachers that know a lot more than I do,
But it could be that the good Lord likes a little pickin' too.

RIP Tom, one of my dad's favorites.

Really want to POLL various versions of “That’s How I Got to Memphis.”

Bobby Bare's is my favorite, but it's a hard song to mess up even if you try.

Agree 100%

FUCK

https://www.tennessean.com/story/entertainment/music/2022/01/05/tom-t-hall-died-suicide-medical-examiner-autopsy/9109362002/