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Modern Acoustic
Music and Music-Related Issues That Matter
August 2014 – Issue No. 37
What’s in a name?
For Poor Old Shine, an apparent obscure racial stereotype
that has prompted the band to become Parsonsfield PAGE 6
ALSO
INSIDE
Get to know
WUMB DJ
Brendan Hogan
CD reviews
Nikki Lane, Parker
Millsap and Ryley Walker
THE LISTS
An ode to songs
with dates in them
Page 4
Page 5
Page 10
LIVE SHOT
FROM THE EDITOR
When I started Modern Acoustic, way
back in 2004, one of my main objectives was
not to be like every other music magazine,
which fills their pages with fluffy profiles of
bands and overblown CD reviews in order to
get as many eyeballs, website hits, and likes
on Facebook.
Yes, I want all those things, but I try my
best not to compromise my true intentions
– to illuminate stories that interest me, and
most likely you, too.
It’s right there on the cover of every issue
of Modern Acoustic: “Music and MusicRelated Issues That Matter.”
My favorite past issues are the ones that
dealt with topics facing musicians or music
listeners. In Issue. No. 7, we asked a college
music professor if she thought the music explosion that happened in the ’60s could ever
happen again. Issue No. 9, we mourned the
loss of album liner notes; Issue No. 15 pondered the future of Internet radio; and Issue
No. 21 questioned whether jazz was dead.
Each of these stories, and others like
them, asked or pondered bigger questions
than the standard fare churned out regularly
COVER PHOTO by Sarah Lefroncois
by commercial music magazines.
And in this issue we again ask a big question: What happens when a band finds out
that its name has a derogatory connotation?
Poor Old Shine, a Connecticut roots band
with a punk attitude similar to the Avett
Brothers, has built itself a nice following in
its four-year existence.
But during that time, it became apparent
that their name, chosen from an old song,
had an obscure but denigrating history in the
American South.
What should they do? Ignore it and continue on? After all, it was obscure. Face the
facts and change their name? It could bring
to a halt any foothold they had gained.
On Page 6, frontman Chris Freeman fills
us in on how the band responded, and where
they go from here. It’s a fascinating look at a
complicated and stressful decision.
Oh, and by the way, while we said we
weren’t ALL about music interviews and CD
reviews, it’s not like we completely ignore
them either.
On Page 4 we talk to DJ Brendan Hogan
of WUMB-FM, who provides the perfect
soundtrack for our post-rush hour commute
home from work. As the first participant
in our new Get to Know... feature, we ask
photo by adam kassirer
Brendan about his playlists, which perfectly
balance classic and contemporary tunes,
while also providing a guide to new artists
hitting the scene, such as Parker Millsap,
Nikki Lane, and Ryley Walker, whose albums
we review on Page 5.
And finally, aided by our faithful Facebook
followers, we offer up our exclusive list of
songs with dates in them, inspired by the
great Bobbie Gentry’s song “Ode to Billie
Joe,” which opens with the lyrics “It was the
third of June, another sleepy, dusty Delta
day.” Happy summer, all.
Rich Kassirer
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photo by RICH GASTWIRT / StageSHOOTER.COM
New Orleans great Trombone Shorty performing at the Green River Music Festival in July.
2 MODERN ACOUSTIC
MODERN ACOUSTIC 3
GET TO KNOW...
CD REVIEWS
Brendan Hogan, DJ, WUMB (91.9 FM)
If you live in the Boston area and like folk, blues and singer-songwriters
– both current and classic – there’s a good chance you already listen to the
radio station WUMB (91.9 FM; www.wumb.org). If you do listen, hopefully
you’ve heard DJ Brendan Hogan, who hosts the evening 7-10 p.m. shift.
The depth and breadth of his playlists – from Robert Johnson-era blues
to current local music to up-and-coming artists such as Ryley Walker and
the Haden Triplets ­– makes his program a must-listen. But it is Hogan’s
vast knowledge of the music he plays and his willingness to share it with his
audience that makes his show special.
The fact that he is also a working musician adds depth to his incite,
explaining an intracacy of a musical passage in a song or what he believes a
musician was trying to convey.
Hogan, 34, grew up and went to school in the Boston area before getting
DJ gigs at WERS and WGBH. But WUMB is where he feels most at home.
“It’s always been my favorite station for music,” he says.
In an email interview, we asked Hogan about his radio program, his philosophy on providing detailed information to his listeners, and about how his
performing career influences his DJing:
You spin a great variety of new
releases and classics… How
much freedom does the station
give you choose the playlists?
Thanks. We have quite a bit
of freedom. Finding the right
balance of material is important
when hosting a radio show. I
work closely with Jay Moberg,
the music director at WUMB, to
identify music that fits the form
of what we’re trying to present
as a whole.
For example, there is a lot of
good music being made in our
own backyard, in the Boston
area and New England, and
that’s something that has found
a home more and more over the
last couple years on the air at
WUMB. I don’t know if there’s a
station playing more local music
every day than us. It’s a similar
case with stuff like old gospel,
and the blues.
Jay and I will sit down at least
once a week and go over music,
as he does with every host at the
station. We decide what should
be added to the playlist, whether
it’s literally brand new releases,
or whether there are some
holes in the library that could be
filled, and we go from there. It’s
important to keep things fresh,
both for the listeners and for
myself as a host, and I feel like
we’ve struck a good balance. Jay
is very good at that.
4 MODERN ACOUSTIC
You do a great job of making
sure the listener knows the
title and album of the songs
either you are going to play or
have just played. Is that a conscious decision? It always bugs
me when DJs don’t do that.
Yes. I think of music history
linearly, so it’s important to me
to know where a recording or
an artist fits in the spectrum of
recorded music. Nothing exists in
a vacuum, and I like to know how
things came together.
To me, your show stands out
because you offer the listener
not only song and album title,
but also some special nuggets
of info of why a song is worth
hearing. Are you an avid album
note reader or do you just have
a store of knowledge and great
recall?
I’m like a sponge when it
comes to liner notes! I can’t get
enough. I think I have a photographic memory, because if I’ve
read something once or twice
and I’ve connected with what
I’ve read, I can recall that information pretty easily later on.
That’s why I don’t like the
trend toward downloaded music. A
lot of what is interesting about recorded music lies in its context and
relation to culture and history, and
you just can’t get that information
from a digital audio file.
How much preparation do you
do for each night’s show? What
does that consist of?
Every day I spend two to three
hours prepping for the night’s
show. One of the reasons I like
WUMB is because there is so
much music to discover and draw
from, whether it’s brand new or
just new to me. I listen to each
song ahead of time, and research
where the album or song was
recorded; who produced it, who
played on it, why is it important,
etc., and I make notes as I go.
I have to be well-informed and
I respect the music. I’m passionate about what I play, and I hope
that translates over the air.
How tied in to the local music
scene are you? Does it help/
hurt to have those ties?
I’d say I’m fairly tied-in. One
thing that is good about the music scene in Boston is that there
is little industry here, so I think
that allows for camaraderie to
exist among musicians that may
not if there were competition
over commerce. Everyone I have
met and played with has been
friendly, open, and supportive.
I’ve personally learned so much
by either playing or hanging out
with other musicians, and I’m
grateful for that.
I hope that I am able, and that
WUMB is able, to help out other
photo by samantha lamb
artists, especially in this town
and region.
How does your own music
influence your DJing?
I think I come off as a musician
talking about music on the air.
And how, if any, does your
DJing influence your own
music?
The best way to learn about
music is by listening intently. I do
a lot of that.
Off the air, where does your
musical taste lie?
I like anything good. And by
good, I guess I mean honest and
genuine.
My deepest love is old blues. I
don’t think I’ve heard anything
better than Robert Johnson.
One album or artist you are really excited about right now…
I think Laura Marling is brilliant and I can’t wait to see and
what she does over the next
bunch of years.
Your 5 desert island albums…
“Desire,” Bob Dylan
“Complete Recordings,” Robert
Johnson
“Revolver,” the Beatles
“Folksinger,” Dave Van Ronk
“A Creature I Don’t Know,”
Laura Marling
photo by chuck grant
PARKER MILLSAP
Parker Millsap
www.parkermillsap.com
NIKKI LANE
All or Nothin’
www.nikkilane.com
RYLEY WALKER
All Kinds of You
www.twitter.com/Ryley_walker
One of my favorite albums of the
year so far came out of nowhere
– or at least Oklahoma. Parker
Millsap’s second, self-titled album is
a fully formed good time of country, blues and folk tunes. It’s as if
Millsap’s been performing for 20
years, instead of being just 20 years
old. He wrings out bluesy, gravelly
voiced lyrics that crackle with wellworn life. His Pentecostal upbringing informs at least a pair of tunes:
the slow-burning blues “Old Time
Religion” and the country-rockin’,
foot-stomping
“Truck Stop Gospel.” Then there is
“Quite Contrary,”
a mash-up of bastardized fairy tale
characters that
are up to no good:
“Alice, Alice, full
of malice/got kicked out of her own
palace/tracks in her arm where she
followed a rabbit/she picked up all of
his bad habits.” Little Jack Horner,
Little Miss Muffet, and, of course,
Mary all have similar issues. Millsap’s story songs such as “Yosemite”
and “Disappear” are filled with
characters, though I’m not sure I’d
want to meet some of them in a dark
alley. I certainly can’t wait to hear
more from Millsap in the future.
“With my tiny little dress and my
white boots on/I ain’t looking for
love, just a little danger/Tonight‘d
be a good night to sleep with a
stranger.” From beginning to end,
Nikki Lane’s second album, “All or
Nothin’,” flirts with danger. Lane’s
songs, brimming with a natural
country twang, belie the devilish
side of a songwriter looking to break
out. Lane, now based in Nashville
by way of Greenville, S.C., exudes
a bad-girl attitude, like an updated
version of Loretta Lynn. She sings
with a sneer on
the aforementioned “Sleep
With a Stranger”
and “Right Time,”
where she sings
“Anyday or night
time is always the
right time/Is always the right time to
do the wrong thing.” The songs are
drenched in pedal steel and honkytonk, and while they sound fine, the
production by Dan Auerbach of the
Black Keys seems a little heavyhanded. While Lane’s tough-gal
personality shines though, the sound
of the whole album seems veiled,
as if it was sung behind some gauzy
curtain. Even so, this is a breakout
album for an up-and-coming country
singer with a lot of spunk.
At 24, “All Kinds of You” has a worn
feel, like something you might have
heard in the late 1970s, when bands
were experimenting by merging rock
and jazz. The Chicago native mixes
tunes with vocals with instrumentals
on this nine-song album. Walker’s
voice fits perfectly into that space
as well. A self-proclaimed fan of
Tim Buckley, Tim Harden and Bert
Jansch, Walker puts his lyrics to melodic jams of his stellar guitar picking, groaning cello, piano and drums.
Opening with the five-minute “The
West Wind,” the
listener gets transported through
time. On “Blessings,” Walker’s
voice sounds like
a more-melodic
Harry Chapin over
some beautiful
cello and guitar interchanges. In a
song-by-song interview with SelfTitled magazine, he says of “Twin
Oaks, Pt. 1”: “A nice shuffle to ease
your mind. Good time to roll a fatty
on your Gerry Rafferty LP.” We may
just take him up on that advice! In
all seriousness, this is that type of
album, one where you could put on
headphones, sit back, and turn up the
volume and lose yourself in Walker’s
atmospheric picking.
MODERN ACOUSTIC 5
What happens when a band on the rise finds
out its name is an obscure racial stereotype?
Meet Parsonsfield (formerly Poor Old Shine).
F
or Poor Old Shine, it started with a song… a traditional prison work song of
the American South, called “Ain’t No Cane on This Brazos.” It’s been interpreted by everyone from Dylan and the Band, to the Low Anthem, Lyle Lovett
and the Wood Brothers. And it was the song in one of the great scenes in the
movie “Festival Express,” as a completely blotto Rick Danko and Janis Joplin
warbled their way through it with the help of Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir on their train
trip across the Canadian countryside.
It is from that song’s lyrics that the Connecticut roots
band got their name: “Captain, don’t you do me like you
done poor old Shine/Well ya drove that bully til he went
stone blind.”
For those unfamiliar with Poor Old Shine, they are a
five-piece group similar in style and attitude to the Avett
Brothers, with influences of bluegrass, old-timey, and
folk music shot with a punky attitude and a rowdy spirit.
As singer/banjo player Chris Freeman explains, the
band’s name simply came from a song the group loved
to play.
“Our first show was December of 2010. It was at
Toad’s Place [in New Haven, Conn.] and we weren’t
even billed as a band,” Freeman says. “We were billed
as Chris Freeman and it was literally a band that was
thrown together in a week. All Antonio [Alcorn, the
group’s mandolin player] and I had ever played together
before was folk songs. … I didn’t really feel comfortable
having the band billed under my name since everyone
was equal in a folk music club. So we pulled our name
from one of our favorite songs that we had been playing
in our song circle at UConn, “Ain’t No More Cane.”
The afternoon of the gig we read aloud the lyrics to the
songs we were going to play that night and looked for a
band name. We liked Poor Old Shine.”
The name just seemed to fit what Freeman and the
band were trying to get across with their music. “I think
we were really in an amazing state of wonder over folk
music and had so much fun playing together that we
may have naively wanted to become the characters and
folk singers we were singing about,” Freeman says.
Since those early days, Poor Old Shine – now including Max Shakun on guitar and pump organ, Harrison
Goodale on bass, and new member drummer Erik
Hischmann – played out steadily, released its debut
self-titled album in 2013, and nabbed a nifty gig as the
live band for the American Repertory Theater’s exuberTurn to next page
photo by RICH GASTWIRT / StageSHOOTER.COM
photo by Sarah Lefroncois
From left: Chris Freeman, Erik Hischmann,
Antonio Alcorn, Max Shakun, and Harrison Goodale.
www.parsonsfieldband.com
6 MODERN ACOUSTIC
Mid-set at the Green River Festival earlier this summer, the band Poor Old Shine
paused between songs and waited as the placard bearing their name, to the right of
the stage, was removed and replaced … and with that, they became Parsonsfield.
MODERN ACOUSTIC 7
The name blame
In our quest to find other bands who might have run into similar issues with
their name, we found very litt.e. The closest we could come to another band
dealing with a racist name (one that was unintended from the beginning) is the
Grammy-winning pop country band Lady Antebellum. In 2010-11, a few blogs
took the group to task for using the name Antebellum: “The band chafes me,”
writes a blogger named Tami in a 2010 post. “It’s not the music. It’s the name.
‘Lady Antebellum’ seems to me an example of the way we still, nearly 150 years
after the end of the Civil War; nearly 50 years after the Civil Rights Act; and
in a supposedly post-racial country led by a biracial president, glorify a culture
that was based on the violent oppression of people of color.” And in 2011,
another post by a guy who claims to be a comic-book historian wrote: “ ‘Antebellum’ is a cool sounding word… I can see why someone would want to use
it in their band name. But it means something REALLY bad, and the members
of Lady Antebellum, three white kids from former Confederate states, should
damn well know that.”
According to the dictionary, antebellum translates to “occurring or existing before a particular war, especially the American Civil War,” a time when slavery was prevalent in the South, often referred to as the Antebellum South.
However, for the band, the connotation is completely different. Here is what they said in a 2012 interview in the Augusta
(Ga.) Chronicle, on their name: “We knew when we came up with this name that we’d have to explain it every day for the rest
of our lives. We were taking some photos one day in front of some old ‘antebellum’ style houses in Nashville, and that word
came out and it just kinda stuck. The word has a nostalgic feel to it, and in a weird way we felt that reflected our sound and
what we were going for.” In a recent interview with Katie Couric they said they never expected their name would stick, that
their label would reject it, but that never happened.
Needless to say, whatever controversy there was never amounted to much, and it certainly hasn’t hurt the band’s success.
photo by Evgenia Eliseeva / www.evephotography.com
Poor Old Shine performing in the American Repertory Theater’s “Robin Hood.”
‘We get an email five
minutes before we go on
stage for a “Robin Hood”
show that says we have
a racist name. It’s hard
to put it out of your
head, perform, and
promote that name,’
says Chris Freeman.
ant production of “The Heart of Robin
Hood.”
Momentum has surely been in the
band’s favor as they have built a solid
fanbase over the years. But there has
been one nagging problem…
According to Freeman, Poor Old
Shine had been performing for about
a year when they first heard about the
issue regarding the band’s name.
“One person brought it up to us at a
show,” says Freeman. “They were nice
enough about it, told us they liked our
music but hated our name. I kind of
froze when he told me why but I didn’t
know how to respond.”
What they have since learned is that Poor Old Shine is an
obscure racial stereotype for a shoeshine boy, or someone who
is looked down upon, in the Deep South.
The news shocked the band. They had no idea of any racist
connotation.
How obscure is this term? Our digging turned up a handful
of references to the word “shine” as a derogatory word for
black people, but nothing that would indicate that Poor Old
Shine, other than the aforementioned song, has any spe8 MODERN ACOUSTIC
cific meaning in itself. Email inquiries to
various experts on race and racial history
around the country returned nothing of
consequence on the band name either.
But Freeman says he’s received at least
a dozen emails and a handful of comments
at shows over the years concerning their
name, and, in truth, it doesn’t matter how
obscure the phrase is, it certainly affected
the band.
“It was difficult because it meant
something completely different to us than
it seemed to mean to people who have
heard it used in a derogatory way,” he
says. “It came to represent us. … It’s a
matter of association. It’s hard to change
someone’s mind once they associate it with one thing. For a lot
of people that was our music… but for others it was this derogatory meaning, and we weren’t going to change their minds.”
Freeman says deciding what to do was frustrating and difficult. Band members’ discussions went back and forth.
“It was hard to know whether to just ignore it, people are
going to criticize you on the Internet no matter what you do
or what your called,” he says. “We tried to forget about it for a
while, but whenever it came up it stung for a while and was a
‘It’s so difficult
renaming something that
already has an identity.
... [But] I don’t think
anyone listened to us
because we were called
Poor Old Shine. If they
like the music, they’ll
follow along,’
Freeman says.
distraction.”
The band did what it could, courteously returning emails from anyone
who had an issue, trying to explain
their intentions and move past it. But it
just wouldn’t go away.
“We get an email five minutes
before we go on stage for a “Robin
Hood” show that says we have a
racist name. It’s hard to put it out of
your head, perform, and promote that
name,” he says.
According to Freeman, even though
they didn’t have issues with venues
or cities they have played concerning
their name, it just became too much
to bear.
“I tried not to think about it, but it
was a distraction at times. I found myself hoping no one would
bring it up after the show each night,” he says.
So last January, the band finally decided something had to
be done. By March, they had a plan, in May they informed fans
via a note on their website, and in July – at the Green River
Festival – they made it official with their stage announcement.
They have a new album to be released Aug. 19. It’s called
“Afterparty” and it’s by the band Parsonsfield.
“It’s so difficult renaming something that already has an
identity,” he says. “We needed to pick something that was personal to us. Most names we came up with felt very contrived.”
Parsonsfield is the name of the town in Maine where they
recorded their albums with producer Sam Kassirer at his
studio, Great North Sound Society.
“It’s also where we met our drummer
Erik. He worked with Sam and was hired
as a session drummer for our album but
stayed on and joined the band full time
after recording,” says Freeman. “Our
sound really changed when he joined and
pulled us from a more traditional string
band sound to something that felt much
more uniquely ourselves. We owe a lot
to what happened in the 10 days that we
spent there working on the album. It made
us the band that we are today, not the band
that improvised folk songs in a song circle.
We still love that, but as a band I think
we’ve moved on.”
Moving on is what the band is doing,
in steps. They will be billed for a while
as Parsonsfield (formerly Poor Old Shine), just to make sure
their fanbase hangs with them during the transition.
“I’m not too worried. It’s gone really smoothly so far and
word has been spreading well I think,” says Freeman. I don’t
think anyone listened to us because we were called Poor Old
Shine. If they like the music, they’ll follow along.”
As for the band’s new name, Freeman is genuinely ecstatic.
“I think it gives us more freedom to explore different
genres and styles without having the burden of expectation,”
he says. “Many people thought Poor Old Shine was a reference to moonshine and thus called us an Appalachian or
bluegrass band. This will give us the opportunity to explore
our own music with greater clarity.”
MODERN ACOUSTIC 9
THE LISTS
Ode to songs with
dates in the lyrics
A video was posted of Bobbie Gentry’s classic “Ode to Billie Joe” on June
3rd, the date prominently mentioned in the song. It got us thinking... How
many more songs are out there with dates in them? After scanning the
5 – “Isis, Bob Dylan: “I married Isis on
the fifth day of May”
10 – “The Night They Drove Old Dixie
Down,” The Band: “By May the 10th,
Richmond had fell”
21 – “21st of May,” Nickel Creek:
“Hallelujah, the 21st of May.”
“Great King Rat,” Queen: “Born
on the twenty first of May, Died syphillis
forty four on his birthday”
24 – “Revenge of the Vera Gemini,”
Blue Oyster Cult: “On the 24th of May,
I’ll gather up your reins”
JANUARY
10 – “The Darkest Hour,” Arlo Guthrie: “It’s the tenth of January, And I
still ain’t had no sleep”
17 – “Kristina She Don’t Know I Exist,” Streelight Manifesto: “1.17.98
has been a day that I’ve come to hate”
22 – “The Lady’s Got Potential,” Madonna: “It was January twenty-second,
1944, a night to remember, yeah, that’s
for sure”
FEBRUARY
19 – “Help Me Make It Through This
Funky Day,” Greg Brown: “It look
like February 19th and November 8th,
They had an ugly little baby and they’re
gonna call it Today”
JUNE
4 – “Radar,” Morphine: “If I am guilty so are you, it was March 4th,
1982”
21 – “Town With No Cheer,” Tom Waits: “Now it’s boilin’ in a miserable March 21st wrapped the hills in a blanket of Paterson’s curse”
3 – “Ode to Billie Joe,” Bobbie Gentry:
“It was the third of June, another
sleepy, dusty Delta day”
6 – “Convoy,” C.W. McCall: “Was the dark of the moon on the sixth
of June In a Kenworth pullin’ logs”
14 – “Karma’s Payment,” Modest Mouse. “I drove my car on June
14th, I drove it right on down the street”
30 – “Charles Guiteau,” Kelly Harrell: “On the thirtieth day of June,
To die I was condemned”
APRIL
JULY
MARCH
1 – “April Fools,” Rufus Wainwright: “Well, life’s a train that goes
from February on, Day by day, But it’s making a stop on april first”
4 – “Pride (In the Name of Love),” U2: “Early morning April 4, shot
rings out in the Memphis sky”
14 – “April 14, Part 1,” Gillian Welch: “Hey, hey, It was the fourteenth day of April”
“God Moves on the Water,” Blind Willie Johnson: Year of
nineteen hundred and twelve, April the fourteenth day, Great Titanic
struck an iceberg”
“Dust Storm Disaster,” Woody Guthrie: “On the 14th day of
April of 1935, There struck the worst of dust storms that ever filled
the sky”
15 – “One More Summer,” The Rainmakers: “My Genie got married
to a CPA, April fifteenth is her wedding day”
23 – “Lorraine,” Lori McKenna: “Judy Garland, Carnegie Hall,
Sunday April twenty third”
29 – “April 29, 1992 (Miami),” Sublime: “April 26th, 1992, There
was a riot on streets, tell me where were you”
MAY
1 – “May 1, 1990,” Adrien Belew: “May 1, 1990, something changed
inside me”
“First of May,” Bee Gees: “Our love will never die come first of
May.”
3 – “Vanzetti’s Letter,” Woody Guthrie: “The year is nineteen
twenty-seven, the day is the third day of May, The town is the city
called Boston, our address this dark Dedham jail”
10 MODERN ACOUSTIC
4 – “Born on the Bayou,” Credence Clearwater Revival: “I can
remember the fourth of July runnin’ through the backwood bare.”
“4th of July,” Dave Alvin: “Hey baby, it’s the 4th of July.”
“Jack Straw,” Grateful Dead: “Leaving Texas, fourth day of
July”
“Saturday in the Park,” Chicago: “Saturday in the park, I think
it was the Fourth of July”
“Night Ride Home,” Joni Mitchell: “There comes a night like
this, Like some surrealist, Invented this 4th of July”
“4th of July,” Aimee Mann: “Today’s the fourth of July, Another
June has gone by”
“4th of July,” Soundgarden: “And I thought it was the end, And
I thought it was the 4th of July”
“Fourth of July,” Mariah Carey: “It was twilight, On the fourth
of July”
“Cuckoo,” traditional folk song: “And she never warble cuckoo
till the fourth day of July”
“Walkin’ the Dog,” Rufus Thomas: “Jumped so high he touched
the sky, Never got back till the Fourth of July”
“New York , New York,” Ryan Adams: “Well, I shuffled through
the city on the 4th of July”
5 – “Harrisburg,” Josh Ritter: “Romero got married on the 5th of
July”
“Fifth of July,” Eddie From Ohio: It’s the fifth of july, feeling
independent”
12 – “July 12, 1939,” Charlie Rich: “July the 12 sho’ was a
scorcher”
Web for any such lists, it became apparent that many were vastly incomplete. With the help of Facebook
friends, we compiled this list. We’re sure there are many more and we encourage you to send them to us
so we can add them to our online list on ModernAcoustic.com. But for now, here is what we’ve compiled.
AUGUST
OCTOBER
2 – “The Family Reserve,” Lyle Lovett: “But it
was my Uncle Eugene, He died on October the
second 1981”
31 – “The New Style,” Beastie Boys: “You wanna
know why – because I’m October 31st – that is my
date of birth”
1 – “I Live With It Everyday,”
Barenaked Ladies: “On August first,
nineteen-eighty-one, I cycled to Scott’s
house with a BB gun”
3 – “Ben’s My Friend,” Sun Kil
Moon: “I woke this morning, August
3rd, It’s pretty slow and uneventful
summer”
5 – “Who Killed Marilyn?,” The Misfits: “5:25 August fifth, 1962/Found
her lying on her chest”
8 – “August 8th,” NOFX: “Birds sing
there’s not a cloud in the sky, yeah
August 8th is a beautiful day”
14 – “Friday Night, August 14th,”
Funkadelic: “Friday night, August the
14th, Old lady luck smiled down on
me”
28 – “August 28th,” Chris Pureka:
“August 28th and the rain slid in, like
a brooding lullaby”
NOVEMBER
2 – “On Ballets and Barricades,” Ramshackle
Glory: “So vote November 2nd if it seems right to
you”
3 – “On Ballets and Barricades,” Ramshackle
Glory: “Just tell me what we’re gonna do on
November 3rd”
5 – “Remember,” John Lennon: “No, no, remember, remember, The fifth of November”
8 – “Help Me Make It Through This Funky
Day,” Greg Brown: It look like February 19th and
November 8th, They had an ugly little baby and
they’re gonna call it Today”
14 – “Things in My Life,” Men Without Hats:
“Was it here or yesterday, Or wasn’t it the fourteenth of November”
SEPTEMBER
1 – “I’ll Meet You in Poland Baby,”
Foetus: Today is the first of September”
3 – “Papa Was a Rolling Stone,”
Temptations: “It was the third of September, That day I’ll always remember,
yes I will”
12 – “Frank Mills,” from the “Hair”
soundtrack: “Met a boy called Frank
Mills, On September twelfth right
here”
17 – “Fiddler’s Green,” The Tragically
Hip: “September seventeen, For a girl
I know it’s Mother’s Day”
21 – “September,” Earth Wind & Fire: “Do you remember, The
twenty-first night of September?”
DECEMBER
1 – “Sweet Baby James,” James Taylor: “Now
the first of December was covered with snow”
7 – “Eyeball Kid,” Tom Waits: “So on the 7th of
Dec. 1949, They got what, They’d been wishing
for”
24 – “December 25th,” Rosie Gaines: “December
24th the whole world is at war”
“White Christmas,” The Carpenters: “But
it’s December the 24th and I’m longing to be up
north”
25 – “December 25th,” Rosie Gaines: “December
25th it’s Christmas one day”
26 – “December 25th,” Rosie Gaines: “December 26th now we
proceed with our war”
Have more songs with dates in them? Send them to rich@modernacoustic.com and we’ll add them to our online list at www.modernacoustic.com.
MA 5 - SONGS
Songs that helped us survive this issue:
“Brushy Mountain Conjugal Trailer,” “Remedy,” Old Crow Medicine Show – The boys know how to have fun.
“Stay With Me,” “A Nod Is as Good as a Wink ... To a Blind Horse,” The Faces – Barnstar! recently covered
this song and it reminded me to listen to the original again. So nasty!
“Quite Contrary,” “Parker Millsap,” Parker Millsap – When nursery-rhyme characters go wrong.
“Magnolia Mountain,” “Cold Roses,” Ryan Adams and the Cardinals – Got me psyched for Newport.
“Ode to Billie Joe,” “Ode to Billie Joe,” Bobbie Gentry – see above.
MODERN ACOUSTIC 11