Doin' Some Hard Travelin'

Here is (some of) what folk music is: it is the music of the people; it is music for the people, often without said people's input; it's whatever your local subway busker decides it to be on a moment-by-moment basis; it is the mealticket of griots, shamens and soothsayers worldwide; it's a label exec in a Manhattan office creating a classification that somehow includes John Denver, Kate Bush, Burl Ives, The Moldy Peaches, Ani DiFranco, Fairport Convention, Lee Hayes, and the Holy Modal Rounders; it's the last three songs (but not the first three) that Vin Scelsa played on the air; it is the spirit of Mother Jones crossed with the perseverance of Studs Terkel mated with the veracity of Pecos Bill; it's the song you spontaneously break into in public. But mostly, folk music is a story, and we all tell it our own way.

There's a new four-disc box set of Woody Guthrie music out from Rounder Records. My Dusty Road originated as a series of recordings made during Woody's 1944 sessions for Moe Asch's eponymous label, that ultimately comprised the bulk of his catalog over the next fifteen years. Those sessions were already expertly catalogued, remastered and released by the Smithsonian/Folkways label over a decade back. But a few years ago, a partial set of pristine-condition masters was unearthed from a Brooklyn basement, and it is this discovery that the Rounder discs collect.

Although not new - many of the Rounder tracks have had multiple releases over the last 60 years - the value of this new set is immeasurable. Woody's recorded legacy has heretofore been relegated to the past, the way one appreciates archeological ruins for their former greatness, with only scarce remnants of exotic artistry surviving over time. My Dusty Road plops the Colossus of Rhodes down on our collective front lawn. The music is clean and unspoiled, as if the man himself was standing right next to you, rank like a dog from riding the rails and spilling dust of twelve states on your living room carpet, but with a voice as sharp and clear as a hungry blue jay. Don't take my word for it. Here are two versions of the same recording of This Land Is Your Land, the first from the Folkways collection (released in 1997), and the second from the Rounder set:

Woody Guthrie: This Land Is Your Land [Folkways]

Woody Guthrie: This Land Is Your Land [Rounder]

I'd be crying with joy, except that I'm hung-up on a few things in the accompanying booklet. Like erroneous master track info, or contradictory recording dates cited on different pages, or the fact that one of the set's "previously unreleased" tracks was in fact released under a different title by Folkways, or that Bess Lomax gets screwed out of a credit for some fine harmony work, or that no one bothers to mention whether or not the included version of Hard Travelin' is the song's first-known recording (it most likely is). The booklet's credits exclude any of the Smithsonian archivists who previously catalogued the Asch recordings; its passages contort themselves to avoid any mention of the Folkways releases, of which they are now both historical records and competitors for market share.

Woody Guthrie & Cisco Houston:

I'm Gonna Join That One Big Union

Now, I myself, have no problem picking a fight like this. I like my music with a big hunk of CONTEXT on the side. And so yeah - it bothers me not a little when me plus a couple of hours on the internet and a trip to the library can out-think the system. In this particular instance, the system includes a record label that defines itself by its respect for historical documentation, and an organization whose sole mission is to preserve Woody's legacy for future generations, not to mention countless writers and critics who are professionally obligated to keep the record straight, and it's a shonda that none of them made any discernable effort to be accurate and professional about something they all claim to adore. So yes, I intend to throw a tantrum about it, and none of you need feel obligated to follow behind. No offense, but if you were as perversely overzealous about all this as I am, I'd have already made you out in the comments. But feel free to cheer from the sidelines: this fascist kills machines, so you don't have to.

Woody Guthrie, Cisco Houston & Sonny Terry:

Gonna Roll the Union On

However. . . you should still get your hands on a copy of the damn thing. Why? Two reasons. First, there's no need for us to all be douchebags about this. My opting for raving lunacy is not even close to a rational defense for your missing out on hearing these tunes. If you're any kind of a Woody fan, then this is manna from heaven. And I hope I never write anything that causes anyone to avoid something simply because I feel cranky about it. When I have solid evidence that something royally sucks, believe me, you'll hear about it.

Woody Guthrie, Cisco Houston & Sonny Terry:

Hard Travelin'

The second reason is that folk music doesn't give a crap. Folk music in its most all-encompassing manifestation almost never begins and/or ends with the music itself. Rather, the music is merely one part of a vast oral tradition, forever engorging itself on myth and fact alike, on back-alley innuendo and networked heresies. Often as not the music and lyrics are two independent treasuries of folklore, whose intersection creates a new crossroads which in turn creates a new Robert Johnson legend every time. Every gap in the story is an opportunity for a half-dozen new interpretations, and every verifiable detail is a heated debate waiting to erupt. It is an American manifestation, to be sure, and it is unique in American music genres. Chuck Berry is every bit Americana as Woody Guthrie is, but Berry's story is solid oak. We know Maybellene was recorded on May 21, 1955, that Ebby Hardy played drums, and that it took nearly thirty takes to get right. Its history is as tangible and sharp as the silver-on-blue lettering of the Chess label it bears. But Guthrie - the real Woody Guthrie, who happily played up his Midwestern yokel persona to sell more records to the east coast elites - is as unknowable as a zephyr, and Pete Seeger willed himself out of thin air and Brahmin fortitude, and even Bob Dylan's enigmas have enigmas.

Within that sweeping tradition lies ample space for the contradictions and hypocrisies to lie down next to the benign fables - hell, it's practically a given that they must. Opposites attract, and mate, and sire new urchins, and repeat ad nauseam until each inbred hive of elemental particles congeals in knowable form as a song. And the process is unending - a dustbowl ouroboros swirling furiously around in the caked earth. I have no real beef with Rounder Records, or Nora Guthrie, or the aforementioned critics, or for that matter, with Woody himself. They have their reasons, and they have their place in the story, and I acknowledge that. Just so long as they remember to make room for the KassaNostra, and the cinders I damn sure plan on kickin' up.

(Oh, and apologies to John Dos Passos for that first paragraph.)

Peace & Vinyl,

The KassaNotra

BONUS BEATLES CORRECTION: Yeah, yeah, two months is way too long to go without a new post, and believe me, it was never my intention to leave y'all with only Dennis Hopper for company. Sorry 'bout that. But I have a complaint of my own: my overwrought bravado in the above post notwithstanding, I do NOT consider myself infallible when it comes to the music I write about. When I started this blog, I was hoping to get into at least a few heated dialogues in the comments, but so far things have been pretty tame. What's that they say about two Jews having three opinions?

Case in point: in my last Beatles post way back in September(!), I ragged on the majority of Let It Be covers out there, 'cause they're mostly lame. I finally settled on a Bill Withers take as a decent offering.

Now. . . I would've expected all y'all to have written in to remind me that in 1972, the Verona (NJ) High School Jazz Ensemble scored an invite to the prestigious Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland, where they absolutely killed, with a set that included a nigh-perfect version of that vexing tune. Just so we're clear, that's high school ensemble, and Montreux Jazz Festival. Luckily for us all, my man Larry at the Funky16Corners blog (he's sort of like our music blog godfather) didn't forget, and so here're the goods, for your listening pleasure. C'mon people - it's no fun if you don't holler back.

Verona HS Jazz Ensemble: Let It Be [live]