Archive for January, 1998

Tubby Brothers

Someone’s dead in Blewitt Street
Down the stairs we chipped some paint
Declined sweet cherry, had some tea
And hovered silently.

Someone’s dead in Caldicot
They dug their grave on a brand new plot
See the footbridge has been taken down
It only takes five minutes drive through town
But the flowers look like wounds
And the roads cut deep and direct
The railways change their names and don’t connect
Read the rest of this entry »

Terry Gross, Washington, DC
* 12/17/98
Fresh Air
FEATURE
(c) Copyright Federal Document Clearing House. All Rights Reserved.
TERRY GROSS, HOST: This is FRESH AIR. I’m Terry Gross. My guest, singer-guitarist Jon Langford, is a founding member of the British punk band The Mekons — one of the few punk bands of the era that is still performing. Critic Robert Christgau says they’ve put out as much good music as anybody in rock and roll.
Jonboy with Gurf Morlix at SXWS 2000 Langford is Welsh, but now lives in Chicago. Living in the States is feeding his growing interest in country music. He plays in the country-inspired band The Waco Brothers, and he pays tribute to the father of western swing on his new CD, “The Pine Valley Cosmonauts Salute the Majesty of Bob Wills.”
Langford recently released his first solo CD called, “Skull Orchard.” Langford is also a visual artist, and under the pen name Chuck Death draws the syndicated comic strip “Great Pop Things,” which satirizes rock and roll history. The strips are collected in the new book, “Great Pop Things.”
Let’s get started with a track from the Bob Wills tribute record. Read the rest of this entry »

“One of the brightest homages I’ve heard in a long time…not a bad or boring track to be found”
Bob Townsend Stomp and Stammer

“Somewhere beyond the pearly gates, Bob Wills is streched out in a rocking chair, a cigar in his left hand, a glass of Jack Daniel’s in the other, tapping his foot and grinnin’ from ear to ear. With all the crap on the airwaves that tries to pass itself as country music these days, this new recording is blessed relief…19 songs all told, each executed with the wild abandon and excellent musicianship that characterized Wills and the Playboys.”
David Bennett San Antonio Current Read the rest of this entry »

LYRICS:

NASHVILLE RADIO

Drinks and pills and Nashville radio, my life will never be the same
Chills and spills from Maine to Mexico, riding on my funeral train

In every town there’s the same tribulation, in every state that I wake up in
The night before is a dim recollection of powers and bottles and sin

There’s a bored little stranger heading out the door just about half my age
Blood on the walls and glass on the floor, I don’t think I even made it on stage

Doctor, Doctor, sign my prescription, I’m in trouble again
Ever since I was a tiny little baby, I couldn’t get rid of the pain

Drinks and pills and Nashville radio, my life will never be the same
Spills and chills from Maine to Mexico, riding on my funeral train

I shake my hips but I walk like a cripple, and my body is getting too thin
I can count every one of my bones in the mirror, poking through my cold white skin

There’s a shiny star on the dressing room door, but I’ll be out in the back of my car
Cause I don’t know a soul I can trust with the money or to tune up my guitar

Drinks and pills and Nashville radio, my life will never be the same
Chills and spills from Maine to Mexico, riding on my funeral train

Doctor, Doctor, sign my prescription, I’m in trouble again
Ever since I was a tiny little baby, I couldn’t get rid of the pain

I can’t sleep without the engine humming, and the wheels rolling night and day
I can’t sleep without the Nashville radio, slipping through the chemical haze

Playing some song that I should remember , with the DJ calling my name
Play my song on the Nashville radio, my life will never be the same

Ever since I was a tiny little baby I couldn’t get to sleep at night
I’d be listening to the Nashville radio hours before daylight

They threw me off the Grand Ole Opry cause I couldn’t behave
I didn’t know how many friends I had until I was lying in a cold dark grave

I gave my life to country music, took my pills and lust
If they don’t play my songs on the radio, it feels like I never was
(feels like I never was)

Fat sweaty cop in an Alabama lock-up looked at me and laughed
Said he heard my songs on the Nashville radio, asked me for my autograph

He said, “Doctor, Doctor, sign my prescription, I’m in trouble again
Ever since I was a tiny little baby, I couldn’t get rid of the pain”

THE DEATH OF COUNTRY MUSIC
(also from Waco Brothers album COWBOYS IN FLAME)

My body is a temple
Safer than a prison
I done some demolition
And in a world gone wrong

The death of country music
Rattles round the planet
We light the flame and fan it
Deep into the night

Where the city casts its shadow
We leave the straight and narrow
Tomorrow and forever
Seems so far away

Where the dance floor’s overcrowded
The music’s getting louder
The people do some breathing
While they’re cheating death

Tonight the west is sleeping
The desert will be creeping
Inch by inch
Across the continent

And the bones of country music
Lie there in their casket
Beneath the towers of Nashville
In a deep black pool of neglect

So we cast our nets in the water
Drag the pool and caught ‘em
Grind ‘em up and snort ‘em
Deep into the night

And we spill some blood on the ashes
Of the bones of the Jones and the Cashes
Skulls in false eyelashes
Ghostriders in the sky

And the Hack bone’s connected to the Buckbone
And the George bone’s connected to the Hank bone
The Willie bone’s connected to the Billy Bones
We’re picking the flesh off the bone

The death of country music
The death of country music
The death of country music
We’re picking the flesh off the bones

DOLLAR DRESS (also on COWBOYS IN FLAME, WACO BROTHERS)

She is dancing with death in the Dollar Dress

There’s a box in an attic in a run down northern town
There’s a key on the shelf so you can look inside
There’s a song that will pick you up and spin you round
A photograph and a letter left behind

Can you prove you’re alive?
Do you know where you’re been today?
Sown into the fabric of your life
Washed and mended, worn away

She is dancing with death in the dollar dress

The hooter sounds and the whole town shakes again
A line of ghosts clock out at the factory gates
Cousins, sisters and brothers are spirited home
They fill the streets and make the traffic wait

Will the flag still fly
If the wind don’t blow today?
It’s sown into the fabric of your life
Washed and mended, worn away

THE RETURN OF THE GOLDEN GUITARIST

His grip is not frozen in one old G chord
Looking for thousands of bodies
With luck he might make it without losing his way.
The return of the golden guitarist

His eyes are as flat as an old 45
That somehow never quite charted
Out of his mouth spews vinyl and wax
The return of the golden guitarist

It’s time to come clean, to come back this way
Time to come back in the harness
You’ve stolen our lust, now he has found
The return of the golden guitarist

What gives him the right to talk that way
Pray silence, now don’t get me started
You got freedom of speech, but you got nothing to say
So welcome the golden guitarist

His eyes are as flat as an old 45
That somehow never quite charted
Out of his mouth spews vinyl and wax
The return of the golden guitarist

Non album song Verdun Hear it, read it
Reviews, and a show report

Skull OrchardOk, this has to be said: English isn’t my prime language, so I should leave my hands off this. Please be patient with my understanding of the lyrics. The original release has lyric sheets to fill the gaps in my understanding, especially of track 13

SONGS:
Tubby Bros. (2:20)
Penny Arcades (3:50)
Butter Song (3:12)
Sentimental Marching Song (4:20)
Youghal (3:06)
Trap Door (2:40)
Inside The Whale (3:30)
I Am The Law (2:10)
Pill Sailor (2:25)
Last Count (3:30)
My Own Worst Enemy (3:00)
I’m Stopping This Train (2:45)
Deep Sea Driver
Tom Jones Levitation (4:20);
Last song (1:04)

REVIEWS

Jon Langford’s debut solo album SKULL ORCHARD is released by Sugarfree Records of Chicago on January 20th.

Jon Langford’s solo songwriting project THE SKULL ORCHARD has evolved into a full blown band which consists of Langford on guitar and vocals, notorious Chicago guitar demon Mark Durante (ex- Revolting Cocks, KMFDM), drummer Steve Goulding (ex-Gang Of Four, Graham Parker & The Rumour) and bass player Alan Doughty (ex-Jesus Jones). Also on the record are Sally Timms, Jane Baxter-Miller, Edith Frost, John Rice and more….

Having lived in America for the last 5 years (currently playing break-neck hard country with his band the Waco Brothers), Skull Orchard sees Langford turning his attention back across the Atlantic to the country he grew up in. Read the rest of this entry »