Wearing my overdose awareness day badge with pride and thinking of young Bouwka (15) who sneaked off and scored one night in Amsterdam and due to the social stigma attached to using heroin (BLOODY JUNKIES) shot up for the first time alone and was found dead the next morning
Hey! I wasn’t sure if I’d ever get to say that to you again. But here we are! Obviously, it’s been a rough two months, but I’m ready to go back to normal, if you guys are. This was the post that was up the day the blog was disabled. I’m leaving the p.s. and the comments that came in before the shut down as they were, and of course please add your comments today. Between now and next Monday, you will be getting posts that were already set up and originally intended to launch before the blackout, and then on Tuesday we’ll go all new. The archive of the old blog will slowly appear here, but I have to do hands-on restoration on each one, so it’s going to take virtually forever. Okay, enjoy the day, and I look forward enormously to getting to talk with you again!
It's always worth checking out and Dennis himself had some very kind words to say about this blog when I first started EOMS. Welcome back!
Many years back, much like Willie and Waylon had years before, Merle Haggard said,
"Fuck this town. I'm moving." and he left Nashville.
According to my sources, it was right after a record executive told him that "Kern River" was a bad song. In the last chapter of his career and his life, Nashville wouldn't call, play, or touch him. He felt forgotten and tossed aside. I always got a sense that he wanted one last hit..one last proper victory lap of his own, and we all know deserved it. Yet it never came. And now he's gone.
Im writing this because I want to go on record and say I find it utterly disgusting the way everybody on Music Row is coming up with any reason they can to hitch their wagon to his name while knowing full and damn well what he thought about them. If the ACM wants to actually celebrate the legacy and music of Merle Haggard, they should drop all the formulaic cannon fodder bullshit they've been pumping down rural America's throat for the last 30 years along with all the high school pageantry, meat parade award show bullshit and start dedicating their programs to more actual Country Music.
While Im venting about the unjust treatment of a bonafide American music legend, I should also add, if for no other reasons than sheer principal and to get the taste I've been choking back for months now out of my mouth, that Merle was supposed to be on the cover of Garden & Gun magazine's big Country Music issue (along with myself) a few months back.
They reached out to both of us in October of last year while I was on a west coast tour. Merle was home off the road so I took a day off and traveled up to Redding.
He was so excited about it and it goes without saying that I was completely beside myself along with my Grandfather who has always been a HUGE Merle fan. We spent the whole day of the interview visiting in his living room with our families and had a wonderful conversation with the journalist. Then we spent about two hours outside being photographed by a brilliant and highly respected photographer named David McClister until Merle had enough...he was still recovering from a recent bout of double pneumonia at the time and it was a bit cold that day on the ranch.
But then at the last minute, the magazine's editor put Chris Stapleton on the cover without telling anyone until they had already gone to print. Don't get me wrong, Chris had a great year and deserves a million magazine covers...but thats not the point.
Its about keeping your word and ethics.
Chris also knows this as he called me personally to express his disgust at the situation. Dude's a class act.
The editor later claimed in a completely bullshit email apology to both Merle's publicist and ours (Chris and I share the same publicist) that they didn't get any good shots that day.
David McClister..
2 hour shoot..
no good photos..
OK buddy,..whatever you say.
Anyway, Merle passed away right after it came out.
Some days, this town and this industry have a way of making we wish I could just go sit on Mars and build glass clocks.
Sturgill
UPDATED:
Shortly after I initially posted this it was announced that Miranda Lambert would be the award recipient.
Before people start chasing clickbait by putting words in my mouth I feel the need to clarify that I was not aware of this at the time of my original post and my words were in no way directed at her. I know that Merle liked and respected her so it's good to see there is at least some blue sky in all of this.
I don't know Miranda nor have I ever met her but something tells me that in her heart, she knows I'm dead on. I am also aware that the ACM is a West Coast organization originally created to recognize West Coast artists like Merle and they have handed Merle many trophies over the years,..even in the last 15 or so mind you. It's also worth noting that the last one was handed to him by none other than Miranda Lambert herself.
But all of this is irrelevant as none of it has anything to do with the original point I was trying to make. My point was that all of these organizations don't walk it like they talk it. I called The ACM out directly because they are simply the latest in a long line of organizations that have done the same since Merle's death...and even before. Showing homage and handing lifetime achievement awards to the greats of yesterday while claiming to uphold and hold dear the original values and integrity of Country music's legacy. Yet these are just hollow words...merely empty semantics. One needs only to look glancingly at the majority of the music that they, along with the CMA's, predominantly choose to recognize and promote at their award shows.
I fully realize that as I type this, meetings and conversations are taking place on music Row to ensure I am blackballed from the industry and that's perfectly fine with me. Im not sure how you can blackball somebody you don't acknowledge in the first place anyway. Yet, even though they mostly go out of their way to ignore artists like myself and Jason Isbell, I assure you they are more than aware of our existence. They are also well aware that we don't need them. Our last albums went to #1 without any help from the Mainstream Country Music establishment...and our next albums will too. With that said, I have no more need to make enemies with these people than I have a need to be their friends. If anything I'm trying to help them. Because more and more everyday, people are waking up to the situation and they are pissed. Perhaps Country Music, especially Nashville, should wake up too before it's too late.
I should also go ahead and add here that whether or not I am nominated for a CMA award this year, I will not be attending the ceremony for no other reason than the fact I already have a sold out show scheduled in Des Moines, Iowa on the night of the awards ceremony and I have no plans to change that.
Mostly though, I just wish Merle was still alive.
I'd love for them to all hear his thoughts on the matter.
P.S. Fuck this town. I'm moving. Sturgill Simpson
Tracklist:
Emahoy Tsegué & Maryam Guèbrou - The Story of the Wind
Unknown - Hello
Dion McGregor - Snowflakes
Dion McGregor - Midget City
Ratatat - Black Heroes
Wild Man Fischer - The Leaves Are Falling
Sun Ra - Enlightenment
Nancy Dupree - James Brown
The Joubert Singers - Stand On The Word
Cindy & The Playmates - Now That School Is Through
Grateful Dead - Shakedown Street
Edan The Humble Magnificent - Fumbling Over Words That Rhyme
Nina Simone - Ain't Got No, I Got Life (Live)
Betty Everett - 1900 Yesterday
Moondog - Fog On The Hudson (425 W 57th Street)
Wild Man Fischer - Wild Man On The Strip Again
The Temple City Kazoo Orchestra - Stayin' Alive
Krak Attack CX Kidtronik & Tchaka Diallo - Fame Rapp
Moondog - Up Broadway
The Parliaments - What You Been Growing
Paul McCartney & Linda McCartney - Monkberry Moon Delight
Africa - Light My Fire
Clarence Reid - Miss Hot Stuff
Edan The Humble Magnificent - Funky Voltron (feat. Insight)
Stark Reality Discovers Hoagy Carmichael's Music Shop - Dreams
Madlib - Rock Konducta Vol 1
Unknown - The Snake
Ohio Penitentiary 511 Jazz Ensemble - Psych City
Blair - Life
Nancy Dupree - What Do I Have
Donald Byrd And The Blackbirds - Jazz Alphabet (Live)
Play Along At Home Rhythm Band - Pease Porridge Hot
Dick Rosmini & Hello People - Experiments (Teac Home Recording)
The Broads - Sing Sing Sing
Shooby Taylor - The Human Horn
Don Armando's 2nd Ave. Rhumba Band - I'm An Indian Too
The John Cacavas Golden Space Orchestra - Hydrogen and Helium
Bruce Haack - Lie Back
Bruce Haack - Sing
Frank Zappa - Oh No
Hermeto Pascoal - Som da Barba (Music From the Beard) (Live)
Blair - Virgo Princess
William Onyeabor - Better Change Your Mind
Thurston Moore & Lee Ranaldo - The Year Punk Broke
Thurston Moore - Thurston @ 13
Jack Fascinato - Music From A Surplus Store
Clara Mondshine - Die Drachentrommler (Dragon Drummers)
Frank Zappa - Excentrifugal Forz
Bruce Haack - Rubberbands
The Stooges - L.A. Blues
Bad Brains - Big Take Over
J-Jems - Dance
Bruce Haack - Motorcycle Ride
Chandra - Kate
Tony Schwartz - Music In The Streets
Ata Kak - Daa Nyinaa
Yoko Ono - Walking On Thin Ice
The Slits - I Heard It Through The Grapevine
William Onyeabor - Let's Fall In Love
Black Dice - Glazin'
Univ. of Ghana Postal Works - Cancelling Stamps At The University Of Ghana Post Office
Joe Moks - Boys And Girls
The Pointer Sisters - Don't It Drive You Crazy
David Essex - Rock On
Paul McCartney - Check My Machine
Jimmy Van M & Richard Hieronymous - I Weigh With Kilos
Hanny Nahmias - Hanna's Sabbath Dress
Sinkane - How We Be
Mort Garson - The Wozard of Iz
Uriah Heep - Wake Up
Black Milk - Wake Up
Mort Garson - Prologue
Frank Zappa - Mom and Dad
The Zombies - Hung Up On A Dream
Tony Schwartz - Music In The Streets
