Dedicated to Casey Linc Moman, born the 16th March, 1978.
Charly Reissue Notes:
The death on the first day of 1997 of Townes Van Zandt, a singer/songwriter from Texas, robbed the world of a troubled genius. His best compositions possessed a magical quality rarely found elsewhere, and he will be greatly missed. This reissue is the final element of a definitive series which will both restore his early (and, many feel, his best) albums to current availability, and allow them to be re-evaluated.
Born into a prominent local family in Fort Worth, Texas, in 1944, John Townes Van Zanet's upbringing was transitory as his father worked in the oil industry, Van Zandt Snr. bought Townes a guitar following Elvis Presley's television debut on the 'Ed Sullivan Show' in 1956. Graduating from High School in Minnesota, Van Zandt went on to a private military school for two years. Around this time, he was diagnosed as a manic-depressive ... He later attended university courses in Colorado and Texas.
In 1964, resolved to become a folk singer, Van Zandt abandoned a law course at the University of Texas in Houston. He found a focus and direction for his music, after witnessing bluesman Sam 'Lightnin" Hopkins performing in local clubs. Befriending two fellow songwriters, Mickey Newbury and Guy Clark, the former was instrumental in the 1968 release of Van Zandt's Poppy label debut. 'For The Sake Of The Song'. This was the start of a string of annual releases: 'Our Mother The Mountain' [1969] was followed by 'Townes Van Zandt' [1970], 'Delta Momma Blues' [1971], 'High, Low & In Between' [1972] and 'The Late, Great Townes Van Zandt' [1973]. Subsequent to the appearance of his sixth album, the Poppy label filed for bankruptcy, which signalled a temporary halt to Van Zandt's recording career. 'Live At The Old Quarter' [1977] was his debut Tomato label release, although the recordings dated from 1973, and were captured during a five day long residency by Van Zandt at the Houston, Texas, venue. Originally released as a 26 track double album, it remains his most accessible work.
A songbook of Van Zandt composinons, 'For The Sake Of The Song,' appeared concurrent with his return as a recording artist. Published by Wings Press of Houston, within the pages of the tome he reminisced about his days at the University of Colorado - a time when he would lock himself in his room for days on end. 'Being drunk all the time, drinking Bali Hai wine, playing the guitar, listening to Hank Williams and early Bob Dylan. I'd come out at the end of a week and throw a giant party I lived on the fourth storey of this apartment building, and at one point during one of those parties, I went out and sat on the edge of the balcony and started leaning backwards. I decided I was gonna lean over and just see what it felt like all the way up to when you lost control and were falling. I realised that to do it I'd have to fall. But I said I'm going to do it anyway So I started leaning back really slow, and really paying attention I fell. Fell over backwards, and fanded four storeys down flat on my back. I remember the impact and exactly what it felt like and all the people screaming. I had a bottle of wine, and I stood up. Hadn't spilled any wine. Felt no ill effects whatsoever. Meanwhile all the people jammed onto the elevator, and when the doors opened, they knocked me over coming out. And it hurt more being knocked over than falling four storeys.' The foregoing occurrence is recalled in the lines of the penultimate verse of the Eric Taylor song "Comanche," which was included on his 1998 Munich Records recording, 'Resurrect'.
FLYIN' SHOES
Produced by Chips Moman, Van Zandt's second Tomato label release, 'Flyin' Shoes' [1978], was his first studio recording for half a decade. Cut at Nashville's American Studios and featuring ten songs, the line-up of studio musicians was, frankly, breathtaking. Local session legends Tommy Cogbill, Bobby Emmons, Jimmy Day and Spooner Oldham joined forces with Gary & Randy Scruggs (the sons of Earl Scruggs). Phillip Donnelly brought along some acoustic and electric guitars and picked a storm, while a young Billy Burnette assisted with backing vocals.
'Loretta,' the opening track, was already an established concert favourite among Van Zandt fans. Two decades later, that was still the case. While he was cutting his 'No Place to Fall' for 'Flyin' Shoes', Georgia born songwriter Steve Young was putting down his own interpretation in another Nashville studio. Young titled the resulting RCA album, 'No Place To Fall', which appropriately brings us to the title track of Van Zandt's eighth album. As far as his song catalogue is concerned, the classic 'Flyin' Shoes' thoroughly deserves the accolade. The interpretation is haunting. Opening with a solo harmonica refrain reminiscent of 'Shenandoah', a piano and acoustic guitar subsequently pick up the melody. Randy Scruggs's mandolin work on the middle eight is one of those once in a lifetime moments. Lyrically, the narrator dreams of taking to the road once more - pure Townes. The only cover on this collection is Elias McDaniel's 'Who Do You Love', a 1956 US R&B hit for McDaniel under his more familiar name, Bo Diddley. A cover version of this song by progressive rock band Juicy Lucy reached the UK Top 20 in 1970. The vocal and guitar on the 'got some money let's go drinking' song, 'Dollar Bill Blues', sound at times, unearthly, while 'Rex's Blues' was written in honour of his old Houston pal, Rex Bell. The lyric of the gentle 'Pueblo Waltz' includes a namecheck for Guy and Susanna Clark. 'Snake Song' closes the album. On the album's front cover photograph, Townes is looking out of one of the windows of his Franklin, Tennessee, backwoods retreat in the front cover photograph, while the whole of the shack is seen on the rear of the sleeve.
The appearance of 'Flyin' Shoes' marked the end of the second phase of Van Zandt's recording career. The opening shot of phase three was a decade away in the future. During the latter part of the Seventies, the Tomato imprint reissued all Van Zandt's previous recordings, apart from 'For the Sake Of The Song.' The closing years of his life were plagued by a seemingly endless stream of live albums of dubious quality and source, and Van Zandt only recorded two further studio albums, 'At My Window' [1987] and 'No Deeper Blue' [1994].
BONUS TRACKS FROM 'THE NASHVILLE SESSIONS'
In 1993 Tomato Records released 'The Nashville Sessions', an album comprising what were presumably twelve out-takes, which are reckoned to date from 1973. Subsequent to completing the recording sessions, the finances of the Poppy label collapsed and the tapes disappeared for two decades. There does, however, appear to be a thread of truth in dating the tracks thus. Ten of the songs appeared on Van Zandt's next three releases, 'Live at the Old Quarter, Houston, Texas' [released 1977 - but recorded in 1973], 'Flyin' Shoes' [1978] and 'At My Window' [1987]. The only versions of 'The Spider Song' and 'Upon My Soul' recorded by Van Zandt were those which appeared on 'The Nashville Sessions', and they appear here as bonus tracks, along with the first known studio recordings of 'Buckskin Stallion Blues' and 'At My Window'.
COVER VERSIONS OF SONGS
It's truly ironic that Townes Van Zandt enjoyed his greatest commercial success as a songwriter during a period when he was once again maintaining a silence as a recording artist in his own right. Taken from Emmylou Harris's 'Cimarron' album, her duet with Don Williams on 'If I Needed You' was released as a single, entering the US Country Chart during September 1981 and remaining there for 17 weeks, peaking in the Top 3. Willie Nelson & Merle Haggard scored a Nunber One US Country chart single with 'Pancho and Lefty' during the early summer of 1983. Emmylou Harris also recorded 'Pancho and Lefty', on her 1977 album, 'Luxury Liner', which also included 'I'll Be Your San Antonio Rose', penned by Guy Clark's wife, Susanna. The intertwined connections are endless. Other artists who have covered Van Zandt compositions include Hoyt Axton [1977], Guy Clark [1978], Steve Young [1978] and Bobby Bare [1980]. During the Eighties, fellow Texans Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Cassell Webb and Calvin Russell also kept his flame alive. Of late, bands such as The Tindersticks, Mudhoney and The Walkabouts have cut material by Van Zandt, while Steve Earle finally joined the brotherhood in 1995 with 'Tecumseh Valley'.
Through the Seventies and well into the Eighties, Van Zandt's home base was, at various times, Austin and Nashville. He favoured living on the outskirts of both conurbations. Solitude seemed to be his favourite acquaintance. Each spring Van Zandt would head for the deserted high country of Colorado and Montana with only his horse and dog, Geraldine, for company.
LAST DAYS
During his last British tour in early December, 1996, Van Zandt was in bad physical shape, In his Country Music People review of the Texan's performance at London's Borderline, Douglas McPherson commented 'He spoke slowly, hesitatingly, as if every syllable caused him the greatest difficulty', Later came the somewhat prophetic observation 'He looked like death, but Townes was flying, He was in good humour, too, joking: 'I have a daughter aged five [Katie Bell]. I have a son aged 14 [Will] and another son aged 27 [John Townes]. I don't get laid much but when I do, it works', Prone to stumbling and falling over during his final years, on Christmas Eve, 1996, it happened once again, Reluctant to consult a doctor, Townes was eventually admitted to hospital on New Year's Eve, He was x-rayed and a broken hip was confirmed. Early on New Year's Day, he underwent an operation where a pin was inserted in the broken bone. Signing an early release from the medical facility, he returned to Jeanene's home in Smyrna, near Nashville. Despite being divorced, Townes stayed with Jeanene and their two young children whenever he was in Tennessee. He died at 10pm on New Year's Day.
TRIBUTES
A deluge of obituaries followed his death, even in the columns of some of the British quality newspapers, but in my estimation, Austin-American Statesman music writer Michael Corcoran captured the essence of the man. 'Soon after high school, the gaunt songwriter ran from the mansion on the hill to the railroad tracks, from comfort to danger, and started writing songs about the desperate drifters and life's losers he met in his travels'. Another Austin scribe of note, John T. Davis, commented 'It seems to me to be the prerequisite for writing songs that you've got to be alone, said the man who once described his four basic food groups as "whiskey, cigarettes, guitar strings and driving". But he passed (away) at home, in the bosom of his family, sitting up in a wheelchair and eating cheese and crackers. And, we are told, laughing'. In The New York Times, pop music critic Neil Strauss wrote of 'powerfully written songs and a spare, haunting delivery that influenced many country, folk and rock performers' and that Van Zandt had virtually become a 'beacon to a generation of songwriters'. That assessment constitutes a nigh perfect tribute.
Long time friend, musician and companion of the road, Richard Dobson, recalled the laying to rest of Townes' ashes on the soil of North Texas, 'We were to meet up with the funeral party at the Worthinqton Hotel. A cold, bright morning under high cirrus cloud; tawny yellow fields and bare trees; Tom Waits on the tape player. We found the hotel where we retired to the bar to wait until the party had assembled. A line of cars began a long, circuitous drive through ethnic suburbs of Forth Worth. Townes' last joke, I thought. At length after much turning and backtracking we came upon a small country cemetery with a number of cars parked around a gravel lot. Standing in the cold wind, Townes' sister-in-law delivered a prayer. Townes' ashes had come in a kind of plastic container which his ex-wife, Jeanene, tore open and poured directly into the hole. "Townes wouldn't want to be buried in plastic", she said. Dust rose up like smoke from the hole. 'Look, he's trying to escape,' she said as a ripple of laughter passed through the graveside crowd. Townes' younger brother Bill delivered the eulogy, a sampling of anecdotes and family history. J. T., Townes' oldest son from his first marriage, played his Gibson guitar. Tall and good looking like his father in earlier days, he sang 'If I Needed You'. And it wasn't only the similarity in looks, but in his voice which sounded eerily like his dad's'.
IN CONCLUSION
Finally, while assembling the sleeve notes for these re-issues, I asked numerous musicians for Townes Van Zandt stories. My favourite comes from New York based songwriter/recording artist, Richard Shindell. Dating back to a time before Richard became a performing musician, the following conversation took place in the toilet of that famous New York listening room, The Speakeasy. Shindell is standing facing the porcelain, as a guy must do, when he notices that Townes is standing next to him. Richard struck up a conversation with, "Mr. Van Zandt, I'm a really big fan of your music; would you sing 'Flyin' Shoes' for me?'. To which Townes replied "What? Now?" Through it all, that Texas-born gentlemen possessed the sharpest wit. Thank goodness that he exercised every opportunity to share it with us...
Arthur Wood [Kerrville Kronikle], April 1998.
Edited by John Tobler.
The author would like to thank in no particular order: Krystyna [for always being there], Michael Corcoran, John T. Davis, Michael Weston King, Charlie Hunter, Richard Shindell, Mickie Merkens and Brian Wood.
Lastly, and greatest of all - thanks for the recorded legacy, Townes.
Original Townes Van Zandt available from Charly:
Our Mother The Mountain (CDGR 211)
Live At The Old Quarter, Houston, Texas (CDGR 216-2)
High, Low And In Between (CDGR 214)
The Late Great Townes Van Zandt (CDGR 215)
Delta Momma Blues (CDGR 213)
Townes Van Zandt (CDGR 212)
For The Sake Of The Song (CDGR 241)
This compilation (P) (C) 1998 Charly Schallplatten GmbH
Country or origin - Germany
Made in the E.U.
File under: Country
All copyrights in the recorded works and in the recorded performances reserved. No lending, unauthorized duplicationlease, public performance and broadcasting prohibited.
ADD
Digitally remastered at Charly Studios.
Compact Disc Digital Audio
SPA
LC 8477
WAG 326
4 017692 338621
Flyin' Shoes (1978) -