The Post-Rockist

I know what you’re going to say: “Oh, so I suppose it’s sooo post-rockist that your first review is of a folk record.” Well, yes, I guess so. Sure, I could attempt to justify it. I could point out that Elliott’s “San Francisco Bay Blues,” according to the album’s liner notes, was one of the first songs that a young lad named Paul McCartney learned to play on the guitar (and that McCartney and Clapton each covered the song on their respective Unplugged albums). Oh sure, I could point out that on this record Elliott is accompanied by the likes of Lucinda Williams, Corin Tucker of Sleater Kinney, and even freakin’ Flea, among others. And I could offer the story from Chronicles where Dylan as a young Minnesota guitar plucker and singer suffered a great blow to his building ego upon hearing a Jack Elliott album for the first time, finding that someone was doing exactly what he was doing, but better. Or later how Elliott showed Dylan such encouragement in his early Village days that Dylan cleped Elliott “my long-lost father.”

But you know what? I’m not going justify this review’s raison d’etre at all. The Post-Rockist snubs its nose at categorization and un-holes pigeons like we’re the World Wildlife Federation or something.

A question I’ve asked myself while listening to the album for the twelfth time: Why is an album by an old man who is singing songs that were old when he was a 20-something so poignant in the life of this 20-something? Maybe it’s because I’m nearing the end of this 20-something period of my life–alas, the quarter-life crisis. Fact is, I could relate to most of these songs even though many are nearing a century in age.

Twelve of the sixteen tracks (totaling less than 33 minutes in length) are somehow related to death–like too many a folk song, I suppose. But hearing them from a man whose voice is not old– like Johnny Cash or Kris Kristofferson or Leonard Cohen, all at about the same age as Elliott when they recorded their most recent albums (well, when the Man in Black was alive)–Elliott’s voice is ragged, but not run down; scratched and scarred, but un-bandaged.

The opener, Engine 143, is an old Carter family song about a young man who recklessly drives his engine train headfirst into a wall–no breaking for this youth. After Georgie slams full-speed the Engine 143, Elliott follows with “Arthritis Blues,” a song about the drugs, booze, and aches sustained as life slowly puts on the breaks for you. It’s just the kind of song you’d expect a 70-year-old man sing, but he outsmarts the listener with the final verse: “If I live to be 43 / you’ll find me running like a Model-T.” Oh the perspective. When the song was written, running like a Model-T was probably considered pretty robust, but from an old man in 2006, it’s a classic instance of using a lyric from yore and flipping the meaning without having to try hard. Elliott recognizes his own cleverness with a little chuckle after singing the lyric.

Three particular highlights:

1. “Blue.” The song was written by Cisco Houston, Woody Guthrie’s playing partner and co-vagabondizer in the 40s (please see Bound for Glory. Really, you must read that book). It all seems pretty innocuous at first. Blue is a dog. Elliott sings of his great friendship with the dog–a fellow traveller on the ramblin’ road. The Shithead to Elliott’s Navin Johnson, I suppose.

The chorus represents the duet that a dog and his companion master have sung throughout the centuries. Many a time have I witnessed this musical communion between man and dog. Elliott sings “Oh, Ba-looooooooooooooooooooooooooo” in a falsetto that would get all the dogs in a neighborhood to join along. Lady would surely roll her eyes as Tramp returns the call. But seeming frivolity turns to tenderly morose feeling:

“When old Blue died it died so hard / it shook the ground in my backyard / so I dug his grave with a silver spade / I lowered him down on a golden chain / When the maker did call his name / I cried. / Hey Ba-loooooooooooooooooooooooooo / I’m comin’ too.”

Then you realize why the singer “Ba-loooooooooooooo”s alone.

2. “Rake and Ramblin’ Blues.” The most awe-striking song on the album. It’s a set up for the end the whole time. It’s a song about rompin’ and ramblin’ and its effects on the ones you love. The guitar is certainly a-rompin’ on this song, as Elliott delivers a honky tonk blues melody and flat-picking a la Hank. He then stops suddenly on the guitar, speaking in syncopated iambs:

“My mother says she’s all alone / My sister says she has no home / My wife she left in a sad despair / With an achin’ heart and a baby fair. / Now when I die don’t bury me at all. / Just place me away in alcohol. / My .44 put by my feet / and tell everyone I’m just asleep.”

And then he cackles. A cackle that sends shivers. The cackle of a real ramblin’ man, a man who can’t stay still. The cackle of a man who does not stop for even his loved ones. The real rolling stone.

3. “Woody’s Last Ride.” The album’s finale. It’s pretty obvious that this is the song that Jack had the least to do with. The brainchild of producer Ian Brennan surely, Jack simply recites a story as musicians deliver delicately a backcloth from which Jack’s words can paint a picture of his hero and friend. I shall not recite the story here–you must listen yourself. It concerns the last time Jack and Woody Guthrie played and travelled together. It’s the story of how the ramblin’ gene gets passed on over the generations. And through the song, through the entire album, Ramblin’ Jack is trying to impart that gene to us.

Still a-ramblin’. Still a-carryin’ on. Still a-movin’. Unable and unwilling to collect any possessions but his memories of the road.

The Post-Rockist is just as much a fan of the stage, the drumset, and the mixing board as any other recovering music snob, but there’s something about the music that moves with the musician, literally, for surely Jack Elliott has played these songs walking through random towns, with random folks walking along and behind. These are the songs that travel not only from coast to coast, but from generation to generation, through space and time. Life as a journey is a metaphor to most of us. Ramblin’ Jack took the metaphor literally. I Stand Alone may be the name of the album–and it certainly could be the title of the biography–but we all have some kind of connection to Ramblin’ Jack’s world. He may well stand alone, but we stand alone with him.

Ramblin’ Jack Elliott’s I Stand Alone is on Anti-.