Eddy Arnold

Speaking of Eddy Arnold, here's the 10 Country songs the Tennessee Plowboy loved to sing (as opposed to all the other "records after records" that sold "magic millions" that he wished he could dump in the river like a sack of kittens?). 

I honestly don't have any basis for comparison in terms of fame or notoriety, this is the first time i've ever heard of him. So, we'll do the numbers. Nashville innovator in the 50s (so, like a Les Paul Doppelganger), 85+ million records sold, 147 charting songs (2nd only to George Jones, with whose renown i am acquainted), so yeah, guy is pretty objectively famous for his time and milieu. Then he went Pop and everyone got all upset, just like Modern English. That's a fun coincidence. 

Behind the scenes it's all the same tug-of-war. Just when you got your thing down pat somebody up and innovates and you get all "back to normal when i was raking in the dough, not you!" Well, from my point of view "normal" was me patiently tolerating your garbage and waiting for my turn while you vociferously criticized my kind of garbage. Technically it's my turn to criticize your garbage while you shut up and take it, but that's not at all what i want. I want to throw all the garbage in the dumpster and have less garbage all around. 

So let's press play and make an effort. I promise I'll like the good parts, but if there's bad parts i'm gonna mouth 'em. Deal? Here we go. 

- My girl wants to party [snap] cuddle bug all the time.

- the metaphor mashup is so confusing. You can't get over her because you're a metaphorical prisoner in your own mind? How's that her fault? 

- i was so lonely without you. K, fine, but where did she go and why? I'm gender stereotyping of course, but the question is relevant either direction. It's got a real Watertown vibe to it is what i'm saying. 

- are you insinuating that she's the one spreading those rumors? That pedal steal line is pure musical sarcasm, but i can't tell which direction it's pointing. 

- again, i'd like some clarification as to why she left you, not just the phenomenological description of how surprised you are about being sad. 

Well then, side 1 had enough passive aggressive sniveling to choke a horse. What's side 2 got for us? 

- i was a bashful kid, but then i grew up to be a womanizer. Even your mom pointed it out? Fun times? 

- the implication is that being an astronaut, cotton farmer, archeologist, or digger (assuming China is the antipode to where you're currently located) are all genuinely unpleasant things in your mind. Hmmm. 

- waaaa! Relationships are hard. Oh ho ho, just gonna slip that "you were lying about your vows" line in there? 

- i sure miss sitting on the porch being morally righteous and observably not doing anything. 

- wish i hadn't fallen in love with you. 

Look, i mean, as an album this is surprisingly good, but the overall concept is that i'm supposed to feel sorry for how terribly unfaithful women are to you. I'll be right back, i just need to go vomit a little. 

Ok, that's a little better. I think maybe we need to zoom out a few levels to really get at what makes me not like this. The music is lovely, i adore sad songs and mopiness in general, but the overarching sentiment is completely misogynistic. This isn't about a specific person or situation, it's intentionally the generalized voice of the "lonesome Cowboy." Cowboy Music is such a heavily mythologized and romanticized genre that it takes an enormous amount of unpacking. 

Remember back when Skip and Sandra punished me with Kenny Rogers and his laments about the trucker life? Yeah, same difference, but Mr. Chicken's own songs were mostly relationship positive in the face of adversity. This, however, is exactly what Gaudio, Holmes, and Sinatra were criticizing (borderline satirizing) with Watertown: i'm out here punching stupid cattle with nothing but unfaithful women i wish i weren't so lovesick about not waiting for me back home. Where's my bucket? 

There's no story here, no insight, no explanation for good or bad, just a lot of elbow nudges and "am i right?" Sycophantic pedantry; she done me wrong. 

Now, as an artistic object i have no argue. The album concept and execution are excellent across the board. Intellectually, though, it's hard to empathize with a world view like that because the actual internal personified narrator is the literal source of his own problem. He wants the opposite of reality and the fact that he doesn't get it is everybody else's fault. That's narcissistic douchebaggery. I can appreciate it AS narcissistic douchebaggery, but that's at least 3 layers of industrially terrible fast-food burrito when there's an honest to goodness taco truck in the parking lot next door. You're not even hiding the hypocritical double standard because you sang the song where your literary mom pointed it out! You are the literal antagonist of your own autobiography, and that's like $2,000/credit hour graduate seminar territory right there. "I only have eyes for you" loses all of its luster when there's the elliptical "but i wish i didn't" attached to it. You account for half of that failed relationship whether you admit it or not. 

Is that a fair criticism of Eddy Arnold the Country singer? Probably almost certainly not. Is it a fair criticism of the marketing persona of Eddie Arnold used to sell millions of 45s for pander profits? Well, Narzon, maybe i wasn't mean enough.

Part 6