Reprinted from Green Man Review.
So, we get an e-mail from Country Joe, thanking us for reviewing the Italian re-issue of several of his albums. I write back and confirm how much I enjoyed the albums, and a week later another package of CDs arrives, this time newer stuff, representing where Country Joe is right now, and what he’s been up to lately. Viet Nam Experience is a retrospective of McDonald’s songs on the situation in South-East Asia. Back in the 60s and 70s we lived with this every day. The body counts, the shaky film footage, the Hueys and rows of saddened young Americans in baggy greens walking through a swamp.
Country Joe starts the album with a redone version of “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die Rag”, this time with some piano and a jaunty beat. This tune is controversial even today, being the subject of a lawsuit brought by a relative of the composer of “Muskrat Ramble” suggesting that Mr. McDonald “borrowed” the melody. The lyrics are the important part as they express the feelings of a generation of young men who were sent off to a foreign war to accomplish… something that was never clearly explained. The vagaries of this war color all the songs on VietNam Experience. The slide guitar-driven “Foreign Policy Blues” is punctuated with the percussion of machine guns; the finger picked “Agent Orange Song” describes the plight of 
a family haunted by the effects of agent Orange. McDonald has written a series of songs about nurses, a group he has felt are unappreciated in American history. “The Girl Next Door” continues the series: “She’s everybody’s savior, the army combat nurse.” “Secret Agent”, “Viet Nam Veteran Still Alive”, “Mourning Blues” and “Welcome Home” each deal with the aspect of the war described in the title.
The album concludes with two long pieces of guitar playing, “Viet Nam Requiem, part 1: the beginning” which is 27 minutes of bluesy, moody picking, which evokes the quiet of a rice paddy, a gathering storm, with the introduction of a military drum, and builds slowly, then more quickly as a sax enters the mix then disappears. The long jam is haunting. Perhaps because of the number of popular images of the Viet Nam War, the listener can add his own film to this soundtrack. Borrowed clips from Platoon, Apocalypse Now, mixed with actual news footage from my memory banks as I listened to this Requiem. “Part 2: the end” is shorter, only 7 minutes, and more abstract, showing how the American Experience in Viet Nam ended, in chaos and panic. This is a very moving close to a powerful album.
I Fell Like I’m Fixin’ To Sing Some Songs looks very much like a bootleg, which has since been adopted as an official McDonald release. It is a very clear, well-recorded gig at Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan. It kicks off with a poem written by M.L. Liebler, read by the author over the guitar instrumental “Tranquility” played by Country Joe. It’s an interesting effect, and presages the most recent album Crossing Borders which we’ll look at in a moment. “Tranquility” slides right into one of Joe’s tributes to Woody Guthrie, “This Land Is Your Land.” Joe provides powerful folk accompaniment on acoustic guitar and harmonica. His own singing is not strong, but always warm and true. He continues in the Guthrie vein with “Goin’ Down This Old Dusty Road” and “Let’s Go Riding in the Car Car.” Songs are introduced with interesting stories, and humorous anecdotes. Country Joe is quite a raconteur. He does another of his nurse songs, “Clara Barton” and wraps things up with a long story about the history of his signature song, “I Feel Like I’m Fixin’ To Die Rag.” Viet Nam is not the only issue Joe feels strongly about. Check out “Sexist Pig”! An entertaining and well-presented hour of live Country Joe!
In 2000 McDonald developed a web-page which is well worth a visit, and which provided the title to an album. The album www.countryjoe.com finds a slow and lazy groove. “Ashkenaz” is a guitar instrumental, which is then followed by the hazy memories of “Summer of Love”: “I guess it’s time to be movin’ on [the good old days] weren’t so good after all.”
This is a very folky album — with acoustic guitar and rack-held harmonica and one passionate singer, it’s back to the basics. “Thank the Nurse” continues the nurse theme. “Thank the nurse that’s nursing you for saving your life”. “Thinking of John Fahey” is a slide guitar memorial to the great guitar soloist. There are 20 tracks on www.countryjoe.com and they continue in this mode. Low key, acoustic, solo, real unplugged music made by a real flesh and blood person. It’s one of the most human sounding albums I’ve heard in years. And I admire McDonald for doing it! I have to say… I’ve been playing a version of “Taps” very much like the one which appears here for almost 20 years, and it’s touches like this which make Country Joe special, to say nothing of closing things off with “We Shall Overcome. ”
Crossing Borders: poetry of M.L. Liebler is Country Joe’s latest album, and it is a union of his own guitar and harmonica playing with the poetry reading of Detroit poet M.L. Liebler. Liebler and McDonald share political and social concerns, and those concerns come across clearly on this album, which is perhaps the most problematic of the four under consideration. Who listens to poetry readings? Leonard Cohen had this problem early in his career and solved it by picking up the guitar and accompanying himself. Cohen’s mentor Irving Layton gave traditional readings of his work, and was spellbinding with just the sound of his voice. Liebler is a fine reader, and his words are presented in well-paced, emotive renditions. There are times when he evokes Captain Beefheart, and other times when influences disappear, and you are left with the images and the sound. The music does its job; it provides a framework, a foundation for the language. This is a brave and successful experiment.
Country Joe McDonald. He’s been around since the sixties, and he continues to provide fascinating, foot-tapping, mind-expanding, electric and acoustic music for the body and mind! Thanks Joe!
(Rag Baby Records, 1987)
(Hance/Rag Baby Records, 2000)
(Rag Baby Records, 2000)
(Rag Baby Records, 2001)
Comments