Season 340: Doc and Merle

Blinded By Love

This is from a previous Season, but I do like this version of a song by Doc Pomus AND Dr. John. Hope you like it - I did a version with some lead playing in it also, but this is the only video I have of it.

 
Bloviate - talk at length, especially in an inflated or empty way.

We call it "blethering", a Scots word. (My Mother was Scots)

I'm hoping to get something in for such a great theme but it's Whitby Folk Week. So I'll be "down the road" during the early part of the week.
 
Last edited:
I know people here will think this is a slam dunk Season for me, but that's not exactly the case, which I admit is odd. I don't do many Merle Haggard songs because my voice doesn't fit his at all, and so many people can do his stuff so much better than I can, I tend to kinda stay away from it. I've known of Doc Watson my entire life it seems, but he's a guy I've never followed, and I have no idea why. No reason, just never did. So, this week is not in my wheelhouse, strangely enough. That being said, there's a treasure trove of songs to pick from, so no problemo there. Here's a Merle Haggard song I heard a band doing at a dive bar many years ago, and I liked it instantly. Was fun trying it out now, did a quick work up, and this is my 2nd take.

 
Back in 1964, Doc Watson played two solo gigs at Purdue Universty and at the University of Illinois. Thes two gigs were documented on the CD Sittin' on top of the World. https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/poprock/detail/-/art/doc-watson-sittin-on-top-of-the/hnum/8001807
Track No.14 is a flatpicked version of the renaissance song Green Sleeves. Now, I know enough of flatpicking guitar to appreciate Doc's mastery, but I am not good enough a flatpicker myself to try to copy him. So I recorded a version of Green Sleeves with fingerpicked Uke and tremoloed mando:
 
This is from a previous Season, but I do like this version of a song by Doc Pomus AND Dr. John. Hope you like it - I did a version with some lead playing in it also, but this is the only video I have of it.



Just. Wow.
 
Here's a duet Porter Wagoner and Merle Haggard had out in 1976, which amazingly to me only went to #76 on the country charts. This is a really powerful song about the dangers of being in a bar band and becoming a raging alcoholic. This is a bit rough and experimental, I was trying some licks and stuff as I went along here, some I kinda had planned, and some I didn't, and it shows, but the vibe felt good, so I kept it. This is one of those songs that if I did it 100 times, I think I'd play and sing it a little differently every time.

 

This is a Merle Travis song from the 1940s. I learned it from a John Prine record in the 1970s. I guess that makes me a young whippersnapper.:D
 
Didn't think I'd be able to get to this one first, lol. Anyway, when I was a little kid, I was very familiar with this song, and it always seemed very dark to me. In my imagination, I saw Clifton Clowers as some kind of strange, feral mountain man with supernatural powers who could speak with animals and was the guardian of this forbidden mountain. And the reason the whole song was only about going to Wolverton Mountain was because he never came back.

Jo Ann Campbell recorded an answer song this to song called "I'm the Girl From Wolverton Mountain" which uses the same music. I have not been able to determine who wrote the new lyrics, however.



Here's a link to another video of Merle Kilgore talking about the history of this song, which is both informative and humorous.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TehoxDrN9Tw
 
Season 340. Submission 1. "If I Were A Carpenter" (Words and music by Tim Hardin, 1966)

Rick, this one has been recorded by Doc and Richard Watson.


 
This song has been in my "to do" list for some time. I first heard it courtesy of Lonnie Donegan and then I later found Leadbelly's version. I noticed Doc Watson had recorded it so I gave it a listen and there's no way I can emulate the Doc Watson High Speed Banjo picking bluegrass style so I'm sticking with the Leadbelly style. Leadbelly does it as a call and response song and I decided to use a harp for the response rather than backup vocal. I added a drone from my shruti box which I think fills the sound out quite nicely. You don't really notice it most of the time but it adds a bit of bass to my 6 string tenor.
Editing to add: This is a Doc and a Merle as the YT vid I looked at credited it to Doc and Merle Watson with Merle Watson on Banjo.

I doubt I'll get another done now till Friday.
 
Last edited:
Perhaps not the first Doc who springs to mind, but as it happens, I just texted this little Doc McStuffins song to my granddaughter this morning. ;D
 
Re: the parent/child theme, here's a song I wrote about my dad who died of cancer when I was 10. He was the Best Dad Ever.

I found that everybody studiously avoided the subject because either it was too painful for them, or for me, or because they just didn't know what to say.

Sometimes I imagine trying to explain what I do for a living (I work in software) to my dad if he were around today, and I don't know where to begin when the world has changed so drastically in the last 20 years. "Right, so there's this thing called the Internet...yeah that dial-up thing but uh, much better..." Kind of mind-boggling. Anyway. Yesterday was the song played at his funeral.

 
I guess I'll go ahead and follow Sparky's song so no one else will have to. That song kind of put a stop to everything I was doing. I'm still choked up over it.

So anyway, I recently got a lap steel guitar. I don't know what I'm doing with it yet, but I wanted to try and do something. "Steel Guitar Rag" was originally an instrumental composed by legendary steel guitarist Leon McAuliffe. Merle Travis wrote some words for it so he could record a vocal version, which also prominently features a steel guitar. I recommend looking up both versions for some awesome steel guitar playing.

 
End of Day One (U.S. EDT): 17 entries, all gems. If you haven’t checked out Sparky’s tribute to her Dad ...

Thank you all for a great start!
 
OF COURSE I have complete tunnel vision this week- and of course I am going to play Merle
Haggard songs. Funny, my two favorite Country artists had the same wife for a bit. Never got to see Buck Owens, but Merle Haggard did come to town about 2 weeks before he passed away, and what a great show.
Anyway- I can’t help anyone with doc songs, or Merle Travis songs (because tunnel vision remember?) but I can with the Hag. He very often paid tribute to his biggest influences, Lefty Frizzell (and I suppose if you don’t do country that may not help) and Jimmie Rodgers...which is still country sorta, but I think everyone knows a Jimmie Rodgers song (OK- I hope).
Anyway- this.
 
Now, it's DOC-AND-MERLE-time. From the album Remembering Merle, I chose Wayfaring Stranger:
 
A little late night Merle, in a van lit by two SolarAid lamps, which are what all these songs are paying for. Posting this from a motorway services on the way home...:(

 
Top Bottom