Randy Newman “Rednecks”

Yesterday I was writing about this Randy Newman song in relation to a Bruce Hornsby tune, and I thought I’d continue on some of the thoughts started in that last post.

You may not have ever heard this song before if you don’t own a Randy Newman album, because it’s certainly never going to get played on the radio.

If I tell you that the song is a scathing indictment of hypocritical Northerners’ racism, from the perspective of a Southerner, you might think, “Hey, that’s something I’d be interested in hearing.”

But if I tell you that the song features, prominently and frequently, the word “Nigger,” are you less likely to want to cozy up to it?

Volumes have been written about the word and its uses and abuses, but in the musical world I live it, I don’t have to deal with it too much. It just doesn’t appear too often in the songs of artists we love at mvyradio.

But occasionally, I have to confront it. And, honestly, I find it hard to be consistent.

A few years ago, I received a withering rebuke from a listener who had heard me play Bob Dylan’s “Hurricane.” Someone had requested the tune that day, and I was happy to play it, but unsure of how to handle the Dylan lyric “he was just a crazy nigger.” When the line clicked by, I flipped the volume off and on, as a hand-made “bleeping” out of the offensive word.

The listener was extremely offended that I would a) edit Dylan and b) think that the use of "Nigger” in the context of Dylan’s narrative, was offensive.

I have to admit, I have made the “Context” argument before.

A friend of mine told me he was protesting a movie because he’d heard that it contained multiple uses of a slur he (and I, and probably you) found offensive. I asked him if context mattered, or if the word was never appropriate to use. He said Never. I asked if, in the movie, it was Hitler who said, “I hate those damn (slur)s!” Would it then be okay to use an offensive word, because it showed the character to be an offensive person? My friend thought about it, but held his position. Even in that context, he felt it was a word that no one should use. I disagreed, but do concede that there are lots of folks out there who hold his position.

I wrote the “Hurricane” complainant an email that explained that while the use of “Nigger” in the context of the Dylan’s story was entirely appropriate, he had to realize that most people are not immersed in a song and its story, when they’re listening to the radio. It was a hot summer day, and as I was spinning the track, I was imagining how that line, out of context, would sound coming through the speakers of say, The Black Dog Bakery, where they, like many, many other businesses, pipe mvyradio through the store speakers.

Context does matter. Not only within the lyrics of the song, but the context in which the song is heard, or only partially heard. There’s a great exchange in an interview with comedian Artie Lange, where he talks about someone who was offended by his act, but only because the person only heard part of the comedy bit.

My argument absolutely did not win over my critic, and he let me know it, one more time, with a disgusted follow up email.

I had another harsh critic that day. Myself.

If I feel the need to edit “Hurricane,” how have I allowed Elvis Costello’s “Oliver’s Army” to air all these years, unedited? Why is the line “One more widow, one less white nigger” any less offensive? Inconsistency undercuts any moral authority I might try to project.

So back to Randy Newman. Viewing it as a Program Director, there’s just no way mvyradio could play this. In any context, if I play it on the air it’s going to read as offensive.

It’s offensive in the simple use of the word “Nigger.” It’s offensive to Northerners, for calling them all racists. It’s offensive to Southerners, for portraying them as racists. It’s offensive in context and out of context. It’s hard to find an angle where it’s NOT offensive.

However, viewing it as a lover of art, that’s the beauty of this song. Randy Newman has crafted something that is viewed as offensive from all angles, an incredible feat unto itself. But most importantly, it’s offensive from the most important angle of all---his ultimate point rings incredibly true.

Hear clips from all three songs mentioned in this post:

Bruce Hornsby “In The Low Country”

In my mid-20s, through a series of life twists and turns, I found myself working at a radio station in the most western part of the state of Virginia, right on the Tennessee border. I’d been a lifelong New Englander, and had my ideas about the American South.

My 7 years living there both confirmed my ideas, and completely challenged those ideas.

I worked for a bright, educated, well-read, thoughtful, liberal family. And at every opportunity, they caused me to consider the stereotype of a Southerner, and to reject it.

Does the stereotype exist? Yes it does. Yes, in the South there are pick-up driving, country music loving, under-educated, super-religious, right wing folks, who are pretty much exactly like the people TV might lead you to believe were in the South.

And truthfully, there are a lot of Southerners who embrace that image, and try to own it, whether they live up to it or not. Bright, educated, well-read, thoughtful, liberal folks who would still readily identify themselves as Rednecks.

My friends were quick to reject that kind of simplified categorization of themselves, or the part of the world they live in. And in a town full of doctors and lawyers and college professors, it became pretty evident to me that my preconceived notions about Southerners were pretty limiting. I, myself, learned to be vigilant about stereotypes, assumptions and pigeonholing.

I’ve especially kept an ear out for it in Country Music, where some artists will sing songs that are intentionally crafted to fit an anti-intellectual, jingoistic, good ol’ boy/girl image. Songs and artists like this serve to reinforce a stereotype that, like all stereotypes, at best over-simplifies who people are and at worst limits who they can be.

So what to do about this new Bruce Hornsby song, “In The Low Country”?

Hornsby is from Virginia, too, albeit from the other side of the state, in the eastern, Tidewater area. And in this new song, he sings in the first person, as a Southern stereotype. A gun-toting, squirrel-skinning, booze drinking, wrasslin’-watching, NASCAR conservative.

Certainly, this is a tongue-in-cheek performance from Bruce, that recalls, in a more subtle way, Randy Newman’s “Rednecks.”

And that’s the problem. The subtlety. I think Hornsby is singing this tongue-in-cheek, but that’s only after listening to the song a number of times, and closely reading the lyrics.

That’s not how most people listen to a song on the radio. They’re driving or working or cooking with the radio on. They’re not listening with a critical ear.

And in that case, does a song like this serve to support the stereotype, rather than skewer it?

Does hearing the hook, “Having a ball in the Low Country” and picking up on lyrics like “Hunt ′em, kill ′em, put ′em on a mat” reinforce an unfair cliché?

I’m struggling with the idea about adding this song to rotation. What do you think?

See this previous post, for details on how a song gets into rotation on mvyradio, then let me know what you think.