Admit it, you've been wracking your brains this weekend, trying to answer the one, fundamental question of life: what is the quintessential bluegrass song? I have the answer.

truth from the mountains

Echo Mountain. which I heard for the first time this morning. It has everything necessary: the high, lonesome tenor, a mandolin, a weepy fiddle, and — and this is essential — the death of a old, loyal hound, with the hook of the song coming at the end to reveal the sorrow and tragedy of it all.

UPDATE: I think it’s a great song, but it’s also a funny song, in its own way. Apparently, some (ascot-wearing, English-junker-car-driving) readers don’t get the humor in the self-referential, sad lyrics of this song and the almost-parodical inclusion of all the standard bluegrass laments. That’s all right, I’m used to that: I once embarrassed my date horribly when, viewing The Titanic, I was the only one in the theater to laugh out loud when that fellow fellow jumped off the stern and after a long, silent fall, hit the ship’s huge propeller with a resounding “gong”. Well, it was funny, damn it!

Anyway, here’s another country song that illustrates what I’m talking about, the final verse of “You Never Even Call Me By My Name”:

[Recitation:]
Well, a friend of mine named Steve Goodman wrote that song
And he told me it was the perfect country & western song
I wrote him back a letter and I told him it was
Not the perfect country & western song because he hadn't said anything at all about mama,
Or trains,
Or trucks,
Or prison,
Or getting' drunk
Well he sat down and wrote another verse to the song
And he sent it to me,
And after reading it,
I realized that my friend had written the perfect
Country & western song
And I felt obliged to include it on this album
The last verse goes like this here:

Well, I was drunk the day my mom got out of prison
And I went to pick her up in the rain
But before I could get to the station in my pickup truck
She got runned over by a damned old train

[Chorus:]
And I'll hang around as long as you will let me
And I never minded standing' in the rain
No, a' you don't have to call me darlin', darlin'
You never even call me
Well I wonder why you don't call me
Why don't you ever call me by my name