Merrimack County
In the town where I was raised
The clock ticks and the cattle graze
Time passed with amazing grace
Back where I come from
"Back Where I Come From"
Mac McAnally
I got an e-mail from Scott Borchetta, proprietor of Big Machine and Valory Records, singing the praises of both his indie labels and one of his charges, Justin Moore.
Telling me even Reba was on Twitter, Scott told me to check out Justin’s video blogs, "his version of Cribs", that his fans loved him and "this thing was growing exponentially in the real world".
I clicked through to Justin’s video
Wherein he appeared like a redneck, living in a crib that…wasn’t quite lousy enough to be a joke, but wasn’t quite good enough to be his real living quarters. Wandering around the room in his overalls, I was struck by the difference between this video and the ones by the top forty wonders. Justin was saying I’m just like you, a blue collar striver who’s never going to be on TMZ.
At first I thought he was insulting his audience, but then I realized they were in on the joke. That somehow Justin and his audience were in it together.
Then he sang his song.
Fast-forward to 2:35. Live and acoustic, Justin sings "Small Town U.S.A."
Interesting that he could sing and play it, and that you could sing along to it.
And I knew the track, not that I could have picked Justin out of a lineup previously, even knew he was the singer. Every time I heard it on the radio I thought of Johnny Mellencamp. Justin’s song was derivative. But it captured the essence.
A lot of people called it prison when I was growin’ up
But these are my roots and this is what I love
‘Cause everybody knows me and I know them
I’m with Justin through here, but then he loses me:
As I believe that’s the way we were supposed to live
Wouldn’t trade one single day here in small town USA
Doesn’t this remind you of Sarah Palin? Speaking of "real Americans"? When did we all get so huffy, defending our roots. We all come from somewhere, but isn’t it okay to strive to go somewhere else? Even if we can never shake where we came from?
And speaking of where I come from…
I’m a fan of singer-songwriters, some who made it, some who never did. And one who never did was Mac McAnally. I love that Geffen album with the little boy and the airplane on the cover.
But "Back Where I Come From" is from a later album. You can hear it on Mac’s MySpace page:
Mac McAnally (it’s the third song down).Â
But the most famous version is by Kenny Chesney. That’s right, Mac might not be famous, but his songs are:
Now you can lie on a river bank
Paint your name on a water tank
Or miscount all the beers that you drank
Back where I come from
This is a slightly different sentiment, a different feel from Justin Moore’s track. There’s no defiance. Just an owning of one’s past.
People want to deny where they came from in Hollywood, in the theoretical mainstream. Everyone’s been reinvented, gotten their lips plumped and their boobs inflated, who they used to be…they didn’t used to be anybody before this.
But in country music where you came from is key. It defines your values, who you are. I love "Back Where I Come From". Because it contains the joy of the backwater almost all of us were raised in. And it came to mind while I was playing "Merrimack County".
When I was younger and in my schooling
I walked the mountains made of stone
The distance sang about tomorrow
And I did wish I was grown and gone
Saturday night I went to see Tom Rush at Largo. Normally, he plays McCabe’s, sells it out, he figured he’d take a risk, play a larger venue. Only one problem, McCabe patrons follow the listings for the Santa Monica venue religiously, what happens somewhere else, across town on La Cienega, may as well be occurring in the Alps. Getting the word out is almost impossible. Be thankful anyone gets the message at all.
So, when we arrived at the venue, it was not full. And it was two songs in. Tom had told us the show was called for 7:30 and he would go on at 8, we got there at 7:45 and he’d taken the stage earlier, there’d been a mix-up in the signals.
And mix-ups like this always make you feel left out. We were sitting in the back, but we might as well have been behind glass, until Tom started telling the story of meeting Joni Mitchell in Detroit and hearing "Urge For Going" for the very first time. He recorded it, and played it on Saturday night.
He also played "These Days" and "Child’s Song", by Jackson Browne and Murray McLauchlan respectively.
But what truly reached me was "Merrimack County", a song I’m only vaguely familiar with.
Tom’s from New Hampshire. Which has got its own mentality. Not as out there as Maine, but not as cosmopolitan as the lower New England states.
New Hampshire’s weird. Unlike Vermont, it’s not mountainous throughout, the southern half is akin to Massachusetts, but it’s not, it’s removed. It’s nothing like Fairfield, Connecticut.
But there’s snow. And ice. And loneliness.
That’s something that’s missing in Justin Moore’s song, Mac McAnally’s too. The alienation. That was a key element of the music of the late sixties and early seventies. Before we were all networked, updated on Facebook.
We were out there alone.
We’re still out there alone.
That’s the music that means the most to me. Not the Black Eyed Peas, not the party numbers, but the songs that speak to the human condition.
Way up north by the icebound ocean
I was born, I was born
Way up north in the Merrimack County
That’s my home, that’s my home
Tom chased love to Wyoming. But now he’s living back in the frozen north. Technically Vermont, but he’s just over the border from Hanover, New Hampshire. Because you can never leave your roots behind.
Tom’s singing "Merrimack County" and my whole life is passing through my brain. And it’s not all sunny. Torture at college in Vermont. Alone in my bedroom in Connecticut.
But it’s where I come from.
We all come from somewhere.
So let the bird fly down the valley
Let the storms roam on the sea
I was born to the rainbow circle
Stony mountain that’s home to me
To hear "Merrimack County" Google: "merrimack county tom rush" and click to hear it on LaLa.
