My Morning Jacket, Band of Horses and more to honor Shel Silverstein
November 14th, 2008 by Wade Tatangelo in News
She Silverstein, who died on Key West in 1999, is best known for classic children books like Where the Sidewalk Ends, A Light in the Attic and my personal, tear-inducing fave, The Giving Tree, which was made into this animated movie, read by Silverstein. But he also wrote screenplays, and hilarious raunch in the form of short fiction and poetry for Playboy — and penned tunes. Excellent ones. His credits include Johnny Cash’s father-son fight classic “A Boy Named Sue,” Loretta Lynn’s mothers-have-it-hard gem “One’s on the Way,” the pub sing along sensation “The Unicorn,” which was a huge hit for the Irish Rovers and Dr. Hook’s signature tune “The Cover of the Rolling Stone.”
My Silverstein faves? “The Ballad of Lucy Jordan,” which Marianne Faithful covered, Willie Nelson’s “A Couple More Years” and Silverstein’s own recordings of “I Got Stoned and I Missed it,” “Stacey Brown Got Two” and “Polly in a Porny,” all from his 1969 underground classic Freakin’ at the Freakers Ball. Another landmark album is the superb 1973 country stoner collection of Silverstein numbers Bobby Bare Sings Lullabys, Legends and Lies. So it’s fitting that Bare Sr. and his son, the highly talented Bare Jr., who a few years back told me how much Silverstein meant to him as a songwriting mentor, are helming what will likely be the tribute album of ‘09. Anything involving My Morning Jacket, Black Horses, Emmylou Harris, Dr. Dog, Andrew Bird and George Jones has to kick ass. Here’s the PR release:
Bobby Bare Jr & Bobby Bare Sr Producing Tribute to Shel Silverstein
Bobby and his dad are executive-producing a tribute to Shel Silverstein that will be released on Sugar Hill/Vanguard in mid 2009. The two of them have the following bands slated to contribute (and quite a few are already recorded):
Emmylou Harris
Black Keys
George Jones & Ray Price
Allison Krauss
Band of Horses
Dr. Dog
Andrew Bird
Kris Kristofferson (backed by members of the Silver Jews)
My Morning Jacket
Shel Silverstein on “The Johnny Cash Show”
November 14th, 2008 at 11:04 am
That’s an amazing lineup, Wade. Great Silverstein quote:
“I know a way to stay friends forever, There’s really nothing to it, I tell you what to do, And you do it.”
November 14th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
Excellent, I knew he penned a few of those, but had no idea he was so prolific..
Dr Dog needs to play in FL sometime soon..
December 18th, 2008 at 11:19 pm
this is not all true-
not all these names are confirmed
this is a list from months ago
please take this down