Nominated by: GK
Music club: Wander to Wozza's
Playlist addition: Ode to Billie Joe
No surprise that this was a GK pick - I've known for a loooong time about his admiration for Bobbie Gentry. Only surprising that he's taken so long to get to it.
What an amazing year 1967 was. The year of Sgt. Pepper also saw the debut of a number of stellar artists: The Doors; Cat Stevens; Al Green; Procol Harum; David Bowie; Van Morrison; Arlo Guthrie; Jimi Hendrix; The Grateful Dead; The Velvet Underground; Pink Floyd; the mighty mighty Cowsills...and Bobbie Gentry!!
The mention of each one of those iconic artists immediately conjures up their signature sound. Bobbie Gentry is no exception. Her heavily accented Chickasaw County, Mississippi delivery immediately came to my mind when GK advanced Ode to Billie Joe as his AOTW.
One further sidebar: while at University I was drawn to the southern gothic world of Flannery O'Connor. I couldn't get enough of her short stories and novels.
Bobbie Gentry must have been a fan as well because each of the songs on her debut has a whiff of southern gothic about it. That helps give the album a thematic unity and the sparse instrumentation is perfect for these songs. Given all the first-person narratives it also feels autobiographical, which figures as Bobbie wrote all the songs (sings all the lead vocals and plays some appropriate acoustic guitar).
The key songs on the album are Mississippi Delta, Chickasaw County Child, Papa Won't You Let Me Go to Town With You and Ode to Billie Joe. Given that Ode was a huge single and it's placed last means that anticipation builds right through the album.
The song itself is a marvel of brilliant storytelling. It hints and teases and is so economical in approach, with loads of brilliant details that evoke all sorts of images. It's one of those rare songs that I never get tired of hearing, even though I've heard it hundreds of times.
For the most part the other songs complement those four standouts well and the only one that I skipped after the second listen was Bugs. I'm also not crazy about Lazy Willie.
Instrumentally, the album has a great sparse sound with some judicious use of harp, horns and violin. Having James Burton on the album doesn't hurt either. As for Bobbie - I don't think she ever sounded as raw and as authentic as she did here.
Awesome. 1967 eh? What a year!
