Had a bad day, feat. Toby Keith

Nobody on the road
nobody on the beach
I feel it in the air
the summer's out of reach
Empty lake,
empty streets
the sun goes down alone
I'm drivin' by your house
Though I know you're not home
But I can see you-
Your brown skin shinin' in the sun
You got your hair combed back and your
sunglasses on, baby
And I can tell you my love for you
will still be strong after the boys of
summer have gone
I never will forget those nights
I wonder if it was a dream
Remember how you made me crazy?
Remember how I made you scream?
Now I don't understand what's happened
to our love,
But baby when I get you back
I'm gonna show you what I'm made of
I can see you-
Your brown skin shinin' in the sun
I see you walkin' real slow and you're smilin' at everyone

I can tell you my love for you will still be strong
after the boys of summer have gone
Out on the road today I saw a DEADHEAD sticker
on a Cadillac
A little voice inside my head said, "Don't
look back. You can never look back."
I thought I knew what love was,
What did I know?
Those days are gone forever
I should just let them go but-
I can see you-
Your brown skin shinin' in the sun
You got that top pulled down and that radio on baby
And I can tell you my love for you will still be strong
after the boys of summer have gone
I can see you-
Your brown skin shining in the sun
You got that hair slicked back and
those Wayfarers on, baby
I can tell you my love for you will still be strong
after the boys of summer have gone

 

Nice, Pall.

 

As for shitty lyrics, I'm pretty sure they are the domain of all types of popular music, not just the country variety.

 

Papa don't preach. You've got it backwards.

I first heard "Masters of War" in a college dorm, at a southern school; there were Dylan records all over that dorm, and 80% or so of us agreed with the sentiment.

Dylan was singing to an audience who agreed with him. So did Toby Keith. I don't think either of them was pandering. They were singing what they believed, just as they believed it, to audiences who were in sympathy with their views. Good business, sure, but not pandering. I'm not vain enough to believe I can get inside Toby Keith's head and determine what motivates him. Nor am I ideological enough to assume I can.

I'm pretty sure you haven't bought any Toby Keith or Worley CD's. I know I haven't. I've bought and enjoyed Dylan vinyl, tapes and CD's. But I'll stick with my opinion, and you're welcome to yours.

 

I'll start to pile on Toby Keith more when I see Lee Greenwood donating every cent he's ever made.

 

Wasn't it the radio stations, responding to outraged listeners, that took them off the air?

The first amendment prohibits government from abridging the freedom of speech. It does not go so far as to say there will be freedom of consequences from said speech. (Don Imus anyone?) Individuals also have the freedom to say, "I choose to spend my money in a fashion that will not advance initiatives with which I do not agree." Not buying the Dixie Chicks' music or listening to stations that play it is no different that way from refusing to shop at Wal-Mart because of the way it flouts imminent domain laws or the way it treats its employees.

 

I'll forgive the Madonna reference.
The point still obtains, even accepting the notion of putting Keith/Worley in the same sentence with Dylan, which ought not to be done. Writing songs to appeal to a specific audience is not necessarily "pandering." However, the Worley/Keith records under discussion were written, purely for cheap profits, specifically as anthemic chants to a uniquely brain-dead general national mood, one that has proven to have tragic consequences in a lot of areas. That, to me, is pandering.
Dylan didn't write "Masters of War" to truckle to a general antiwar sentiment in the country because there wasn't one, especially at the time he wrote it.
All that having been said, both Dylan and Keith -- You got me on Darryl Worley, I'll confess -- have written far better material than the songs we're talking about here. (I always hated "Masters of War" until the two guys from Pearl Jam sang it.)

 

As Larry the Cable Guy put it, ``Doesn't that Natalie know if it weren't for the two cute sisters she'd be another clerk at Lane Bryant's?''

 

Yeah, that's where I go for wisdom.

 

I think poke cleaned up that quote. Mr. Git-er-done would have said "Don't that Natalie know if it warn't for the two cute sisters she'd be another of them there clerks at Lane Bryant's?"

 

The logic here is the same at use back when Archie Bunker would tell the hippies to move to communist Russia.
Just sayin.

 

I really never understood the gripe with the music listed here. Granted, I don’t listen nor like country. Keith’s records suck, according to my taste, but I don’t care that he pandered to make a buck. Look at American Idol. Is there a bigger example of pandering to the lowest common denominator in order to make a buck?

The Dixie Chicks were not necessarily taken off of the air because of their comments. They were taken off the air and used as pawns in order to push a certain message. It was those radio stations organizing CD burnings. It was those radio stations that forced them off the area in areas that weren’t receiving complaints.

As to their concerts… you know what you are getting. If I go to a Toby Keith concert, I should expect based on his music that he would slide in a few verbal BJs for George Dubya. I would also expect him to whine about liberals. I am not about to complain about it though, it is expected.

The same goes for Streisand and the Dixie Chicks. If you know going in that you are going to be preached to, why go if you don’t want it? That is the same as going to church and complaining that the preacher is talking about God too much.