RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA. Byrd’s and Gram Parson’s “Hickory wind” is an old favorite, but I don’t think it ever sounded more captivating than in the Carolina it’s about.
That’s how it always is.
Music gets maximum shimmer in its proper geographical surroundings.
Jojo, I’m in North Carolina and it is the neighboring state South Carolina Gram Parsons sings about in “Hickory wind” on Byrd’s groundbreaking country rock album “Sweetheart of the rodeo”.
But even in the leafy, hilly plains around Raleigh, the pines stand tall and you can sense the seductive hickory scent of dear old Gram spinning its stinging homesickness around in the warm, soft wind that sweeps over the hills after sunset.
Right here, right in this flamboyant part of the South, the dented serenade therefore strikes with greater force than ever before—and only in the regions of Joshua Tree in the Mojave Desert can I remember the man’s frail voice sounding so beautiful.
That’s how it works very often with music, the geographical connection is significant.
Like in New Orleans, where as a casual visitor you are easily bewitched by the extremely polite local expressions, the mushroomy swing and the spicy Cajun tones, and therefore pre-purchase records at, for example, the Music Factory on Frenchman Street. Then you come home and play them and by all means, Rebirth Brass Band, Clifton Chenier and Big Chief Monk Boudreaux is still good – but that feels not quite the same way as in the hot humidity during long nights at Tipitina’s.
In the same way, rustic honky tonk always swings more genuinely in Nashville than anywhere else, while luxuriously produced AM rock to my ears is quite pointless in most environments, but when you’re rolling along the 24-lane freeways of Los Angeles it was created for, it enhances the very feeling of life – and not until you’ve had it in your headphones in Manhattan during the blue hour just before dusk have you experienced a New York masterpiece that Televisions “Marquee moon” in its full glory.
It just is.
Now I will investigate whether or not James Taylor’s “Carolina in my mind” also gets even more luster right here.
Incidentally 1: Please don’t tell any North Carolinians you know that I equated their state with South Carolina. They may also belong to the historic South and they may also be quite conservative and traditional, but they see themselves as far more sophisticated than the bon-lurkers of the raw-barked Twin States, first seceding from the Union before the Civil War in the 1860s and all.
Incidentally 2: Geography plays just as big a role in Swedish-produced music, of course. Håkan sounds best in Gothenburg, Robyn in Stockholm and Mando Diao in Borlänge. Ideally, it is actually on the winding roads out to Torsångs Cafe that you should hear Björn Dixgård sing.
Incidentally 3: In Texas, where the Swedish national soccer team and its many-headed fan base are currently nesting in anticipation of the WC duster, it is Doug Sahm and the various constellations he led over the years that apply. Like, for example, “At the crossroads” with The Sir Douglas Quintet sounds, so IS The Lone star state.
Incidentally 4: Well, James Taylor’s Carolina song feels more soulful in its home environment.
CAUSES OF ECSTASY
•Paul McCartney – The boys of Dungeon lane (Album)
– Nostalgia may be forbidden, but in the right hands…
•Earth, Wind & Fire (Max/HBO Documentary)
– A history lesson I had no idea I needed.
•Simon Bank & Erik Niva (Sportbladet stars)
– The World Cup’s most explosive radar pair.
