NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE in the late
1980's was a lot like Paris in the 1920's....except we had the syphilis, and
body odor thing under control by then, not to mention cannabis horticulture and
recording technology was really getting into high gear.....
MUSIC was burning & blazoning across the universe like
never before, or ever again. An intellectual and spiritual renaissance the
likes of, the world will never witness again was happening and in a very loud
way for sure.
TO walk down 16th avenue in 1987, was to stroll among the
streets of Gods, both real and imagined.
PUBLISHING companies, Record labels, recording studios,
& restaurants....kitschy, corny, gift shops with cheesy promo-photos of even
cheesier hillbilly wannabes...stores, bars, souvenir shops with Hank Jr ashtrays,
or Barbara Mandrell bolo-ties, little Jimmy Dickens “cowboy hats” by the bowls
of Nashville keychains, right next to goo-goo bars, with that picture of Heidi,
the goo-goo heiress....
YES THE "Cars of the Stars" museum...the "Wax
figurines of the Stars"..."So & So's personal museums" of
personal nick-nackery, shrines of stupidity & the beautiful innocence and
honesty of it all...
YOU COULD DINE in Shoney's, where a man could no shit, have
breakfast with an ole gal whose ole man lived next door to an ole boy whose
cousin knew the guy who used to drive Merle's bus!...
Everything a country fan on long weekend vacation could want
to see. Sweaty camera straps cutting pasty, lily white stripes across the crimson
sunburned flesh of the ogling tourists as they punctuate the crosswalks in
gaggles in their "gold nugget" jewelry and stupid cowboy hats fresh
off the racks of Stuckey's or other fine Nashville Tennessee clothing establishments.
God Bless their souls & the records
they bought back then…
I WAS quite sure, had my investor not backed out, my business
model "TURDS OF THE STARS" would have really done well. I was going
to mount toilets sideways on the walls, displaying the leavings of the holy
among mortals.
FOR INSTANCE...Elvis...and "the
King"..... Hank Junior's "Junior"....
Johnny's "Cashews"...Charlie's "Pride" or...Minnie's "Pearls"...
However
I wasn't quite what to do with the Oak Ridge Boys display....
But just like most of my other great ideas, like my mashed
potatoes on a stick franchise, they soon took a big back seat to my new REAL
job....
and the metaphysical task at hand....songwriting.
