Will people be uncomfortable with dark lyrics about a poor kid who grew up in a violent dysfunctional family. Perhaps with some words only common to east Texas. For example pulp wood (the wood paper is made from) is call "pup wood" by people living in east Texas. "The quarters" is a common name for a area black people were forced to live in during segregation in the small towns of the Jim Crow south.

Black lives have always mattered to me as much as anyone's life. I wanted to produce a song that addressed some of these issues as I saw and lived through them. Not so much to promote any certain cause but to depict the stark reality and conditions of the early 1950's both for poor black and poor white people.

Perhaps this is the right time for such a song, perhaps not.

Feedback?

Billy

Yes the time is right. A lot of young people need a good history lesson on how bad it really was during those times.

I wouldn't call them dark lyrics though. To me dark lyrics are about killing people and/or pushing suicide. YMMV

Your lyrics may be painful for some people to hear but real history is not always wine and roses.

I say go for it.

Go for it.

FWIW:

We co-wrote with floyd and produced a song (Our Good Old Days) about child labor, tenant farmers, yellow fever, coal mining and suffrage.

We wrote and produced another (The Way Things Are) about school shootings from a child’s perspective.

Both were well received here and elsewhere.

Do millions of pop, etc., listeners care? Likely not. But nowadays you can find genres and sub genres within the very large Americana tent where folks are very attentive to lyrics including the subject matter. We live in that music bubble and love it.

Bud

Do you write your lyrics to say what people want to hear, or do you write so people hear what you want to say.

Songs are stories set to music. Just write your story.

Thanks for the feedback. What the wider world thinks about my lyrical content is not so important.

I wanted to try to write this using BIAB and post it here. Race relations and especially the exploitation of people of color can be a pretty inflammatory subject in todays world. The last thing I want to do is create hate and discontent here.

Prejudicial bias, predilection for disrespecting people is not limited to people of color. The song does center around the life and times of a fictional poor uneducated black man but it could be just as easily have been a poor uneducated white man. Lack of education, poverty, and the realities life in a principally agrarian culture weigh heavily on everyone.

Billy

That is actually a pretty important question because there are good reasons to do both.

In this case it is more about what I want to say.

Intelligent thoughtful comment Dan.


Billy

Is the concern that the story would depict racist characters doing racist things, and that this can get an author quoted out of context and accused of racism? Hopefully that kind of bad faith is not as widely practiced here as in other cultural eddies like young adult fiction literary criticism.

Hi Mark.

To some extent yes. Many things that would be considered racist today would not even be considered anything at all in 1950. Of course it was racist but no one white or black payed much attention to it.

I would be more authentic if I could use the vernacular of the 1950's but of course that is not possible in todays politically correct conditions. I am able to write blues from the forties and fifties in a very authentic way because the itinerant musicians of that time were compelled to use words that had double meaning and innuendo. Example, "I gave my baby the 99's) which refers to cocaine. You could get killed as a black musician for singing and using the wrong words back in those days.

I am still running this through my mind trying to make a decision if I have the skill set to write this without coming off as racist myself.

Billy

Jethro Tull is arguably my sustained favorite band. "Aqualung" is arguably my sustained favorite song by that band. Listen to it and see if you can guess how I feel about "dark" subjects and regional expressions. "Dog-end"? "Bog?"

As to the broader question: Although I attempt to write "good" lyrics (otherwise, what's the point?) they are almost never the first thing I listen to in a song "new to me". That would include nearly every "song" on the showcase. If lucky, I might get snatches and gists. When you write it, it's yours. When I listen to it, it becomes mine. Those two may never mesh.

"Born in the USA" is not about giddy patriotism. The closer to the bone, the closer to the truth. Sugar-coat nothing...not even optimism...and don't preach. You'll be fine.

Consider writing it as a memory. That may put some difference between the singer and the narrator, if that makes any sense at all.

" the two may never mesh" I guess the two seldom mesh in truth. I always say it is my job to write and your job to listen and really none of my business what you think. Hope you like it but...

I am not a very good songwriter. People put up with me live and are most always kind. Then out of the blue I get a call from outer Mongolia telling me in broken English I am the best blues singer they ever listen to and that recording is fantastic. I guess that sort kind of response is what keeps me from selling everything and go try to learn to play golf...lol

Billy

I have listen to Aqualung many times but this is the first time I sat down and read the lyrics. It is more than a little "dark" which I actually find I like and makes it interesting.

Bog? Dog-end? British English that would not be easily recognized across the pond. I know the word dog end but other that peat bog and perhaps the crapper I am not sure about bog. Fish dog ends I have also heard in London. If a person has a real interest in lyrics they will ask around until someone explains the term. Just as a side note I was at a concert and Ian's flute was so loud it actually was painful...no ear plugs at the time. Great band.

Billy