"Good Old Boys" by RANDY NEWMAN - September 1974 US Fourth Album on Reprise Records (October 1974 in the UK) – Guest Musicians Includes Ry Cooder, John Platania, Ron Elliott, Dennis Budimir and Al Perkins on Guitars with Glenn Frey, Don Henley and Bernie Leadon of Eagles on Backing Vocals (May 2002 UK Reprise/Rhino Expanded Edition 2CD Reissue and Remaster with 14 Bonus Tracks) - A Review by Mark Barry...

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RATING: *****  

"…Smart Ass…"

Randy Newman's follow-up to the acidic and brilliant "Sail Away" album of 1972 was another ball-buster equal to its predecessor's fame – "Good Old Boys" provided shell-shocked '74 listeners with more deeply uncomfortable subject matters that even here in 2024 (its 50th Anniversary year) raise a "You-wot!" eyebrow response.

Having done the Reissue and Remaster business by "Sail Away" – time for our hero to get the same nod towards door number four. Rhino have found an entire album of February 1973 piano demos with spoken intros between every song (see CD2). "Everyone is so friendly on this album…", Newman snarks sarcastically before his moving and sad "Louisiana 1927" demo version – not really. To the details…

UK released 27 May 2002 (21 May 2002 in the USA) - "Good Old Boys" by RANDY NEWMAN on Reprise/Rhino 8122-78243-2 (Barcode 081227824327) is a 2CD Expanded Edition reissue of his fourth studio album with Previously Unreleased Demos on Disc Two (reissued in 2003 in the UK on Reprise/Rhino 8122-73839-2 (Barcode 081227383923) as a single CD - essentially CD1 of the double). It plays out as follows:

CD1 "Good Old Boys" (36:55 minutes):

1. Rednecks [Side 1]

2. Birmingham

3. Marie

4. Mr. President (Have Pity On The Working Man)

5. Guilty 

6. Louisiana 1927 [Side 2]

7. Every Man A King

8. Kingfish

9. Naked Man

10. A Wedding In Cherokee County

11. Back On My Feet Again

12. Rollin' 

Tracks 1 to 12 are his fourth studio album "Good Old Boys" - released 10 September 1974 in the USA on Reprise MS 2193 and October 1974 in the UK on Reprise K 54022. Produced by LARRY WARONKER and RUSS TITELMAN - it peaked at No. 36 in the US Rock LP Charts (didn't chart UK).

BONUS TRACK:

13. Marie (Demo) - PREVIOUSLY UNISSUED

Musicians On The Album Included: 

RANDY NEWMAN - Piano, Electric Piano, Synth and All Lead Vocals

RY COODER and JOHN PLATANIA - Electric Guitars

RON ELLIOTT and DENNIS BUDIMIR - Acoustic Guitars

AL PERKINS - Pedal Steel Guitar

RUSS TITELMAN, WILLIE WEEKS and RED CALLENDER - Bass

ANDY NEWMARK, JIM KELTNER and MILT HOLLAND - Drums

BOBBYE HALL and MILT HOLLAND - Percussion

DON HENLEY, GLENN FREY and BERNIE LEADON of EAGLES - Backing Vocals

  

CD2 "Johnny Cutler's Birthday" (41:44 minutes):

1. Rednecks

2. If We Didn't Have Jesus

3. Birmingham

4. The Joke

5. Louisiana

6. My Daddy Knew Dixie Howell

7. Shining

8. Marie

9. Good Morning

10. Birmingham Redux

11. Doctor, Doctor

12. Albanian Anthem

13. Rolling

Recorded 2 January 1973 at Amigo Studios, Hollywood, CA with Randy Newman on Piano only - Produced by Russ Titelman

Remasters are by DAN HERSCH at Digiprep and with new Liner Notes by DAVID WILD - the '2CD Expanded Edition' set offers 14 Previously Unreleased Demo Versions and a pleasingly comprehensive 20-page booklet complete with reminiscences from the great man himself. The David Wild essay 'Randy Newman's Southern Discomfort' tells it like it was and unfortunately still is - Newman rightly proud of his stance on important issues. There are promo photos, gig posters (World Premier of "Good Old Boys" with the Atlanta Symphony, 5 October 1974) and those acidic lyrics alongside original recording/reissue credits - it's a tasty job done and sounds so good. This is not an audiophile album, but the Hersch Remaster has given enough oomph to the piano-led songs to make them even more powerful and haunting and that's what I wanted. 

The album opens with an incendiary piece of social observation songmanship written as if sung by a Southern Good Old Boy who clearly favours keeping the coloured folk down and most definitely out (as the lyrics literally say). Ever the news junkie – Newman had been watching TV in December 1970 when he witnessed the 75th Governor of Georgia – the deeply bigoted and white racist Lester Maddox (who had been instrumental in enforcing segregation in his town and restaurants in the Sixties) sat beside the legendary Georgia American Football Full Back and Black Civil Rights Activist Jim Brown on The Dick Cavett Show. Placing these politically polar-opposite men beside each other saw Brown unable to contain himself (as Cavett knew) and he remarked about racism towards negroes. It was fractious to say the least, but Newman felt that Brown had never been given a chance to counter the whoops and hollers he felt went the wrong way. So he wrote "Rednecks" where the song is peopled with references to smart-assed Jews, no-neck oilmen from Texas, rednecks who don’t know their ass from a hole in the ground. The smug singer (johnny Cutler) goes on to suggest how black people should be put in cages in Chicago and San Francisco and Cleveland. As you can imagine, "Rednecks" is grating-funny - but it’s also deeply uncomfortable as you hear the glee the singer employs in his sickening lists of hate. 

The following two melodies soften things - "Birmingham" and "Marie" filled with the sadness of working people struggling to live let alone love – characters drunk and pleading. The audio on those two is good – clean – but they are suddenly trampled by fantastic audio on "Mr. President (Have Pity On The Working Man)" which employs a jolly brass section that give heft to lyrics about folks running out of money while cold winds blow onto porches, kitchen tables with scraps on them. Side 1 ends with what I think is one of his most understated masterpieces - "Guilty" - a whiskey-sodden cocaine-laden lover pleading to his lady to take his sorry ass back in her arms again. Others have seen its ache and covered it - I particularly love the Bonnie Raitt and Joe Cocker versions from the Seventies.

Speaking of exceptional covers, they don't in my book come much better than Aaron Neville taking the sad and moving dustbowl feel of "Louisiana 1927" and making it a highlight on his 1991 album "Warm Your Heart" (A&M Records). Randy's version has strings that elevates the 'trying to wash us away' lyrics about floods - people's homes and livelihoods destroyed by an act of a heartless God and a conveniently absent government. Reprise used "Louisiana 1927" with "Marie" on its flipside as a belated US 45-single on Reprise RPS 1387. They also tried plugging the "Good Old Boys" album by pairing the jaunty and commercially usable "Naked Man" from Side 2 (I think the Eagles are the backing vocalists) with the slow and melancholy "Guilty" from Side 1 as a US 45-single in January 1975 on Reprise RPS 1324. 

Side 2 highlights also include "A Wedding In Cherokee County" which I recall Ireland's Freddie White used to sing in Dublin's Baggot Inn during the Eighties (recorded it for his "Long Distance Runner" album in 1985) - a smokehouse rocking-chair piano lurch filled with fabulous lyrics about no-goods and slimy old bastards.  The album rolls home with tales about machinists and a Polish girl with gaps in her teeth - the Eagles distinctive against the slide guitar on "Back On My Feet Again". Even with Nick DeCaro arranged strings - "Rollin'" feels like an Eagles B-side - is slight - anti-climax after the brilliance that went before it. But there's no doubt about the feeling that "Good Old Boys" is an album seeing a brilliant songwriter flourish - it isn't going to be everyone's favourite Friends episode - all cuddly and warm - but it is genius.

Stripped of all instrumentation except his grand piano - the 'demo' of "Marie" drips of pain and loneliness - the lyrics almost identical to the finished album version. It may end abruptly and have the airy feel of a 'demo' - but "Marie" in this form is loaded with that rarest of things - raw emotion that is almost unbearable to hear. Brilliant. Speaking of rough cuts – the fascinating back inlay shows the Stereo Tape Box for the 2/1/73 US session – 'Birthday Party' crossed out to read "The Joke". Each of the CD2 demos features a spoken lead-in – the lyrics almost all razor-close to the finished cuts – already honed and set to shock. The character (and suggested album title) Johnny Cutler and his Birthday is supposed to be the theme throughout – Newman suggesting sound effects that might preamble each song. You can also hear him working out the storylines as he speaks too. The remastered quality is by and large superb. 

Newman is undecided about including "If We Didn't Have Jesus" – one of the new titles – and while it is good his gut instinct that it was bordering on cliché was right. A rabbit is being chased by a big black dog in "The Joke" – a song that did not make the final cut and you can hear it is thematically out of place. "My Daddy Knew Dixie Howell" could have made the album – Cutler singing of his 29th birthday fading into the manhood of 30 – suddenly singing about how Daddy had a shop in Tuscaloosa where he cut hair (the famous Dixie Howell included). It slowly dawns on the listener that the drunken Johnny Cutler is none too enamouring with dead Daddy and his insufferable magnolias (he puts Vaseline and Razors in the coffin). And on it goes to Cutler's wife being the "Marie" we've known as someone else all these years – the sinister "Shining" probably just that – too sinister. 

For sure Randy Newman's 1974 album "Good Old Boys" will not be everybody's idea of 'Airplane' type laughter - 'Family Guy' gags-a-plenty some of which might actually make you gag - or at least double-take. But this Reprise/Rhino 2CD Reissue/Remaster hammers home its on-the-money brilliance and musical bravery with real style...