The Storytellers

There’s a certain kind of magic that happens when the stories behind the songs get captured on tape. Not the polished liner note version that a publicist polished… I mean the unfiltered yarns told in smoky rooms under suspect stage lights that flicker like they’re listening too. Those moments when a songwriter stops being a performer and starts being a friend you’re drinking with on your back patio somewhere between midnight and the rest of your life.

Hundreds, maybe thousands, of those kind of stories are gone forever. Lost to the ether. Floating somewhere between the rafters of a place like Cheatham or Gruene and the sticky floor of whatever white van the songwriter was in the night it happened. We carry them in our memories, half remembered but fully perfect.

But every once in a while… a few of them are captured. A mic was on. Someone hit record. A tape rolled. And because of that tiny miracle, we can revisit them any time we get the itch.

When you talk about storytellers, you start with Todd Snider. You just do. Todd was as beloved for the tales as he was for the tunes. He could spin a story sharper than a knife and usually twice as funny. His intonation had a hint of Keen, his rambling owed a debt to Jerry Jeff, and his whole "I can't believe this absurd shit either" vibe owed something to Prine.

One trip through his Devil’s Backbone Tavern intro, the banana lead in to Conservative, Christian or his Jerry Jeff story and you know immediately...this guy is different. This is the highlight of my life.

There was a time in my youth where my friends and I spent as much time listening to comedy records and watching stand up specials as we did music. Adam Sandler, Rodney Carrington, Jerky Boys, Chris Rock, Foxworthy, Chappelle's Show etc. Sandler's first two comedy records were particularly impactful.

When Todd's stories were at his best, he was as funny and engaging as any of those folks. With the added bonus that he would then sing a song that tied a button on the punchlines from the story. It was a truly incredible trick. One that he pulled off better than anyone else. Even his heroes.

Other troubadours have walked that same line between melody and punchline and have had their landmark stories caught on tape too,

Robert Earl Keen perhaps set the template for Todd with his fantastic RHP-997 “Tarzan and Adonis” adventure that tumbles right into “Road Goes On Forever” on Live No. 2 Dinner. That same disc finds him dishing an intro to “Mariano” that describes the coolest backyard chaos ever. San Marcos shenanigans and a decidedly specific Texan image: a window unit A/C blowing cold air across a beer drinking picnic like some redneck miracle of modern engineering.

Charlie Robison’s pickup truck remembrance of an early 80's adolescent adventure in Bandera. AC/DC blaring, mag wheels spinning, Schaeffer Beer sweating in the heat...dragging main on the way to eternity. It feels like it was carved into the side of a cedar post somewhere. Timeless.

Then there’s Drew Kennedy, a guy who didn’t just love Todd Snider, he absorbed the storytelling DNA. DK’s speech cadence, his sly grin, the intellect simmering underneath it all hints at the lineage. His “I Got the Doubles” story with Josh Grider and Blaine Martin at the helm is one of the finest modern examples of how to grip an audience with nothing but charm and chaos. It proves you don't always have to be the protagonist to make it charming, sometimes you just have to be a witness.

And of course there is the original rapscallion, the patron saint of Texas songwriting hell-raising mischief, Jerry Jeff Walker. Jerry Jeff could deliver a bon mot with the same ease he delivered a masterpiece. His “Pickup Truck” monologue, floating in the moonlight with Hondo Crouch feels like a dream you once had and only half trusted. And that brief, humble setup on the live New Orleans cut of “Mr. Bojangles”? That’s the sound of a man shrugging off immortality like it doesn't really matter to him, but you know he knows it does.

There’s more. There’s always more.

Cody Canada’s got his fair share, including that wild knight suit story from Live and Loud at the Wormy Dog. Cory Morrow dropping a quick “He’s not crazy, you're crazy” before launching into “Sing With Me” on his double-live record. Those little moments, ten seconds long, but eternal in their own way.

These stories are part of the connective tissue of this whole scene. I've found myself listening to all of them over the past few days since Todd's passing. And the punchlines and beats hit the same as they did the first time I heard them.

How about you? What stories move you?