This song has two distinct versions: the early one recorded in 1993 that's a C&W waltz and the R&R version in 4/4 time, done in 2013. I need to add another instrument to the R&R song but my minimalist guitar is so solid I can't think of what to add. If I went into a bar and heard this song, I would pay close attention. It's got a story, a lesson, a moral and it features a porn theater (remember them?)
THE C&W version has a florid history and was played a lot at the Las Cruces Inn. Since it's a rather long song (it has to be to get in all of the plot) it's probably better as the much shorter R&R song.
Written: Page AZ 1973
Knees wrote this song late one night in a motel in Page AZ in 1973 after ingesting what he was told was powdered THC. Whatever it was, it was incredible and he wrote the song in about an hour. The next day he went out on Lake Powell in a super speedboat (as a passenger, not the driver) and amazed himself by being able to remember all of the lyrics, probably because the song tells a story.
Well I know this is a bar an everbody’s drinkin
Well I know this is a bar an everbody’s drinkin
But an ol friend of mine just set me to thinkin
That mebbe we oughta try somethin else.
So if you just settle back an listen a spell
You’re liable to hear an educatin tale
About sex, booze and ourselves.
Well I was up in Denver bout two weeks ago
Wudn’t doin nothin thought I’d take in a show
So I parked my car an started walkin
The first show I came to was just my style
Triple X-rated called “Everthing’s Wild”
A whole buncha sex an not much talkin.
An on the poster I saw the name
Of a guy that I used to know
Ol Fred always said he was gonna make it big
An sure enuf he’s the star of the show.
So I paid my admission and went inside
Bought me some popcorn an a four dollar Sprite
Then I saw somethin that stopped me dead
Well remember I tole you a little while ago
About my ol friend who’s the star of the show
Well there, the projectionist was Fred.
We must have talked for an hour or two
Bout people and places like ol friends do
Relivin good an bad memories
An I wondered how Fred had sunk so far
When a few years ago he was a big porno star
So I axed him and here’s what he tole me.
Put the blame on the whiskey and wine;
They sucked the man outa me
I once had the world spread before my very eyes
But the bottle was all I could see.
So alla you people gathered in here
Guzzlin your whiskey, your wine an your beer
Remember bout my ol friend Fred
Well here was a man who had all he could handle
Till somethin took the wick right outa his candle
An that somethin, here’s what Fred said
Put the blame on the whiskey and wine
They sucked the man outa me
I once had the world spread before my very eyes
But the bottle was all I could see.
Well I know this is a bar an everbody’s drinkin
But an ol friend of mine just set me to thinkin
That mebbe we oughta try somethin else.
Why not? From April 21, 1977 at the Las Cruces Inn.
