Rest In Peace, Happy Enchilada

And then COVID-19 took John Prine…  I wasn’t quite ready to say goodbye to him.  Surely losing Bill Withers to heart disease last week was tough enough, but now another voice from my private stock is gone too soon.  I share the Withers tunes with the world, and the world embraces them.  But honestly most of John Prine’s songs I listened to on my own.  It’s not that he didn’t speak for most of us in his charmingly self-effacing, folksy way, it’s that you don’t roll out Prine songs at parties.  It’s thinking music, sung in a gravely voice that warmed the soul.  His most famous song was Angel of Montgomery, which Bonnie Raitt covered and made it a hit.  Enough people know that one that I’ll leave it to fly on its own.  Here are a few of my favorites.

All The Best
“I wish you love – and happiness
I guess I wish – you all the best
I wish you don’t – do like I do
And never fall in love with someone like you
Cause if you fell – just like I did
You’d probably walk around the block like a little kid
But kids don’t know – they can only guess
How hard it is – to wish you happiness”

All the best John, you’ll be missed…

Glory of True Love
“No, the glory of true love
Is it will last your whole life through
Never will go out of fashion
Always will look good on you”

Jesus the Missing Years
The video on this one isn’t great, but John Prine is, and that makes this version worth listening to.

That’s The Way That The World Goes Round
“That’s the way that the world goes ’round.
You’re up one day and the next you’re down.
It’s half an inch of water and you think you’re gonna drown.
That’s the way that the world goes ’round.”

I love the live version of this John sings where he talks about the woman who confused the lyrics “inch of water” as “happy enchilada” , but this version with Stephen Colbert is new to me and put a smile on my face when I watched it.  We all need to smile more nowadays, don’t we?  Rest in peace, Happy Enchilada.