Tag Archives: Hayes Carll

Arkansas Heritage Month – “Little Rock” Songs

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Monroe RussellThe Capital City has popped up in a variety of songs in different genres over the years.  Today we look at five notable instances.

Collin Raye’s 1994 song “Little Rock” peaked at Number 2 on the Billboard Country charts and was Number 14 for the entire year.  Found on Raye’s album Extremes, it was written by Tom Douglas.  The song centers on a man who is trying to rebuild his life after battles with alcohol have affected his marriage.

Notable lyric: “I think I’m on a roll here in Little Rock.”

 

Hayes Carll’s take on Arkansas’ capital is also known as “Little Rock.” It was his title track from the 2005 album.  It tells the tale of a man who has traveled all over the US and is excited to make it back to Little Rock. With a driving country-rock beat, it typifies Carll’s style of music which has one foot squarely in both camps as a singer-songwriter.

Notable lyric: “All of my life I’ve tried to find/ “a piece of this earth for my peace of mind.”

 

Leo Robin and Jule Styne wrote the 1949 song “Little Girl from Little Rock” for their Broadway musical Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.  Introduced by Carol Channing, it told of quintessential 1920s vamp Lorelei Lee’s rise from “the wrong side of the tracks” to Manhattan’s elite neighborhoods.  It has remained part of Channing’s repertoire in nightclubs and concerts.  In 1953, it was retooled with sanitized lyrics and made into a duet for Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell in the film version of the musical.

Notable lyric: “Then someone broke my heart in Little Rock/and I up and left old Arkansas.”

 

Little Rock has also appeared in several “List songs” including “I’ve Been Everywhere.” Originally written with Australian place names in 1959, it was adapted to North American places in 1962 by Hank Snow. Arkansan Johnny Cash recorded it in 1996.

Little Rock appears in the second verse: “Glen Rock, Black Rock, Little Rock, Oskaloosa,”

 

Billy Joel’s 1989 “We Didn’t Start the Fire” contains three references to Little Rock. In the first section’s look at 1949, the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical South Pacific is mentioned.  With a heroine from Little Rock, this musical was the most popular show on Broadway during the 1948-1949 and 1949-1950 Broadway seasons.  The second comes in the 1953 portion with “Rockefeller” which referenced playboy Winthrop Rockefeller’s abandonment of New York City for Arkansas. He had residences in both Little Rock and on Petit Jean Mountain. The final entry came in 1957, when Joel references the Central High integration crisis with the lyric “Little Rock, Pasternak, Mickey Mantle, Kerouac, Sputnik, Chou En-Lai, Bridge on the River Kwai.”

 

He’s made it “back to Little Rock” – Hendrix College alum Hayes Carll

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181891_C9_008Hendrix alum Hayes Carll makes a much welcome return to the River Market tonight. The initiated know what’s in store but for those who don’t, this is tell it like it is music for people who might not normally be into that sort of thing. Honest, at times humorous and certainly engaging, a Hayes Carll show is a show that you won’t want to miss!

His paean to Arkansas’ capitol city, “Little Rock,” has perhaps my favorite line about the city: “a piece of this earth for my peace of mind.”

An outstanding performer, he is also a phenomenal songwriter. He pens most of his own songs, but also writes for others.  NPR picked “Chances Are” one of its top picks for 2014.  They termed this song  (he wrote which was recorded by Lee Ann Womack) an instant classic.

Show time is 9:00 p.m. The opening back is Band of Heathens. Tickets are $20.

 

Hayes Carll at the Rev Room Tonight – with Bonnie Montgomery opening

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181891_C18_044_004Hendrix College alum Hayes Carll returns to Little Rock for a concert tonight at the Rev Room.  Doors open at 7pm and the concert starts at 9pm.   Bonnie Montgomery, a renowned singer-songwriter in her own right, will open for him.

“Another Like You,” Carll’s stereotype’s attract duet of polar opposites, was American Songwriter’s #1 Song of 2011 – and KMAG YOYO was the Americana Music Association’s #1 Album, as well as making Best of Lists for Rolling Stone, SPIN and a New York Times Critics Choice.

Playing rock clubs and honkytonks, Bonnaroo, Stones Fest, SXSW and NXNE, he and his band the Gulf Coast Orchestra merge a truculent singer/songwriter take that combines Ray Wylie Hubband’s lean freewheeling squalor with Todd Snider’s brazen Gen Y reality and a healthy dose of love amongst unhealthy people.

Born in Houston, he went to college at Hendrix College in Conway – getting a degree in History, then heading back to Crystal Beach to play for a wild assortment of people either hiding out, hanging on or getting lost in the bars along Texas’ Gulf coast.

After releasing Flowers & Liquor in 2002, Carll was voted the Best New Artist of 2002 by The Houston Post. He would go on to release Little Rock, on his own Highway 87 label, which became the first self-owned project to the top the Americana charts.  His third album was 2008’s Trouble in Mind.

For those who live in and/or love Little Rock, Carll’s paean to the Capital City of Arkansas contains probably one of the best descriptions ever:  “A piece of this Earth for my peace of mind.”