Loudon Wainwright III - Does Humour Belong In Music?

by Stuart Penney

The title of this piece comes to you courtesy of Frank Zappa who released a live album of that name in 1986.  Comedy in pop / rock is a notoriously difficult trick to pull off and few are able to marry the two successfully.  It’s one thing to write brilliant, comedic lyrics, but quite another to match them with high quality original songs ("Weird Al" Yankovic, I'm looking at you).

In my experience there are just a handful of artists who have consistently found the sweet spot between dark, caustic humour and great songwriting / musicianship.  Heading the list every time is Zappa, of course, closely followed by Randy Newman at his 70s/80s peak.  And then, we have Loudon Wainwright III.  He may be a tad less celebrated than the other two, but in the pantheon of tragicomic songwriters LWIII (as we shall call him) is right up there with those giants of disdain and acerbity.

I’ve been infatuated with Wainwright and his music for more than half a century.  His songs have regularly made me laugh and cry (mostly laugh, now I think about it) and every one of his 30-odd albums is uniformly excellent, often peppered with flashes of genius. 

He’s an engaging and hugely entertaining live performer too, and while it sounds an unlikely comparison, I often think of him as Frank Zappa with an acoustic guitar (but with a much friendlier disposition and the smut level dialled way down).  But how did this fascination with LWIII begin?  Come with me now as we travel back to the early 70s. 

After Bob Dylan withdrew from public life following his mysterious 1966 motorcycle accident, it sparked all kinds of crazy rumours and crackpot conspiracy theories.  One such tale claimed Bob had died and been replaced with a lookalike.  Even though Dylan soon returned to the recording studio he kept a much lower profile than before.  His voice was different and, apart from the occasional live appearance (eg Isle of Wight Festival in 1969), he would not tour again until 1974.  That was more than enough solid “evidence” for some that the old Bob was gone forever.  

So, in a move which, at this distance, can only be described as bizarre, if not a little desperate, the US music industry and the rock press began the search for someone to fill the void.  The hunt was on for what they insisted on calling the “New Bob Dylan.”  Presumably that meant they were looking for a candidate who played acoustic guitar, wore a harmonica rack around their neck and delivered self-penned deep and meaningful songs in a wheezy, Dylanesque voice.

Names pulled from the Woody Guthrie-style denim fisherman’s cap included (but were not limited to) Elliott Murphy, John Prine, Gordon Lightfoot, Bruce Cockburn, Tim Buckley, Steve Forbert and even Bruce Springsteen.  But of all those worthy troubadours there was only one man who had the wit, wisdom and self-awareness to write a song about the entire sorry business and that was Loudon Wainwright III.  Here’s a lyric extract from “Talking New Bob Dylan” which appeared on his 1992 album History:

Out of commission, had a motorcycle wreck

Holed up in Woodstock, with a broken neck

The labels were signin' up guys with guitars,

Out to make millions, lookin' for stars

Well, I figured it was time to make my move

Songs from the Westchester County Delta country

Yeah, I got a deal, and so did John Prine, Steve Forbert and Springsteen, all in a line

They were lookin' for you, signin' up others

We were "new Bob Dylans" your dumb-ass kid brothers

Well, we still get together every week at Bruce's house

Why, he's got quite a spread, I tell ya - it's a twelve-step programme.

Interviewed by Melody Maker in late 1970, Wainwright said "Every time I see myself compared to Bob Dylan I cringe.  I'd like them to stop, but there's nothing I can do about it."  Far from being comfortable with the new Dylan tag, Wainwright preferred to describe himself as "a post psychedelic aristocratic beatnik."

I first encountered LWIII around the time of his 1971 second album.  The songs on Album II - especially “Motel Blues,” “Saw Your Name In The Paper” and “Plane; Too” - were funny and sardonic in equal measure and they really resonated with me.  Best of all was the tender “Be Careful There’s A Baby In The House.”  Almost 50 years later I made sure this beautifully observed song took pride of place in a Spotify playlist marking the birth of our first grandchild. 

Then there were the succinct yet jocular album titles themselves. His 1970 debut Loudon Wainwright III was followed by Album II and, as sure as night follows day, we saw Album III in 1972.  Led Zeppelin were using a similar pithy numbering technique with their LP titles at the same time, but Loudon had a distinct advantage over Jimmy Page and co – that surfeit of Roman numerals actually formed part of his name. 

Ed. Note: In what must have been a marketing man's fever dream LWIII and Led Zeppelin actually appeared side by side as the opening tracks on the 1972 UK sampler LP The New Age Of Atlantic (Atlantic K20024).  Zeppelin’s “Hey, Hey, What Can I Do” was followed by Loudon’s “Motel Blues.”

Except on his somewhat earnest debut album, Wainwright didn’t really sound much like Dylan and all comparisons would evaporate in later years as his songwriting matured and his voice became sweeter and more melodic.  He didn’t look like Bob either, being several inches taller and built like an American footballer.  But he had a similar unkempt, ragamuffin image and his songs were quirky and confessional.  Did I mention many of them were also very funny?  

In 1973 he scored his first and only hit single with “Dead Skunk,” a banjo and fiddle-driven country flavoured track lifted from Album III.  This eulogy to roadkill is probably still his biggest and best-known song to this day.  Milestone or millstone, for better or worse, it’s his very own “Stairway to Heaven,” if you will:

Take a whiff on me, that ain't no rose

Roll up your window and hold your nose

You got your dead skunk in the middle of the road

Stinkin' to high heaven.

I suspect the first line quoted above sailed right over most AM radio listeners’ heads.  Used by LWIII to imply “smell,” “Take a whiff on me” was a clever pun borrowed from the title of a much-covered American folk song of that name referencing cocaine use.  

The first recorded version from 1930 was titled "Cocaine Habit Blues" by the Memphis Jug Band, but it was Lead Belly who brought the song to prominence.  In the UK there was a 1961 sanitised version by Lonnie Donegan titled “Have A Drink On Me.”  A decade later Mungo Jerry covered Woody Guthrie's version of "Have A Whiff On Me" on their "Lady Rose" EP and the record was banned from radio airplay by the BBC. 

As the years went by, he continued to release high quality albums on a regular basis (with the occasional foray into TV or movie acting - eg M*A*S*H).  Times and tastes may have changed but I always found time for the latest LWIII release: Attempted Mustache (1973), T-Shirt (1976), I’m Alright (1985), History (1992), Recovery (2008, in which he re-visited some of those early songs) and the rest.  Unlike many artists of his era, his songwriting only seemed to improve with age.

I had never seen him play live, but that changed in the mid-90s when he toured Australia on the back of the album Grown Man (1995).  In the interim much had happened in the Wainwright world.  Together with his first wife, the wonderful and sadly missed Kate McGarrigle (1946 – 2010), Loudon was now part of an impressive musical dynasty with their offspring Rufus Wainwright (b.1973) and Martha Wainwright (b.1976). 

His fractious relationship with his children proved a rich source of inspiration for songs.  These included “Hitting You” (1992), “Rufus Is A Tit Man” (1975), “Pretty Little Martha” (1978), “Five Years Old” (1983), “Your Mother And I” (1986) and much to Martha’s chagrin when she discovered it was written about her, “I’d Rather Be Lonely” (1992).  In retaliation the kids wrote their own Loudon-inspired songs, notably Martha’s “Bloody Mother Fucking Asshole” (2005) and “Dinner At Eight” by Rufus (2003).

Over time LWIII’s albums had grown from sparce, solo recordings into extravagant full band affairs.  That was all very well, and it suited the material he was writing.  But for the pure, undiluted Loudon experience, just one man and his acoustic guitar will always be the only way to go.  And this was how I saw him perform at the intimate Fly By Night club in Fremantle, Western Australia.

Australian 7" EP 1973

Basically, a converted Nissen hut, the (sadly now defunct) Fly By Night was laid out a little like Ronnie Scott’s jazz club in London (albeit, with a capacity of 500, twice the size) with tables up the front and standing room only at the back, so early arrival ensured a prime spot at a table within touching distance of the stage. 

Over the two-hour set we saw a textbook LWIII performance: the idiosyncratic face-pulling and bizarre tongue-waggling, the hail-fellow-well-met anecdotes, the perfectly timed ad libs and continuous banter with the crowd.  Plus, of course, we got all those wonderful songs, many of them chucklesome, others tender to the point of heartbreaking: (“Dead Skunk,” “Road Ode,” “Your Mother And I,” “The Swimming Song,” “Men,” “April Fool’s Day Morn” etc).  His voice was stronger and more flexible than I remembered and his guitar playing (still with that ubiquitous Martin D-28), while fairly rudimentary, suited the material perfectly.  

He was still cracking jokes and joshing around when he came back out after the encore to mingle with the fans.  Most of the audience had already drifted away, leaving just a handful of die-hards.  “Ah, my people!” he boomed with mock braggadocio as they offered up items to be autographed.  The wisecracking and congeniality continued to the very end.

Before leaving I asked him to sign my treasured original vinyl copy of Album II.  It was the same one I’d had since first discovering his music in 1971.  It was the record I owned back when he was still in the race to find the “New Bob Dylan.”  And that, my friends, was quite literally a lifetime ago.  

As for the somewhat rhetorical title of this essay.  As long as the high-quality music in question includes a healthy dose of satire, irony, pathos and sarcasm (not necessarily all in the same song), the answer must surely be an emphatic "yes."

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