Charlie Daniels dies at age 83, RIP

by Rod Williams - Charlie Daniels is dead at the age of 83. Rest in Peace.

Charlile Daniels holds a warm place in my heart. I am sorry to hear of his death. As I have gotten older, I have seen more and more people die off that I admired or respected. Some of them, I didn't know much more about them than that their music has spoken to my soul. Others, I knew their mind. Some, I admired for their impact on the world, others because, not even knowing me, they helped make it thorough the night. Ronald Reagan, I loved because, in my view, he was the person most responsible for ending Communism and throwing it onto the dust bin of history, liberating a third of the world from slavery, saving the rest of us from a destiny of living under totalitarian tyranny, and saving us from nuclear annihilation.

I know it is a mixed bag of chracters but in my Rest-in-Pease Hall of Fame is Ronald Reagan, William F. Buckley, Barry Goldwater, Waylon Jennings, Ray Price, George Jones, and now, Charlie Daniels. There may have been others that caused me a twinge of sadness and a moment of reflection, but for those I listed above, it was like I lost a good friend.

Those much younger than me may not know of Charlie Daniels other than that he was an aging country star. He was more. Charlie Daniels was pivotal. He let music out of its genre boxes and let people appreciate a range of musical styles. He introduced a generation to country music and they didn't know they liked country music.

I have always been a country music fan. I never related, except maybe for short periods hear and there, to the popular music of my era. Yea, the Beatles were OK, but I never loved The Beatles. I have always loved county music. However, I really do have an appreciation of almost all music. For a while I said I could appreciate all music except opera. Well, at one point about the mid 90's I was driving home and had pubic radio on because I always liked NPR news. Following the news, an opera performance came on and I did not change the station and when I got home, I realized I had been listening for maybe thirty minutes and I thought, I really enjoyed that. I then started listening to opera. I would go to the library and check out opera CDs and many of the CDs would have English translations of he lyrics. Country music and opera have a lot in common. Opera is often about ubrequited love, and unbelievable heartbreak and longing and maudlin pathos. I went through about a six months period where I explored and leaned about opera and learned to appreciate it.

I never did develop a love of the Ellla Fitzgerald-type improvisational scat signing or the instrumental progressive dissonant jazz, but I did develop an appreciation for lots of jazz. I really have developed an appreciation for almost all types of music, except for rap and I just can't get into it. So, I appreciate almost all kinds of music. Back to Charlie Daniels.

In the mid 70's I was attending college and loving it. I was late to go to college, I never had an adult to encourage me and somehow thought that college was for a different class of people. You might say I had an inferiority complex. I did enroll in college thanks to the GI bill and learned that I was a whole lot smarter than I had given myself credit for and loved learning. I was married at the time and then out of the blue, my wife left me and filed for divorce. I was devastated. I took it hard. I had to move out of my home and moved closer to college.

Money was tight and I got by on the GI bill and working odd jobs at day labor and working part-time as needed with a moving company. I had to live as cheaply as possible and rented an apartment between a red-neck couple and a bunch of guy whose hosehold composition was constantly changing but who were worthless red-neck hard rock fans and dope heads. Living in close quarters, I became friends with a class of people I had never known before. I had known poor people, but these were a subset of poor people that you might call "white trash." During this time living among degenerate poverty-stricken, hard-rock-loving, petty thieves and losers and dealing with heartbreak and lonliness  and somstimes experiencing bouts of depression, I was also growing intellecutrally, exhilarated by learning, meeting new friends in addition to my neighbors, exploring new ideas, and having new adventures. I studied harder than I had to.  It was rewarding to get A's.  It boosted by ego and if I was going to argue with my teachers, I had to know what I was talking about. Durning this tremultous period, which also included some excessive drinking and use of pot, Charlie Daniels provided the soundtrack to my life.

I was always conservative politically, but during this time I became somewhat of an  individualist, that some might classify as neo-hippy. I wore blue swede cowboys boots and had longish hair. I was active in College Republicans but was not the chamber-of-commerce-in-waiting type Republican. I started a chapter of Young American for Freedom on campus and wrote a regular editorial for the student newspaper. I was kind of a trouble maker and aruged with my professors. I never considered myself a libertarian but was at this time, maybe a "libertarian-Republican?" Someone once said a libertarian is a Republican who smokes dope. I was kind of that person.

 About this time in the mid-70's Southern Rock became a popular form of music. For those who may not be familiar, it was a mix of blues, country, and rock with a defiant attitude and an expresson of regional pride. I guess the heyday was about 1972 to about 1982 or so.  I loved the music. It spoke to me. The genre was kind of broad and ranged from ZZ Top and 38 special to Credence Clearwarter to Charlie Daniels. I still loved County music, but I was listening more and more to Southern Rock. I tended toward the country end of the spectrum and in addition to Charlie Daniels I loved Wet Willie and the Marshal Tucker band. I had albums by these artist and wore them out.

Charlie Daniels really spoke to me. My favorite albums for a long time was Fire on the Mountain. I still probably know the words to every song on the album. My favorite song on the album was "Long Haired County Boy." If you listen to it, it has kind of a defiant populist libertarianism to the lyrics. Here are the lyrics.:

People say I'm no good and crazy as a loon
'Cause I get stoned in the morning
And get drunk in the afternoon
Kinda like my old blue tick hound
I like to lay around in the shade
And I ain't got no money but I damn sure got it made

'Cause I ain't asking nobody for nothin'
If I cant get it on my own
If you don't like the way I'm livin'
You just leave this long-haired country boy alone

Preacher man talking on T.V.
Puttin' down the rock and roll
Wants me to send a donation
'Cause he's worried about my soul
He said Jesus walked on the water
And I know that it's true
But sometimes I think that preacherman
Would like to do a little walking too

But I ain't asking nobody for nothin'
If I cant get it on my own
If you don't like the way I'm livin'
You just leave this long-haired country boy alone

A poor girl wants to marry
And a rich girl wants to flirt
A rich man goes to college
And a poor man goes to work
A drunkard wants another drink of wine
And a politician wants a vote
I don't want much of nothin' at all
But I will take another toke

But I ain't asking nobody for nothin'
If I can't get it on my own
If you don't like the way I'm livin'
You just leave this long-haired country boy alone

After college, I moved to Nashville and for years attended the annual Charlie Daniel's Jams. These were events I looked forward to all year long. These were happenings; concerts that lasted from about six in the evening to the next morning. Daniels opened the shows to rousing applause by saying, "Ain't it great to be alive and be in Tennessee." It was exhilarating.

These were rowdy affairs. At this time, the authorities did not even try to stop people from smoking dope at concerts and pepple would sneak in booze and the occational fire cracker would explode.  While the majority of music was "southern rock," the guest included everyone form Roy Acuff to Izaak Pearlman to James Brown. James Brown was a treat. I know now that seeing a Confederate battle flag causes woke progressives to have a meltdown. Charlie Daniels Jam's were peppered with people waving Confederate flags. James Brown performed and didn't let it bother him. Brown came on stage wearing a big cape, and made a big production of his appearance- not a modest bone in his body. He preformed and preformed and sweated and was energetic. He refused to stop performing and faked having to be dragged off stage. The Charlie Daniels Confederate-battle-flag-waving-crowd loved James Brown!

After Southern Rock faded as a genre, some bands began being marketed as rock and some just faded away or hung on, on the strength of their former glory without a musical home. Charlie Daniels became part of country music again from which he originated and still toured and recorded up until his death. Daniels became a vocal proponent of the conservative and christian points of view in later years. His website contained an editorial page, called "soap box" where he pontificated on the issues of the day. He we a patriot and an avid proponent of veterans. I was pleased to see him become an outspoken conservative but it would have been fine with me if he would have left the lyrics alone that said he would, "take another toke."

I am saddened by the passing of Charlie Daniels. Rest in Peace.

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Charlie Daniels: my honest feelings on the Confederate flag.

Charlie Daniels

Reposted from Charlie Daniels Soap Box - The recent senseless act of slaughter in a church in Charleston, South Carolina awakened America to the ever present lunacy and evil that walks among us and has also reopened some old wounds and deep feelings on both sides of a long festering situation.

Before I go any farther with this piece, I wish to express my love and admiration for the people of Charleston who have, in the face of immense pain, shown a restraint and a common sense seldom seen in tragic situations involving race.

When I saw the pictures of the people who had been murdered I made the statement, "I know these people", which I didn't mean literally, but figuratively, in that they were the kind of Christian people I have been around all my life, worked with and sat in the pews of churches with.

Salt of the earth folks, who not only professed to know the Lord Jesus Christ, but lived their faith every day of their lives. The kind of people you want to have praying for you, the kind who know how to put their arms around a hurting person and comfort and console.

The kind of people who raised their families to turn to Almighty God in times of trouble and heartbreak, proven by the forgiving words spoken by family members in court to the monster who had wantonly murdered their loved ones.

As in all Satan inspired iniquity, God has the ability to bring great good and in this situation, the people of Charleston South Carolina have shown the world what being a Christian is all about and the depth of common sense and class that exists in that community.

I feel sure that a jury of peers in South Carolina will see that Dylann Roof gets what’s coming to him and justice will be served and meted out to the full extent of the law.

In relation to the main crux of my column today I would like to relate an experience I had in a Midwestern city when the band was appearing with the local symphony orchestra. In the evening before the show started, one of the venue staff came to me and said, "There is a gentleman out front who is offended by the confederate flag on your piano".

I responded that we didn't have a Confederate flag painted on our piano. The upshot of the whole thing was that Taz, our keyboard player, had an American flag and a Tennessee flag with the flagstaffs crossed on the front of his piano with a drawing of his namesake, a cartoon Tasmanian Devil, and the phrase "Yessiree, Tennessee" painted under it.

The point I'm making is that this gentleman was probably the kind of person who looks for something to be offended about and sees things that aren't even there in an attempt to find something.  Of course the situation concerning the Confederate flag in Charleston is a much more serious situation with justifiable feelings that go back a century and a half, and the problem has the potential to be a racially divisive one.

The bottom line is that the flag in question represents one thing to some people and another thing to others.  Far be it from me to advise the people of South Carolina or any other state as to what they should fly over their capitol buildings or anywhere else in the state for that matter, but I truly hate to see the opportunists move in and create a symbol of hate out of a simple piece of cloth.

Of course we know most politicians are going to chime in and glean whatever political hay that is available, but, in my book, the corporate rush to rid their shelves of anything with the Confederate battle flag on it is pure hypocrisy.

If they felt that deeply about the subject, they should have done something years ago and I notice they have no problem accepting the profits from the merchandise they have on hand. I have received many requests to do interviews on this subject and had a lot of tweets asking me to comment, but I declined, wanting to take the time to explain my feelings in detail, without having to answer other people's loaded questions or express myself in 140-character limit of Twitter.

This will have the potential to be lengthy, so bear with me and I will try my best to relate my honest feelings on the Confederate flag in question which was actually the battle flag carried by several Confederate army regiments, and not the official flag of the Confederacy.

I was born in 1936, a mere 71 years after the Civil War ended when the South was looked upon by what seemed to be a majority of the Northern States as an inbred, backward, uneducated, slow-talking and slower-thinking people, with low morals and a propensity for incest.

This was in the days before television and about all the folks up North knew about Southerners was what they heard and there were a lot of people who took great pleasure in proliferating the myth, and some still do it to this day.  As you might suppose, people in the South bitterly resented this attitude of superiority and in some quarters the words “damn” and “Yankee” became one word and a somewhat fierce type of Southern pride came into being. The Confederate battle flag was a sign of defiance, a sign of pride, a declaration of a geographical area that you were proud to be from. That’s all it is to me and all it ever has ever been to me.

I can’t speak for all, but I know in my heart that most Southerners feel the same way.  I have no desire to reinstate the Confederacy, I oppose slavery as vehemently as any man and I believe that every human being, regardless of the color of their skin is just as valuable as I am and deserves the exact same rights and advantages as I do.

I feel that this controversy desperately needs to be settled without federal interference and input from race baiters like Al Sharpton, that it's up to the individual states as to what they allow to be a part of their public image, what the majority of the people of any given state want should, in my opinion, be their policy.

Unfortunately, the Confederate battle flag has been adopted by hate groups - and individuals like Dylann Roof - to supposedly represent them and their hateful view of the races. Please believe me when I say that, to the overwhelming majority of Southerners, the flag represents no such thing, but is simply a banner denoting an area of the nation and one's pride in living there. I know there will be those who will take these words of mine, try to twist them or call them insincere and try to make what I've said here some kind of anti-black racial statement, but I tell everybody who reads this article, I came up in the days of cruel racial prejudice and Jim Crow laws, when the courts were tilted against any black man, the segregated educational system was inferior and opportunities for blacks to advance were almost nonexistent.

I lived through the useless cruelty of those days and did not get my feelings out of some sensitivity class or social studies course, but made my own decisions out of experience and disgust.  I hold no ill feelings and have no axes to grind with my brothers and sisters of any color. The same God made us, the same God will judge us, and I pray that He will intervene in the deep racial divide we have in this nation and make each person – black or white - see each other for what we truly are, human beings, no better, no worse.

It's time to do away with labels, Caucasian-American, African-American, Asian-American, Native American and so forth.  How about just a simple "AMERICAN"?

What do you think?

Pray for our troops and the peace of Jerusalem. God Bless America.

Charlie Daniels

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The Confederate Flag and "I sang Dixie."

It looks like it belongs in the Dixie Putt-Putt golf course.

I  think the Confederate battle flag in South Carolina should come down, but I don't live there and it is not for me to decide but I can still have an opinion, like everyone else who has weighed in on the topic. I think it is unnecessary to offend other people unless there is goods reason to do so, and many people find the Confederate flag offensive.

Following the tragedy of the senseless shooting in Charleston South Carolina it seems the focus has shifted to the appropriateness of having a Confederate battle flag fly on the grounds of the state capital, as if there was a connection between the two. From the issue of the appropriateness of the confederate battle flag flying on the grounds of the state capital in South Carolina the discussion has expanded to other displays anywhere that memorialize the civil war in the South and pay homage to our ancestors and heroes.

As it relates to the fiberglass stature of Nathan Bedford Forrest on I-64, I really dislike it.  I doubt most tourist driving through know it is Nathan Bedford Forrest, however.  At 70 miles an hour you probably have no idea what it commemorates.  My dislike for the stature has to do primarily with aesthetics. It looks cartoonist. It is ugly. It looks like the kind of "art" one finds on a putt-putt golf course. Maybe travelers going up I-65 at 75 miles an hour think they have just missed a putt-putt golf course.

Also, I have to ask: the horse has a saddle, but no bridle.Why is that?  Should it not have a bridle? Surely General Forrest did not ride a horse without a bridle? Despite my dislike of the statue, I think it is a waste of effort to try to build a foliage barricade to hide it from sight.

In response to controversy over the Confederate battle flag near the South Carolina state house, Walmart, Amazon, Sears, and eBay have all stopped selling items featuring the Confederate flag and the parent company that owns the rights to the Dukes of Hazard merchandise has announced they will no longer license the General Lee car featured in that show. Other states and locals have began looking at the appropriateness of statues and bust of Confederate heroes and images on state and county seals that recall historical Confederate associations and names of streets, bridges, and buildings named to honor Confederate dead.

I understand the desire to ban the Confederate flag.  I guess if I were African-American I would find it offensive and want it banned.  I think I know how they feel because I feel much the same way about that hate symbol known as the "peace" sign.  That is the symbol that those who betrayed out troops in the field, marched under during the Vietnam war.  That is the sign carried by the American fifth column on campuses and in the streets of America that encouraged the enemy not to give up because they had massive numbers of supporters in America who were daily trying to persuade their own government to give up, pull out of the war and give the North Vietnamese an easy victory.  Now, that symbol of betrayal is sold on eBay, Walmart, Amazon and Sears and elsewhere as a fashion accessory. You can find it on backpacks and clothing and pocketbooks and any number of items. Personally, I would prefer to ban the peace sign over banning the confederate flag. I personally find the peace sign offensive. No one grantees me the right to not be offended however.

The flag we cal the "Confederate flag" was not a national flag of the Confederacy but was the

battle flag of the Army of Northern Virginia.  It only came to be considered the Confederate flag, later. I don't think most people who display it or celebrate seeing it being displayed think of it as a racist symbol. During the civil rights era, some southern segregationist appropriated the flag as their own symbol to show defiance to federal authority but time has passed since then and I think that to most people the Confederate flag is simply a symbol of southerness.

I myself am from East Tennessee, which during the Civil War was pro-Union. That is why East Tennessee was a Republican stronghold in a Democrat Tennessee from then on.  Areas of the South that were too hilly to grow cotton were generally pro-Union in the Civil War and became isolated Republicans strong holds for the next 125 years in an otherwise solid Democrat South.  So, I did not come from a pro-confederate part of the South, but I still had an identity that was represented by the Confederate flag. I never wore a confederate belt buckle or had a confederate license plate on my pick up truck (I never owned a pick up truck). I did however, own a Lynard Skynyrd album that featured a Confederate flag.

My favorite music has always been Country music but during the 70's I became a big fan of Southern Rock. My preference in Southern Rock never went as far toward the hard rock end as the spectrum as Molly Hatchet, tending more toward the country rock of The Charlie Daniels Band and Marshal Tucker Band.  For several years I attended the Charlie Daniels Volunteer Jams held at Municipal Auditorium. These shows were a blast of great music and hard partying that easily ran ten hours long and while I saw everyone from Roy Acuff to James Brown and even an occasional classical musician or gospel choir, the foundation of the shows was Southern Rock. Many participants brought Confederate battle flags and waved them during the show.

Charlie Daniels would start the show by saying, "Ain't it Great to be alive and be in Tennessee!"  And, the crowd would go wild.  I think that like celebrating a shout out to being in Tennessee, the Confederate battle flag was symbolic of a shout out to being proud of one's southerness. A lot of Southern Rock bands not only celebrated being Southern but celebrated their State identity.  Charlie Daniels' albums often featured representations of the tri-star symbol from the Tennessee flag and at the start of his performance would say, "I'm Charlie Daniels from Mt. Juliet, Tennessee."  Marshal Tucker's shows would start with an announcement: "From Spartanburg South Carolina, it's the Marshall Tucker Band!" And, The Alman Brothers let it be known they were from Georgia and several of their album covers featured some representation of the peach, which represents Georgia. Southern Rock, like Country music often celebrated the South and a sense of place.  I still love the CDB song "The South's Gonna do it Again."

I know that now America is becoming so homogenized that there is not much sense of place any

Southern Motel

more. Almost any where you go, you see the same chain restaurants and people listen to the same music and you rarely hear a heavy accent. There may be more people living in Nashville born elsewhere than there are native Nashvillians. I don't know if that is really a good thing or not.  I certainly want foreign immigrants to become Americanized, and would not want so much regionalism that it was a source of conflict. By the same token, I think something valuable is lost when we lose the way we speak, the way we interact and when we all become antonymous individuals rather than people with a sense of place and history and a sense of belonging.

I think this search to take down symbols of southerness had gotten out of hand. Recently, mayoral candidate Charles Bone who is an investor in the lower Broadway venue Acme Feed and Seeds, responded to a complaint about a piece of artwork that hung in that establishment and he had it removed. The artwork features a women wearing a Confederate flag bikini in front of a sign that says "Southern Motel."  Wearing the Confederate flag on your butt is not honoring the flag. Any idiot who is offended by this piece of art should be told to "get over it."  As Tom Morales owner of the establishment said about the piece, it is "satirical commentary on Southern culture."

This is nuts! What next? Ban the songs of Stephen Foster? Ban the playing of "Dixie?" Burn down the surviving antebellum plantation
mansions? Remove the Confederate memorial statue in the square in Franklin?

Political correctness has already stifled speech in America to where conservative commencement speakers are disinvited from speaking if students object. People shout down views they do not agree with. Are we to become the American Taliban and destroy icons of the past because they don't fit our current ideology?

I'll close with this:

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Charlie Daniels' on Guns and Church

Since I identify with the people who fall into Barrack Obama's elitist description of people of faith who keep firearms I'm not very happy with Barrack Obama's recent remarks. He said something to the effect that us rednecks cling to our guns and our religion when we get frustrated and I would like to take umbrage to these remarks.

My faith goes much deeper than his superficial explanation and I love my guns even when I'm not frustrated. And I am not by myself. I was going to church and shooting guns before Mr. Obama was even born and come from a long line of good people who have been doing it for generations. To me this latest Obama blunder only helps reveal the depth of condescension the far left wing of the Democrat party has for the folks out here in flyover country. Mr. Obama's remarks are insulting to a lot of folks. It's kind of like Abraham Lincoln said, "God must love the common people because he made so many of them".

His remarks make me think that Obama doesn't know the people of this country very well. I'm sure he knows the jet set and the Hollywood bunch, the limousine liberals and the save the whales, kill the babies crowd, but does he think that the ordinary people don't count? Does he think that they're so stupid that they don't know who he's talking about when he says these things? Does he think their opinions aren't important? Apparently.

How can a man stand in front of America and tell people what he wants to do for them and have so little respect for a whole segment of the population. In fact, a very large segment. Does that mean that he would only represent the high-minded liberal ideals of the far left and ignore the rest of us? What kind of Commander and Chief would he make if he doesn't respect the very people who make up the lion's share of the armed forces. You may say I'm over reacting, but I'm getting sick and tired of him making these elitist statements and saying that he had been taken out of context or some other flimsy excuse.

After his wife's remark about not being proud of this country and his pastor's statements calling America the U.S.K.K.K.A. and his own statement about not wanting his daughter punished with a baby, it makes me wonder what kind of a man Obama really is and what kind of a president he'd make. Would he be an antigun advocate pushing the effort to take the firearms out of innocent citizen's hands? Would he not respect the religious beliefs of America, not taking them into account in his agenda? I really don't know much about the man and neither does America. He basically came from out of nowhere and as the facts come out little by little, they don't make a particularly confident picture. I have a great fear that if our military gets broken by another president, this time we're not going to have time to fix it again and what that spells for America, I don't even want to contemplate. Oh well, I guess I'll grab my gun and go to church.

Pray for our troops.

What do you think?

God Bless America

Charlie Daniels

Commentary: I pretty much agree with the view expressed by Charlie Daniels in this article, but I don’t own guns or regularly go to Church so I am not as offended as Charlie Daniels. Obama made a stupid remark. Maybe he should use the Hillary excuse and blame it on sleep deprivation and fatigue. The day of when you could say one thing to one group and something else to another is over. In this information age, the tape is always running. Did Obama not think that the rednecks in Pennsylvania might be listening when he was speaking to the elitist liberal crowd in Hollywood?

I have always liked Charlie Daniels. In the mid 70’s I had several CDB albums and wore them out. I always thought Charlie Daniels was Country, but at that time he was not played on Country radio. He fell in the genre of “Southern Rock” and you were more likely to hear CDB on Rock radio.

In the heyday of the Charlie Daniels band, I attended several of the Volunteer Jams. These were ruckus concerts that lasted eigth to ten hours. The lineup was never announced in advance. The bulk of the music was Southern Rock but covered the spectrum from Hard Rock to hard core Country to Soul Music to even an occasional Opera performance. Those concerts were great fun. People anticipated them and speculated on who the guest would be. People partied hard, heard some great music and had a great time.

Knowing the Daniels from the 70’s and 80’s I have been surprised by the Daniels of recent years. Until recent years, I never did know the politics of Charlie Daniels, but he had a tolerant view of drug use and was somewhat of a rebel. In recent years he has emerged as a God-fearing, hard-on-crime, anti-drug Conservative. I agree with many of his political views but never expected he was so religious or such a social conservative. He always reflected a populist value and that still shines through.

Charlie takes his editorializing quite seriously and post his opinion on his web page about once a week. He has a folksy way of expressing himself and I think he often says what a lot of people are thinking. I wish his opinion pieces had wider distribution. He needs to be syndicated. His site is listed in the blogroll to the left. Go to his site and then click on “soap box” for his editorial page.

Here is Charlie Daniels performing one my favorite songs, Long-haired Country Boy. This song brings back pleasant memories and I enjoy it every time I hear it. I don’t feel like a put-upon poor southern boy, so I don’t know why I love this song as much as I do. Charlie was obviously not the God-fearing, anti-drug, social conservative he is today back when this was a hit.

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