Last week, the world lost a funny and brilliant singer-songwriter named Todd Snider. He was 59 years old.
For the past week as I logged onto the social media, I found an overwhelming wealth of articles, memories and stories shared by a lot of folks that were deeply inspired by this man. Todd Snider was certainly prolific, For those that explored the world of Todd Snider, it was universally acknowledged (by anyone paying attention) that this man was truly a master storyteller. Brad Beheler noted this on galleywinter.com:
“Todd was as beloved for the tales as he was for the tunes. He could spin a story sharper than a knife and usually twice as funny. His intonation had a hint of (Robert Earle) Keen, his rambling owed a debt to Jerry Jeff (Walker), and his whole ‘I can’t believe this absurd shit either’ vibe owed something to (John) Prine.”
“When Todd’s stories were at his best, he was as funny and engaging as any of those folks. With the added bonus that he would then sing a song that tied a button on the punchlines from the story. It was a truly incredible trick. One that he pulled off better than anyone else. Even his heroes.”
I loved the way Todd would prepare his audience with his “eighteen minute speech” (which was usually less than two minutes):
“I wanna let you know that I also might share some of my opinions with you over the course of the evening. I’m not gonna share them with you ’cause I think they’re smart or because I think you need to know ’em, I’m gonna share ’em with you because the rhyme. I didn’t come down here to change any of y’all’s minds about anything, I come down here to ease my own mind about everything. It works every time.”
“The Ballad of the Kingsmen” was the initial gateway Todd Snider composition that pulled me into the Todd Snider universe. As the documenter of all-things-LOUIE, it was inevitable that multiple people would alert me to this recording. It was a witty talking blues-type ballad that connected the 1960s censorship of LOUIE LOUIE to the 1999 Columbine High School massacre, when Marilyn Manson was being blamed for this tragedy.
The fact that Todd Snider was born and grew up in Portland (Oregon), which was also the birthplace and hometown of the Kingsmen, made perfect sense. Ultimately, Todd was later inducted into the Oregon Music Hall of Fame on Saturday October 9, 2021 at Aladdin Theater in Portland, a few weeks after a September 26th memorial for Mike Mitchell of the Kingsmen at the same theater.
That particular song was one of many great tracks on his 2004 album “East Nashville Skyline”, which was released on Oh Boy Records, John Prine’s independent label. Steven Hyden, who interviewed Todd multiple times, shared his thoughts on this album on his Stubstack page:
It’s where he finally figured out how to make folk music that sounded like a muddy and messy cross of “Exile On Main St”. and “Ragged Glory,” which was his ultimate artistic ambition, I think. He made it after he crashed out of a semi-promising major-label career, almost died, and ended up on Prine’s record label. In our last interview, he spoke with obvious pride about how the album impressed his label head and role model.
On the Amazon page for this album, Roy Kasten shared this review:
On his seventh album, he paints a word-drunk, smart-ass, but always affectionate portrait of this gritty neighborhood–the dead-end dives, low-rent bungalows, and musicians barely scraping by–with a freewheeling comedic spirit as true to country as it is to rock & roll. He gives Mike Tyson a chummy hug, flips off the moral majority, fails to decipher “Louie, Louie,” and turns an attempted suicide into a bittersweet recognition of human folly.
I do think “East Nashville Skyline” is a masterpiece.
How could I not love the self-deprecating opening song of that album “Age Like Wine?”
“My new stuff is nothing like my old stuff was
And neither one is much when compared to the show
Which will not be as good as some other one you saw
So help me, I know, I know, I know”“I am an old timer
Old timer
Too late to die young now”
– T.S.
Todd Snider released at least 17 albums throughout his 30 year career, with sources citing different counts due to variations in what is included (live, studio, compilations, EPs). There’s a lot of great music to choose from, as well as a memoir that I’m looking forward to reading.
Returning back to Steven Hyden’s excellent Substack article on Todd, I appreciate this concept:
“I don’t want to get into the circumstances of his final days and weeks except to say that it sounds like the plot of a Todd Snider song. A shaggy-dog tune about an outsider cast into the lower rungs of America, the depths of which most of us don’t want to witness or acknowledge, where human beings suffer from lack of empathy and wanton neglect and spiraling addiction and poor health care and the profound alienation and desolation such things engender. A deeply sad story that he would have found a way to make funny.
I can almost see it from Todd Snider’s perspective, the pathetic spectacle of media outlets that never would have deigned to consider a person like Todd Snider “important,” all of a sudden rushing to post body cam footage of his prolonged physical and mental breakdown on their rapidly marginalized and eternally shitty websites. When you think about it as a metaphor for a debased culture, where a great unheralded songwriter can only become famous when he’s viewed as trainwreck grist for the algorithm, it does have the ring of bleak satiric irony that Todd would have appreciated. Had he lived longer, he might have gotten around to writing “I Saw Todd Snider On TMZ” for his next record.”
Rest in peace, Todd. We are definitely going to miss you and your fine music. In the meantime, I’d encourage folks to check out more Todd Snider music and read the full essays about him that I’ve bookmarked in this article.
In closing, I leave you with Todd’s “Opening Statement” which addresses his eventual and final demise.
– E.P. of LouieLouie.net.
Before I refuse to take any questions
I’ve got an opening statement
I’d like to keep to myself, but
I’m open to the idea my death
May well defy all of my logic and
My imagination
I may never know this road I’m on
The here and now or the gone
Coming home or running away
We were light and sound
Before a darker matter
Froze us into what we are for now
Too late, over in a minute
Losing a fight before I knew I was in it
Just kept me swinging until long after I knew
That it was over
I may never know this road I’m on
The here and now or the gone
Coming home or running away
You gonna miss my laugh someday
– T.S.
Reference links:
The Story Tellers – Brad Beheler at galleywinter.com
Todd Snider, Runaway Locomotive, R.I.P. – Steven Hyden
Todd Snider Stares Down Pain: ‘I Don’t Think I’m Going to Get Better’ – Rolling Stone