I'd thought of doing some kind of tribute to songwriter Bobby Charles when he died last month, but, well, there weren't any particularly good clips on YouTube (I was looking in particular for Small Town Talk - here's Rick Danko's version), and the Times ran a fine obituary anyway, and, well, you can't mark every death, even though his eponymous 1972 album remains an under-appreciated classic.
Then today I happened on Mark Steyn's Song of the Week #156, and it's Bobby Charles' See You Later Alligator, and it's really excellent: not just on the song itself, but on the man:
When Martin Scorsese was filming The Last Waltz, he wanted Charles to sing "Later Alligator" and have The Band and Dylan and all the other bigshots play along - an act of hommage from the biggest stars of the day to a protean rock'n'roll landmark. But the singer figured he'd like to do a new song that nobody knew. "Martin Scorsese dropped his jaw," remembered Charles. "He couldn't believe I was saying no to him... 'Who is this guy?' he asked. 'He's somebody that doesn't want to be a star.' I said, `I'm sorry, it's just the way I am.'"
He's an ace music journalist, Mark Steyn. I just wish he'd drop all the Eurabia shit.
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