Hello in There

I spent Monday, March 30th believing John Prine was dying from the virus, or had died and his  family had not yet released the news.  Catastrophic thinking, I know.  There’s a lot of that going around.  I got very emotional here in the shack.  Sometimes my emotions surprise me.  The first emotion was profound sorrow.  Very soon it turned to anger.  Here’s what I thought.

“If this pandemic takes John Prine from us before he has written all the songs he’s imagined, in that wonderfully creative brain of his, I don’t know what I’ll do.  If anyone deserves to keep living until he’s ready to go it’s him.  I’ll be damned if he is going to be stolen away by some random soulless infection.  We share something.  That’s why I’m sure he’s not ready to go.  Because I know I’m not ready.”


I first heard John Prine in 1973.  I was a first year English teacher in Ottawa living alone in an apartment above a garage.  I entertained myself and others by playing albums like the Yes Fragile, Edgar Winter’s They Only Come Out at Night,”and Led Zepplin IV very loudly on a turntable through giant speakers.  It was a way to avoid stacks of freshman essays on a table in the other room that needed to be read and graded.

Tom Fatten, a first-year music teacher who was leading a great jazz band at OHS, made a quick assessment of my musical situation and suggested I broaden my playlist.

“Hell McClure, you’re an English major.  I mean, head banging is fine, but turn the volume down and soak up some poetry with your music.  Listen to John Prine.  You are going to love his lyrics.”

I took his advice and bought his first album, simply named John Prine.  On the cover sat a twenty-four year old man with a moustache on a bale of straw.  Kris Kristofferson wrote a blurb for the back of the album cover.  Steve Goodman played guitar and sang harmony on a few tracks.

But it was the wit, insight, and tenderness of Prine’s lyrics that made that piece of vinyl a hit.  And in all fairness Leo LeBlanc, the pedal steel player, helped too.  I still have the album, along with his most recent album and several in between.

On the back of that first album, Kristofferson writes about meeting Prine for the first time.  Kristofferson had played a Chicago tour stop where he shared the billing with Steve Goodman.  After the show Goodman convinced Kristofferson he had to hear this new guy.  They ended up in Old Town.

It was late. Kristofferson and his band had to leave town early the next morning, but they made their way to a club that was closing, probably the Earl of Oldtown.  The owner, Earl Pionke, would have unlocked the door and most likely made them drinks.

The streets were empty.  Inside the bar the chairs were up on the tables.  Kristofferson said they pulled chairs down and were sitting in front of the stage, just a raised platform really in the center of the room on the south wall.  There was an awkward moment, while John unpacked his guitar, where everyone knew it was like “Okay kid, show us what you got.”   

John Prine stood there, looked down at his guitar, and just started singing.

Kristofferson wrote this about that night;  “…by the end of the first line we knew we were hearing something else.  It must’ve been like stumbling onto Dylan when he busted onto the Village scene. …One of those rare times when it all seems worth it….”

“He sang about a dozen songs and had to do a dozen more before it was over.  Unlike anything I’d heard before.  Sam Stone, Donald & Lydia.  The one about the Old Folks.  Twenty-four years old and writes like he’s two hundred and twenty.  I don’t know where he comes from, but I’ve got a good idea where he’s going.”  

Where he was going was the place Bob Dylan, Kris Kristofferson and Steve Goodman had already entered, music stardom. 

By the time I saw John Prine in concert he wasn’t playing many small clubs.  I saw him at a big venue on Navy Pier in the 80’s.  But he remained a humble guy, a plain talker with a wry sense of humor, writing simple songs that went straight to your heart. 

John grew up in Maywood and worked as a postal carrier out of high school.  He said walking his mail route was good for thinking up songs.  He was drafted into the army and luckily sent to Germany. When his tour was over, he came back to Chicago.   

My friends Ken Brown and Sharon Loudon lived in Chicago in the 70’s and were lucky enough to hear John Prine play live at the Earl of Old Town.  They sat at a table up close, probably in the same spot where Kris Kristofferson heard him.  Prine performed right in front of them, singing songs that were recorded on that first album.

The song about the old folks Kris Kristofferson mentions is Hello in There.  It’s a story put to music with a short cast of characters: an old man who narrates the tale and remains nameless, his wife Loretta, their kids John and Linda in Omaha, Joe (somewhere on the road), a deceased son Davy, and his friend Rudy. 

Prine tells the story in three stanzas with a chorus that repeats twice.  212 words is all.  His spare acoustic guitar accompanies the lyrics, along with an organ and electric guitar on the studio version.  But that night in the empty bar it would have been just he and his acoustic guitar, unamplified, playing and singing quietly to a few people.

He sets the scene and then adds lines that stab listeners with an awareness of the emotion the narrator carries in his heart.  We feel what he feels.  Here’s how Prine, though the narrator, sums up grief and resignation over the death of his son.  One fact, two short phrases. 

We lost Davy in the Korean War,

And I still don’t know what for,

Don’t matter anymore.

The old couple’s relationship with their surviving children is captured in eight words.

              A life of their own left us alone

To help us understand their life together, the old man reveals this about he and his wife.

              Me and Loretta, we don’t talk much more

              She sits and stares through the back door screen

              And all the news just repeats itself

              Like some forgotten dream that we’ve both seen

He considers calling up his friend Rudy but doesn’t, fearing this exchange:

              But what could I say if he asks “What’s new?”

              “Nothing, what’s with you?  Nothing much to do.”

The chorus compares the effect aging has on people versus the world around them. 

Ya know that old trees just grow stronger

And old rivers grow wilder ev’ry day

But old people just grow lonesome

Waiting for someone to say, “Hello in There, hello.”

The song ends with a plea.  It’s John Prine speaking directly to us.  At least it feels that way. 

              So if you’re walkin down the street sometime

              And see some hollow ancient eyes

              Please don’t just pass ‘em by and stare

              As if you didn’t care, say “Hello in There, hello. “

Not many young singer songwriters wrote songs about the crippling loneliness of old people in 1971.  The late sixties and early seventies were all about youth, drugs, sex, and rock and roll.  But John Prine thought of other things and got his listeners to think of them too. 

I’ve had people tell me that they cry every time they hear that song.  I don’t cry anymore, but 47 years later I now know something of what that old man felt.  For John Prine to imagine those feelings and express them so well as a young man in his early twenties reveals his gift.  You can hear it by clicking this link.

Hello in There

But the song that spoke to me most directly on that album was Far From Me.  Unlike Hello in There told through a narrator, Far From Me is a first person narrative. 

Like most of Prine’s songs, it’s simple.  A guy picks up his girlfriend at a diner and has a realization.  The way he describes that moment made me his fan forever.

Here are the complete lyrics.  Nothing I write can improve on the these 282 words.

As the café was closing on a warm summer night

And Cathy was cleaning the spoons

The radio played

The hit parade

And I hummed along with the tune.

She asked me to change the station

Said the song just drove her insane

But it weren’t just the music playing

It was me she was trying to blame.

(Chorus)

And the sky is dark and still now

On the hill where the angels sing

Ain’t it funny how an old broken bottle

Looks just like a diamond ring

But its far, far from me

Well I leaned on my left leg

In the parking lot dirt

And Cathy was closing the lights

A June bug flew

From the warmth he once knew

And I wished for once I weren’t right

Why we used to laugh together

And we’d dance to any old song

Well ya know, she still laughs with me

But she waits just a second too long

(Repeat Chorus)

Well I started the engine

And I gave it some gas

And Cathy was closing her purse

Well, we hadn’t gone far

In my beat up old car

And I was prepared for the worst

“Will you still see me tomorrow?”

“No, I got too much to do.”

Well a question ain’t really a question

If you know the answer too.

(Repeat Chorus)

Far From Me (Live)

I was twenty-two and alone in my apartment above the garage the first time I heard Far from Me.  My mind raced back to a spring night five years earlier.  I was in the driver’s seat of a ‘63 Ford Galaxie when I realized the person I loved, sitting next to me, no longer loved me. 

Everyone has had their heart broken right?  I think so.  But few talk about it.  Fewer yet sort out what happened, write it down, and share it so others can relive and perhaps understand their own experience. And of those that do, none have done it better than John Prine.

I don’t remember the words that girl spoke when I first knew, in my beat up old car, she no longer loved me.  But when I heard John Prine sing the lyrics of Far From Me, I felt the pain wash over me like it had just happened.

I was convinced John Prine not only knew how I felt but felt exactly the same thing.  I knew because in Far From Me he put what I felt into words. His ability to express both my joy and despair through his songs makes me feel very close to him.  It makes no sense really, but I’m afraid when he goes, some part of me will go with him.   When it does it will truly be a time for tears.

And now that time is here-April 8, 2020.  Thank you, John Prine, for all you gave me.