Moving on with our week of “Man of Constant Sorrow,” I thought we would visit Waylon Jennings. Yesterday, I wrote that he turned the song into “an easy listening monstrosity.” And that’s true. But I listened to it again, and I was right to add that it “is good in its way.” Part of the problem we have is that as time went on, the people singing became more removed from the subject of the song. Jennings was not a man of constant sorrow.
This song is off Jennings’ second solo album, Folk-Country. The album isn’t bad. It’s got that late-60s sound that I associate with people like Bobby Goldsboro. But it has nothing of what I love this song for:
I had never heard that cut before and I never want to hear it again. I can’t agree with you on this one Frank. That cut has no redeeming features for me. I really liked Jennings when he and Willie went “Outlaw”. Their music had a rawness I liked. This rendition of Sorrow is awful. The soul of the song is buried in glop.
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Well, I did write, “But it has nothing of what I love this song for.”