Murder ballads

[Clams]

Not sure what it says about me but I've always had a soft spot for a good murder ballad. The latest and greatest being Banded Clovis from Tyler Childers' excellent new record Purgatory. Over banjos and fiddle, Childers spins a tale of two strung out dudes who climb a ridge to dig in the cold dirt and rocks for arrowheads and artifacts and whatnot. After one dude finds some valuable clovis, the other shoots him dead so he can sell it for drug money. Great stuff.



Another good new one is Colter Wall's Kate McCannon. She's the "prettiest girl in the whole damn holler" but when her man finds her in the creek with another, he doesn't think twice about putting three rounds into her.



My all time favorite from the genre just might be Down the River by Chris Knight, a dark tale about family, murder and revenge in the backwoods and rivers of Kentucky


Some other great ones are Springsteen's Nebraska, Hendrix's Hey Joe and Neil Young's Down by the River. Long Black Veil and Stagger Lee are both classics as well (although they've both been covered so many times that I don't know who originally did them). Good stuff.

[scotto]

Not always "ballads," bet definitely murder:

[rlipps]

Some great choices Clams. I'd add Long Black Highway by Chris Knight and Loving County by Charlie Robison to those as well.

[whatwouldcooleydo?]

Oh, this is so in my wheelhouse. I have a pretty huge collection of what I call old timey music, what my wife calls "plinky plink," stuff from the 20s and 30s. I have a handful of compilations dedicated to murder ballads and I love the stuff. You cannot have a discussion of this genre without going back to some of the true classics and bedrocks of the genre, stuff like Banks of the Ohio, Down in the Willow Garden, Little Sadie, Tom Dooley (Dula, in some cases), Pretty Polly, Omie Wise, Frankie and Johnny (sometimes Frankie and Albert), et al. And here I'm just going back to the American side of the coin, the British Isles have their own impressive canon when it comes to murder ballads. Busy, so that's all I can say for now, but I am sure to return to this

And even if you don't go all the way back to the 20s/30s, don't forget Nick Caves album Murder Ballads


hard to find youtube coverage of some of the essential versions, so I'm posting what I can quickly find

[Beaverdam]

Knoxville Girl by The Louvin Brothers

[tinnitus photography]

mic drop

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0OX_uk ... t6rfEr1M5A_

[Flea]

mic drop

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0OX_uk ... t6rfEr1M5A_

Beat me to it. So I'll just throw up The Mercy Seat and leave.

[Zip City]

List fails w/o Johnny Cash

[hanklow]

My username is the main character in Matthew Ryan's murder ballad "Night Watchman"

[Clams]

List fails w/o Johnny Cash

Cool, I was not aware that Nick Cave did a whole record of murder ballads. And yeah Zip, I had meant to include Johnny in my original post but forgot.

[Iowan]

Billy Pritchard - Slobberbone

[Zip City]

List fails w/o Johnny Cash

Cool, I was not aware that Nick Cave did a whole record of murder ballads. And yeah Zip, I had meant to include Johnny in my original post but forgot.

Coincidentally, Cash does a killer version of "The Mercy Seat"

[worrierking]

Most Murder songs are country.

LA County--Lyle Lovett
Crazy Eddie's Last Hurrah-- Reckless Kelly
Live Oak--Jason Isbell

[Mundane Mayhem]

Guess you probably can't call it a ballad, but the song that came to mind right away was The Coup's "Me and Jesus the Pimp in a '79 Granada Last Night."

[Clams]

Guess you probably can't call it a ballad, but the song that came to mind right away was The Coup's "Me and Jesus the Pimp in a '79 Granada Last Night."

Ballad or not, we accept all murder songs here.

[bovine knievel]

Not sure the results were murder or if the tunes are ballads but The Felice Bros. have a few good ones.

Frankie's Gun
Whiskey In My Whiskey

[whatwouldcooleydo?]

anyone in interested in Americana/roots/old-timey/whatever you want to call it needs a copy of this absolutely essential set

[whatwouldcooleydo?]

this one goes back to the 1650s. It's done by a million people, typically called Two Sisters/Twa Sisters or something like that

[whatwouldcooleydo?]

not sure that Leon Payne's classic Psycho is techically a murder ballad in any ethnomusicological sense, but fuck it, it's such a great creepy song

[whatwouldcooleydo?]

another awesome set

[whatwouldcooleydo?]

[whatwouldcooleydo?]

this is a great book, a tad off-topic, butI imagine most here would enjoy the hell out of it

[Smitty]

this is a great book, a tad off-topic, butI imagine most here would enjoy the hell out of it

Absolutely essential .

When I think of murder ballads, "Knoxville Girl" is the first thing that comes to mind. Although it's not strictly murder ballads, if you're into that sort of thing I think you'll dig this playlist I put together a few years ago:

https://open.spotify.com/user/smitty702 ... sNrRfzyCVE