Todd Snider And Will Kimbrough – “If the melody is right, you can open your heart”

ND: That’s true subversion: They can enjoy it before they even know that they disagree with it.

TS: It’s my humble opinion that’s the best way to do it.

WK: All I’m trying to say is peace and love, let’s relive that for a second and remember that these motherfuckers are criminal. With a song like “Trying To Be Less Polite”, I meant the line where I said “The president’s a fool,” but that song is one [where] I went back and thought, “That could be too preachy.” But what I decided was, that song is unadulterated rant inserted into a pop melody that I wanted to play for people.

TS: Can I suggest this other thing? “The President’s a fool?” Which year are you talking about? Name a date. Today, yesterday, tomorrow? What’s the line?

WK: “The president’s a fool, I don’t want to get up early and I wish I had a good stiff drink.” Now, I love to get up early. So I’ve changed my mind about that. But that doesn’t sound good in a song. When I say the president’s a fool, I thought that was just something obvious.

TS: Yeah, that’s obvious. Who would take that gig? You’d have to be a fool. Worst record deal going, the president.

WK: You could also look at it like that was my naive response. That song came on its own like that. Later, I could judge it. But in the beginning, I have to go with something that’s, what’s the word…intuitive. That’s what the president does, he goes with his gut. I don’t want to be that intuitive. Maybe he would be better working in music.

TS: Man, you can’t go to war without everyone getting all up into it. If all that’s going on is that the dude who’s in charge, everybody thinks he’s pretty cool but he’s screwing some chick, maybe you can drift off into that. But if it’s war, everybody’s talking about it. Even jocks are talking about it.

WK: It’s where people get killed, and it’s where all the money goes. The idea of democracy is really neat, if you mess with it and change it. The good thing about music is you can still make a record that says, “You’re fucked up. Stop.” Whatever importance it is, it doesn’t make any difference. This is what we do.

III. I KNOW LISTENING TO SKYNYRD MADE ME WANT TO PARTY.

ND: Decades ago, you could sing “Four dead in Ohio” if you were Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, and you could sing about the righteousness of the youth movement in “What Is Truth?” if you were Johnny Cash. Now, you can’t even sing “She needs wide open spaces” if you’re the Dixie Chicks and you’ve criticized the president.

WK: Well, the people that run the things now aren’t naive. Marketing is the most serious science in America. There’s no innocence in the media. I went to Sweden with Rodney Crowell, played a tour and opened for him. The last night was Stockholm, and we went to dinner with the promoter. This is 2004, before the elections. This woman from the booking agency said, “We’re owned by Clear Channel, and while the Dixie Chicks controversy was going on, we were doing the Chicks’ tour over here and it was huge.” It was Clear Channel promoting the Chicks, at the same time they were banning them from country radio. It’s just business.

TS: Shit, I bought that Dixie Chicks record like I was voting.

ND: Can music change minds anymore?

TS: I know listening to Skynyrd made me want to party, man.

WK: I think it can help people make up their minds.

ND: I have to admit that there have been some concerts where the artist went on a political spree and I agreed with that artist’s position but I just wanted to hear them sing. Steve Earle and I think exactly alike on the death penalty, but there are nights where I’d rather hear him do “Guitar Town” or “Ft. Worth Blues” than preach about the rightness of an opinion that I already hold.

WK: If you’re in rock ‘n’ roll, or whatever you call music we do, you know part of it is that people want to buy the beer and drink a lot of it and have a good time at the show. But music can change your mind. Sometimes it changes your mind just while you’re at the gig, and then when you leave you’re back at where you were.

ND: You two have been working together for more than a decade now. What’s the difference in making a record like The Devil You Know this year and making Viva Satellite back in ’98?

WK: There’s more authority now to Todd and to me. We make decisions. Usually Todd makes decisions and I go, “Good decision.” Then he comes back and says, “I changed my mind.” I say, “Are you sure? I’m with you, man.” Usually it’s just being trusting. I have yet to have Todd bring in anything that sounds like shit. I remember on Viva, there was that movie-character A&R guy that would come in. He was almost like a weird apparition that we would have dreamed up of a bad A&R guy.

TS: Well, they wanted us to rock. Rock. And we wanted to rock. We were rocking. That’s why they yelled “rock!” And I thought that was a cool record. My only problem with that particular movie is the script.

ND: Do you feel tied to each other?

TS: I would like to hook up with Jay-Z and totally run with his posse, but I’m so tied to Kimbrough that they wouldn’t even listen to my ideas. It’s upsetting to me. Because, Beyonce…oh, Beyonce.

WK: Uh, yes.