My Top Ten Songs About Hank: The Ballad of Hank Williams (#1b)

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The top two are tied in my countdown of my favorite songs about Hank Williams. I had to flip a coin to see which would come out on top, the serious, sad song, or the funny song. The funny song goes first. #1b: The Ballad of Hank Williams - Hank Williams Jr. & Don Helms I'm not a big fan of post-accident Hank Williams Jr. In his younger days he was die-hard country (listen to "I Walked Out on Heaven" or "Cajun Baby" and you'd never guess it was Hank Jr.). After he recovered from the near-fatal fall from a mountain in Montana his music changed dramatically. From his post-accident material I can pretty much count on one hand the things I really like, such as the haunting "Montana Cafe." And this. This is one of the funniest songs you're ever going to hear. "Don," Hank Jr. begins the song, "tells us how it really was when you were working with Daddy." Don Helms, the steel guitarist for the Drifting Cowboys, obliges. Set to the tune of the old fiddle tune "The Eighth of January" (the same melody that's featured in Johnny Horton's classic "The Battle of New Orleans"), Helms, with help from Hank Jr., recounts what it was like to tour with a superstar. And, according to this song, it wasn't pretty. Helms recounted how Hank wasn't good with finances ("we played them dates, and we filled the places well, but Hank, he'd done blown the profits all to hell") or fidelity (the "owner of the Opry," Jim Denny, threatened to "tell Audrey about some women Hank had laid") or band harmony ("every 20 minutes some of us had a fight"). Then Hank decided to take Helms' advice to "make a new start"...by cleaning house: "He fired my ass, and he fired (fiddler) Jerry Rivers, he fired everybody just as hard as he could go, he fired ol' Cedric (Rainwater, the bassist), and he fired (guitarist) Sammy Pruett, and he fired some people that he didn't even know." Don Helms was the last surviving member of the Drifting Cowboys. He died in 2008. There are two ways to tell a story like this: seriously and somber, or play it for laughs. Don Helms chose the latter. I'm glad he did. The Ballad of Hank Williams Written by Don Helms Recorded by Hank Williams Jr. & Don Helms From The Pressure Is On, 1981 And he fired some people that he didn't even know!