A Pretty Good Guy To Hang Around With

Lovely interview with John Prine in the New York Times here. I've been a fan since I picked up his record The Missing Years back there in the early 90s. It came out at a time that Bruce Springsteen (yes, him again) was going through his own missing years and popped up singing backing vocals on Prine's Take a Look at My Heart. Further investigation revealed that Tom Petty also sang on the record and, being a card-carrying, faded denim-wearing fan of anything that hinted at the endless highway, I was off and running with JP's back catalogue

And what an awesome collection of songs. Sam Stone, Hello in There, Paradise, Spanish Pipedream, Angel from Montgomery. And they're just from the first record!  Six O'Clock News, Blue Umbrella, Illegal Smile, Speed of the Sound of Loneliness, Souvenirs. I could go on.  Actually, I will go on. Picture Show, People Puttin' People Down, Jesus, The Missing Years, Lake Marie, He Forgot That It Was Sunday. Did I mention You Got Gold? I just have. And you know what? There's loads I've left out. If you've never heard him you could start with any of his records really - there's no bad ones.

I met him once. He lives part of the year in Galway but I met him in the old Tower Records on South William Street in Dublin. I was paying for something at the counter when I noticed the guy in front of my was John 'All the Best' Prine. As we left I said hello and shook his hand and told him I loved his music. Said I'd seen him play recently and really enjoyed it. You know, real cut-to-the-heart-of-it, insightful stuff. I'm sure in his quiet moments he still thinks about it and wonders whatever happened to me. Anyway, I let him be and went on with my day.

A few hours later I was walking into HMV on Grafton St. (yeah, I get around) when he was walking out. We looked at each other, said hello again and he pointed at our shopping bags and said "Well I guess we both like buying records, huh" and we hugged and went for a few pints and wrote an album of duets together. Nah, I never saw him again apart from on a stage. Which, given the way those interactions went, is probably exactly how it should be.

He's had a rough few years with his health but he's still out there working and singing and hopefully having a good time doing it. If you ever get the chance you should go see him play. As I may have mentioned, he's written a decent song or two.