Last year I talked about seeing the infomercial for the Time-Life series of Hee Haw DVDs. I bought a single disc (2/16/74) from Amazon.
The musical guests are Johnny Cash & Jean Shephard (who sings her hit “Slippin’ Away” - the reason I bought this particular episode).
Johnny sings “Big River” & “The City of New Orleans”, Jean sings “Slippin’ Away” & “Come On Phone”.
Besides the usual collection of cornfield jokes, a visit to the barbershop, and other “classics”, there’s a ton of music:
Buck Owens sings “Cowboy Convention” and “Is Anybody Goin’ to San Antone”
Roy Clark does “I’m So Lonesome, I Could Cry” and, along with Stringbean and banjoist Ronnie Stone, “Stop That Ticklin’ Me” (on the disc label, it’s spelled “Tickelin”).
The Hagar Twins do a decent version of “My Maria”.
George “Goober” Lyndsey mutilates the bluegrass gem, “Mountain Dew”.
Since they rarely did topical humor, the show has aged fairly well. What I found interesting about the music is that all the electric guitars played are Telecasters. Even the bass player for Cash is playing a Telecaster bass.
Buck Owen’s guitar is painted red, white, and blue. I found out that he did this because he was very patriotic.
All in all, I found the show to be pretty entertaining. More so than when I watched it the first time (in this case I was 10 years old). The disc was only $12. Not a bad bargain.
When HeeHaw was on, my dad used to watch it every week. I hated my dad, so I hated country-western, and anything he liked. It wasn’t until working in a record store when k.d. lang and Dwight Yoakam’s first albums came out that I discovered I loved good CW. Since then, I’ve seen a few references to HH that made me curious about it as a music, well, archive, for want of a better word. I’m sure there are some real gems embedded in the cornpone.
I’ve been watching old episodes of the Lawrence Welk show for similar reasons; discovering some great little bits among bubbles.
I grew up listening to country music of the 60s - early 70s. I bought Time-Life’s “Country Classics” CD series - lots of great stuff. I lost my taste for country when the crossovers began in the mid 70s - Kenny Rogers, Alabama, etc.
I still don’t like “modern” country with the sole exception on Alison Krauss & Union Station (who won three Grammys last night). I do still listen to the stuff I grew up listening to, though.
Sadly, Stringbean was murdered. I think it was in the 1980’s. A lot of the old country music people had reputations for being really nice people and he was one of them.
Normally, no. However, in this case I would say yes. It’s a specific episode I wanted and it’s not available anywhere else (they were showing it on CMT at one time, but I didn’t have that channel). I don’t even know how many episodes are still in existence, so being able get the one I wanted makes it worth the money.
My 8 year old self had it bad for those Hagar Twins.
I use to see Grandpa jones around town when I lived in Nashville. He was incredibly sweet and soft spoken.
Stringbean’s murder was one of the things that made people think of Nashville as a “big, bad city” instead of the oversized town, it had been.
A couple of years ago, my husband and I were walking down the sidewalk in downtown Nashville. A couple of guys in suits got out of a limo. One of them was Goober Lindsay. I said “Hey, it’s a Goober.” :smack: He whipped his head around, and looked pissed. He didn’t see see me though. The sidewalk was crowded. But geeze, if you don’t want to be called an asshole, don’t name yourself Asshole Smith.
My parents and grandparents (we all lived together) used to watch *Hee-Haw * every Saturday, so I grew up with it.
Back then, Buck Owens owned KNIX, a radio station in Phoenix, and used his red-white-and-blue guitar as its logo.
I had a crush on Kathy Baker, the blonde who was always cuddling up with the hound dog.
I’ve got the disc with Slippin’ Away, too. Good stuff!
I never cared much for the Hagar twins–but I still laugh my ass off when I remember how my Dad (who couldn’t stand them at all) always called them “Heckle and Jeckle.” He always had this smarmy tone in his voice when he said it. Cracked me up then, and still does now!
My folks used to watch it pretty religiously when I was young and for that reason I have fond memories of it. I was up pretty early today and caught an infomercial for it. Although it recalled some great nostalgia, I am not certain I would enjoy it as an adult. (Although hot women in revealing clothing is always a good thing.)
