Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Album Cover of the Week: Garth Brooks's No Fences

Oxymoron's recent comment reminded me of two things. One, the barbed wire fence post dovetailed (in ways not originally anticipated by the author) with solon's recent thoroughgoing treatments of privacy issues. And two, it has been more than two weeks since my last "album cover of the week." And so therefore this seems fitting:




I was always sort of "meh," when it came to Garth Brooks musically, with some songs being ones I really dug, but most being ones, again, to which I responded with a general "meh." Still, this album title, and the cover with all its invocation of the innocent, well-minded cowboy whose freedom must be preserved, oozes sociopolitical context, and therefore deserves to be taken seriously.

On the level of music? Well, I never much took Brooks seriously as a "Cowboy." I liked the class warfare implications of "Friends in Low Places" very much, however.

But you know what? I LOVE. I mean LOVE his epic song, "Two Piña Coladas," to the point that I elevate it into the top 50 stratosphere of pop song Utopia in my admittedly addled brain. But I mean really, check these shenanigans out:


Garth Brooks - Two piña coladas by taduckly_
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3 comments:

  1. harrogate6/14/2011 12:27:00 PM

    "Two Pina Coladas" lyrics:

    "I was feelin’ the blues
    I was watching the news
    When this fella came on the TV

    He said I’m tellin’ you
    That science has proven
    That heartaches are healed by the sea

    That got me goin’
    Without even knowin’
    I packed right up and drove down

    Now I’m on a roll
    And I swear to my soul
    Tonight I’m gonna paint this town

    So bring me two pina coladas
    One for each hand
    Let’s set sail with Captin Morgan
    And never leave dry land

    Troubles I forgot ‘em
    I buried ‘em in the sand
    So bring me two pina coladas
    She said good-bye to her good timin’ man

    Oh now I’ve gotta say
    That the wind and the waves
    And the moon winkin’ down at me

    Eases my mind
    By leavin’ behind
    The heartaches that love often brings

    Now I’ve got a smile
    That goes on for miles
    With no inclination to roam

    I’ve gotta say
    That I think I’ve gotta stay
    ‘Cause this is feelin’ more and more like home

    So bring me two pina coladas
    One for each hand
    Let’s set sail with Captin Morgan
    And never leave dry land

    Troubles I forgot ‘em
    I buried ‘em in the sand
    So bring me two pina coladas
    She said good-bye to her good timin’ man."

    Lyrics that merit rhetorical analysis in their own right. I invite that here.

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  2. Oxymoron6/14/2011 12:34:00 PM

    That watermark under Garth's left arm almost gives the impression that he is carrying a bedroll. Perhaps he is that lone cowboy who once wandered the frontier but whose freedom is now restricted by miles of barbed wire. "No fences," he cries. "Please, no fences."

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  3. harrogate6/14/2011 12:44:00 PM

    Great catch, oxy. The album cover in so many ways communicates what exactly we rhetorical experts mean when we hold forth on principles of visual rhetoric.

    And, isn't it interesting that states such as Texas, Arizona and California are being invoked, with such poetic fervor, towards establishing the tightest possible blockades against fluid movement from place to place?

    I know it is more complicated than that and do not mean to demean the salient worries about how a nation can handle its borders, but there is something perversely ironic, nonetheless, in these iconically western states operating at the vanguard of a plea for the Fence.

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