I’m a Prine fan from way back farther than I want to admit. He has a nostalgic tone and home-focused appreciation of internal emotional states that is speaking to us and even our kids right now.
Lately we’ve been playing my favorites like Souvenirs and Angel from Montgomery, and deeper into his playlist, That’s the Way that World Goes Round, or Whistle and Fish. The raspy voice resonates with loneliness, lost love, addiction blues, and longing for a past time that seemed happier.
“When was that written?” my grown kids ask. We look it up and find Angel from Montgomery dates back to 1977. There is silence in the room as we all appreciate that a good song is a good song, regardless of when it was written.
How he manages to help me smile while contemplating dark things like domestic violence, isolation, and depression, I don’t know. I just know that the tempo helps, and he has a way of uplifting the spirit in spite of whatever is happening.
As an English teacher, I used to teach my students to write in the present tense for art because every time we encounter it, we experience it anew. In my book, John Prine will always be in the present tense for me.