"If I Could Only Fly"

[Steven]

Hi,

Merle Haggard sings Blaze Foley's "If I Could Only Fly":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4LdyF2I ... re=related.

Blaze Foley sings "If I Could Only Fly":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMT76_mYDV0.

[Steven]

Hi,

Here's another Blaze Foley song.

'For Anything Less":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qp4YyIPGk70.

[Steven]

Hi,

Willie and Merle covering "If I Could Only Fly": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxnw-B1BGDs.

[Kush]

Hi Steven,

Really enjoyed the Willie/Merle duet. It was similar in style to their Pancho and Lefty interpretation which was a hit - Willie starts off and sings most of the song and Merle comes in and sings a verse.

Here is another Blaze Foley song sung by JT Van Zandt

Clay Pigeon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2t_X9WXvF5E&


and Blaze Foley and Townes Van Zandt sings Snowin on Raton

www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxC1utGVR2w&

[Steven]

Hi Kush,

I like the Townes' son cover of "If I Could Only Fly." The Blaze/Townes singing of "Snowin' on Raton" I like, despite
getting the feeling that they'd both had some very hard living at around the time of the performance. Feeling bad for
them because of that (though they are now gone), distracted somewhat from watching/enjoying the clip. I know
you'll enjoy John Prine's cover of "If I Could Only Fly": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvFRfVsaXu0.
The feeding pigeons clay lyric is intriguing to me, btw. Clay pigeons I've heard of as being clay targets for shotgun shooting. I don't think that pigeons ordinarily eat clay. Perhaps they might out of curiosity or if it's small enough and grit-like to possibly aid digestion. I don't know. Probably feeding clay to pigeons was Blaze's poetic license in the song to utilize an inverse of target shooting to exemplify a mundane (no bang/no excitement) kind of activity. I don't recommend that anyone feed pigeons clay.

[Kush]

Hi Steven,

I was intrigued after reading your post above - to be honest I had never really thought about that title 'Clay Pigeons' although it was a little odd. Anyway, I did a little googling and it turns out in fact parrots and pigeons in particular amongst all avians are voracious eaters of clay. It is known as geophagy. So I guess Blaze Foley knew what he was writing about. Although the title says 'Clay Pigeons' and the lyric says "feed the pigeons some clay" - there may be something to what you say in your last line about poetic license.