Goose Creek Symphony – Words Of Earnest

I wanted to throw something different at you today, and this is something different. As I was looking for some more roots music, I heard this and loved it. It took me a couple of listens…I haven’t stopped listening to it all week. It is roots music, no doubt, and heavy back porch bluegrass country with a tinge of rock. I love the melody, chord structure, and the dynamics they built in. It starts off as country as cornbread but switches gears with some horns, guitar breaks, and fiddle near the end. Although the country voice is there, the music is more rock structured. I’m not sure what to call it, but I’ll just call it good.

They were a very original band that blended country, rock, bluegrass, and psychedelic into something that didn’t fit anywhere. They were too twangy for the rock crowd, too trippy for Nashville, and too Kentucky-mountain raw for L.A.. When I listened to this song, I was won over.

This was the title track of their 1972 album. I’ve read reviews about this album, and some called it a masterpiece of cosmic Americana. The album should’ve been their big breakthrough, but Capitol didn’t know what to do with them since they didn’t fit neatly in a box.

Goose Creek Symphony was formed in the late 1960s by Charlie Gearheart,  a Kentucky songwriter with country and rock ‘n’ roll influences. Gearheart, whose real name was Paul “Charlie” Gearheart, had played around in bluegrass and psychedelic rock bar bands before deciding to mix the two, to let fiddles, horns, banjos, and Telecasters mix together.

He gathered a very talented bunch of musicians from Kentucky and Arizona, naming the group after a small town near his old Kentucky home: Goose Creek. Early members included Michael “Ted” Reeder on drums, Alvin Bennett, and William “Charlie” Prichard on guitar and fiddle, all guys who could swap instruments mid-song without losing the groove.

They did have a hit in 1972 with the cover of Janis Joplin’s Mercedes Benz. That was on this album as well.

Words of Earnest

Lived in the city and I lived in the wood;
Lived through the fire and I lived through the flood,
Lived through the summer when the creek went dry;
Guess I’ll keep living til the day I die,
I think I’ve done everything, In my time;
Everything I didn’t do wasn’t worth doing when I had that time, OH no

Talked to the prophets and I talked to the fool;
Even tried work and I even tried school,
Fell in love I got pushed through hate;
Even drove my car through a big steel gate,
I think I’ve done everything, In my time
Everything I didn’t do wasn’t worth doing when I had that time,

Deep in the hills of old Kentucky, Once lived a man I used to know;
He got up every morning at the crack of dawn, Earnest was his name you know
He was full of love an understanding, Never had a nickle or a dime;
Happiness is free, is what he said to me, Earnest was a friend of mine,
Friend of mine,

To many people on the same old road;
Loaded down with the same old load,
To live a good life you can’t do it that way;
Cause every day is different an it’s different every day,
Gotta do everything, in your time;
Everything you wanna do, Really worth do when I had that time, OH Yeah it is

Nobody knows when I’m lonely, Nobody knows when I’m blue;
Nobody knows when I’m happy, Nobody knows that I’m blue,
Nobody knows that I love everyone, Nobody knows that I’m fine;
Nobody ever gets in my way, Cause nobody’s on my mind

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

65 thoughts on “Goose Creek Symphony – Words Of Earnest”

  1. Pingback: Goose Creek Symphony – Words Of Earnest – MobsterTiger

    1. Thanks Christian…this band has really stuck on me…I love their range…they cover a little bit of everything in there. I was totally impressed with them. You think it’s just a country song but when the music kicks in…it is different.

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  5. Good, obscure find. My first thought was mirroring Jim’s…they were trying hard to be the ‘next’ The Band but hadn’t got there yet , at least with this song. It’s an oddity…unlike so many songs, it’s quite likable first time through. But unlike many, I don’t know that it would get more palatable after repeated listening. In that respect, it comes across close to a novelty song although it’s obviously not a comic piece

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    1. See it was the opposite for me…I didn’t care as much for it on the first listen…it started to stick with me and now I can’t stop listening to it! There are similarities to the band but…this band is more country to me. They released A LOT of albums so someone was listening at the time….and Charlie is still playing from what I’ve read.

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      1. Right, from what Wiki says they’re still going &:have an East and West version. As with any act (at least any one worth knowing);it’s tough to get a real feel for them from only 1 song. I might like them, certainly some of the elements are in place

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      2. I admire them Dave because they tried something different…and it was different. Yes there was The Band in there…but I thought it was funny the guitar player played in Blue Grass and psychedelic bands….I had to pause on that… I didn’t have enough time or I would have reviewed the album…I was stuck on this song…it’s an earworm to me…it’s got a classic rock structure with fiddles, horns, and banjos lurking about.

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    1. Oh cool…of all the people I thought you might have heard of them before. I can’t stop listening to it.
      I love that tune Uncle Pen you sent me. See I can see how rock fans would like this. It has a rock structure but with horns and country instruments.
      It was a minor hit and it’s the first time I heard them. Thank you so much for commenting. I’m going to explore some more.

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      1. Know them but not well. You probably got more out of them by the way you described the music. I do have a spot for traditional leanings. Hard gig to stay alive in. Sounds like they found an audience of hard core fans.

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    1. I was going to email you this song…I had it written out…but didn’t on Friday….just wondering if you had heard of them. You are one of the very few readers I have that like Bluegrass…and this mixes with rock and country. Steve and CB I kinda thought they might have heard of them. I just fell in love with it after a few listens.

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      1. I don’t quite hear bluegrass in there. Can there be bluegrass without a banjo? Mandolin? Whatever genre or mix of genres they are they are good. Want to listen to the album if I ever get any time.

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      3. I just finished listening to the album. Going to have to disagree on the bluegrass. Country for sure. I do hear The Band and The Dead in there. There is a purity to their lyrics that’s very pleasant.

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      4. Well thanks for listening as always Lisa…yea I enjoyed this find. Rootsy music that I’m really into right now.
        Dang WP…you know the bell that lights up automatically when you have a comment in the top right of your browser? For a year mine doesn’t’ do that and I have to manually refresh it…I’ve talked to the Support for WP since last Feb… Sometimes I’ll refresh and it will be 15 unanswered comments. I’ll send YET another email.

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      5. You are welcome, Max, and I always look forward to the music you find on your travels to share with us. So thank you right back.

        So sorry the Ghost in the WP Machine is hassling you. The support people have been able to tweak whatever issues have hit my blog fairly quickly. Last Feb is a long time for an unresolved issue! One thing I haven’t contacted them about is the Chinese views I’m getting. They are double the rest of the views. They never like or comment, which leads me to believe AI training bots.

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      6. I’m Pissed now…here is what they responded with: I looked into the status of this for you and we do not have a timeline for when this issue might be resolved. Based on what I’ve seen in the notes, it may be some time before this is addressed as our developer team has had to prioritize other issues at this time. You may not see new updates posted on GitHub, as we moved away from using GitHub a few months back. There won’t be a publicly viewable URL where you can track the issue going forward, but you’re welcome to check in with us periodically for status.

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      7. What the ??? Basically saying you’re on your own with it? What is GitHub? Never heard of it. Not a ringing endorsement for customer service, their response, is it. I wonder what other issues are taking priority? The Chinese AI Training Bots, perhaps? If they don’t have enough staff, HIRE MORE or contract with someone to get it fixed, but don’t respond as they did, my goodness.

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      13. Because I *just* listened to this on YouTube, and because it is friggin fantastic, here is Billy Strings and the Boys doing a cover of Tangled Up in Blue. Now if you want to hear some genre bending:

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      20. I’ve listened to him on podcasts, where he talks about how he learned from his “dad” who wasn’t really his dad but like a dad to him, and how he developed reverence for the best of the best in music makers. He’s the real deal.

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  9. Cosmic Americana sounds just about right. The Band is obviously a template but theres a whiff of Grateful Dead and plain old Country underlies it all. Boy, would they be a hard sell to record label Management as far as pigeon holing them?

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    1. You described them really well. Something different and that is a bad word to execs. You could not place them in a box I don’t think. You just let them out and do what they do and hope for a cult-core audience. They had one, just not big enough but they released like 14 albums… so I guess they had enough. The Dead was a good comparison.

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  10. I really like this. Never heard of them. I will check out the whole album. If I had to compare them to anyone, I would say New Riders Of The Purple Sage. Thanks for bringing them to my attention. Very good.

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  11. It makes sense to me that you post the kiss off from WP in a post about Goose Creek Symphony. Capitol, the record company that released this and at least one other lp from them, did not have a clue what to do with them, and therefore they didn’t. Goose Creek got a little “in the know” press earned them the horrible critics choice moniker, but never got the support they deserved, Then Area Code 415 came out and stole what might have been the accolades Goose Creek deserved, But the fact that I’d guess you aren’t familiar with them says another side of the story.

    Music was growing at this time and a lot of it didn’t fit into existing genre titles. Today, Goose Creek and Area Code 415 (or was it 451?) would be called unsung pioneers of Americana.

    I don’t recall. Have I recommended the two WB albums by John Hartford, AeroPlane and Morning Bugle? What about the first album by the Cache Valley Drifters? Or, on another spectrum, the Ready To Ride album by Southwind. All albums that I loved that very few people know about but have turned out to be influential.

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    1. You know what? I thought you may know them…I’m glad you do. I had only 3 people today who knew of them.
      No you haven’t but I’ll look them up…thank you so much. I’m not too proud to ask either…I appreciate all reccomendations. This is one band that I googled “under the radar 60s 70s roots band” and this band came up…I was floored with this song.

      Thanks again for the artist….
      PS…yes I am pissed off…I sent an email back…so I’ll see what they say…it’s the principle now…more than the problem

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      1. You work in IT, right? You know very well that if the problem isn’t something they handle all the time it is a mystery that gets blown out of proportion by their fear of their ignorance. I’m not talking about you, I’m talking about my many years in IT.

        (I still remember the Outlook issue we couldn’t fix and Microsoft didn’t have a clue until my individual tech support guy read that the small version of Outlook was only for xxx number of users. If we went to xxx+1, which we did, the whole thing crashed. Long time ago and I am happy to have it behind me.)

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      2. Yes I do…I’m an IT Director… Oh yes I know what you mean. Oh what did you do in IT? I wish I would have went into programming but I didn’t. I went into more networking and things like that. Jack of all trades and master of none lol.

        Oh yea…oh the pitfalls of listening to Microsoft! I like my job now…I have time and we outsourced the helpdesk support to the maker of the POS system…so I don’t have to babysit 7-14 techs anymore. We run with Microsoft 365 and stay in the cloud. No more weekends sweating working on servers.

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      3. I was originally a word processor, using a Xerox 860. Worked for a bunch of CPAs. In 1983 (March to be specific), a little program called Lotus 1*2*3 came out. I figured out how to take the work papers the CPAs had done in Symphony (1*2*3’s big brother) for DOS into WordPerfect 4.2 for DOS and clean it up in WordPerfect. This was, if I say so myself, pretty impressive. It impressed UCLA Extension, for whom I taught software courses in the evenings for 25 or so years. It taught me the magic of macros, particularly when Microsoft released a working version of VBA. A good friend of mine convinced me a few years later to go into network management. I hated it and eventually came back to writing macros and VBA.

        I smiled at your description. You must be good at it, you seem to have it under control. I’m impressed.

        One big problem with programming is if you want to stay at the top you have to learn the flavor of the week.

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      4. I so wished I would have started earlier. I didn’t get a computer until I was 28 years old in 1995. You saw this amazing transformation through the time you were in it.
        Oh macros! I don’t go near that if possible. I would be out of my pay grade. A tech I was working with did get me into Visual Basic…I wrote a few programs…very simple ones but I loved it. I wish I would have continued.

        Oh…I don’t know about control lol…but yea it’s got so much easier now with all of this cloud magic. I mostly quarterback projects now which suits me fine.

        Yes you are right…it’s always something new and now…AI can now do much of the programming.

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  12. I knew of these guys and listened to their album back then; our drummer loved it. You are right, it was Jefferson Airplane meets Flat and Scruggs. I can see why no one knew where to put their music. Reminds me a bit of The Band. Sometimes folks, like me, bought albums because of the band’s name; this would have been one of those.

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    1. Thanks Phil for commenting. I was wondering how many people knew them. I think you are about the 4th person…thatss more than I thought. I just fell for this when I heard it. Jefferson Airplane meets Flat and Scruggs…that is interesting! It’s like a rock structure with a country voice and instruments.

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  14. Max, I’ll admit, when it started I was thinking, “Ya know, I’m not a big fan of back-porch bluegrass music.” But there are always exceptions to the rule – and this track is definitely one of them. I love where it goes instrumentally, and you nailed it with “changing gears” and the dynamism. I can see why you’re raving about it. It’s absolutely insane this wasn’t a mega-hit. I feel so grateful to have heard this masterpiece of cosmic Americana – so a huge high five is in order, Max! I’ve already downloaded it to add to my collection. You found a diamond in the rough friend.

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    1. Matt…I thought you might really like it or really hate it. The first listen I wasn’t too keen but the second listen really got to me. The first time I was more confused…then I caught on and really liked it a lot. I’m with you…I can’t believe it wasn’t a hit!
      Thank you Matt for you enthusiasm…I didn’t know if I was hearing something only I would like…but you helped validate it for me. More people liked it than I would have thought.

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      1. I’m so smitten with it that I don’t want to listen again just yet — I don’t want to diminish the magic of that first experience. I’m giving my listening senses a little time to let it all sink in and to give the song room to breathe, as it were. It’s not only an instant classic in my book, but probably one of the finest examples of dead-center roots and all-American music I’ve ever heard. I’ll give it another listen tomorrow to see how it strikes me on a different day. I know it sounds a bit crazy, but that’s just how I like to do it sometimes. I can see your followers have been lauding it too — and for good reason. Cheers Max.

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      2. No I felt the same way! It’s so different I didn’t know what to think about it. That is the reason I reccomended it to you. I thought it was a good chance you would like it…but I wasn’t completely sure.
        You have made me feel better about my choice! I have listened to it over and over again since I found it Wednesday. I can’t get enough of it.

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      3. I don’t blame you — it’s a musical mind-bender in every sense. At one point, I was hearing The Band in it, then flashes of early to mid-’70s Bruce, and then something else entirely. It’s all over the place – but in the best way possible.

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