Lost Gem: "Alcohol and Pills" - Todd Snider (2004)


"The fame don't take away the pain...it just pays the bills."
~ Todd Snider ~



Singer-Songwriter Todd Snider...hailing out of Oregon...appears to have more than a friendly acquaintance with every subject he sings about.

Sounding like a blended mix of harder John Prine and twangier John C. Mellencamp, Todd plays the part of an Americana reporter...with a sly fox orneriness.
Lost Gem:--> "Alcohol and Pills"...written by Fred Eaglesmith, is a Todd Snider blistering wake up call on how NOT to solve your problems.

Not preachy...but certainly personal...(Todd's several brushes with near-death substance abuse problems can attest to that.)
And the hook is anthemic and easy to find yourself belting along with...The Snide.

Have you heard this one?


Hank Williams, he came up from Montgomery
With a heart full of hard-luck country songs
But Nashville, Tennessee, they didn't understand him
because he did things
Differently then the way they were done.
But when he finally made it to the Grand Ole Opry...
he made it stand still.
He ended up on alcohol and pills

Elvis Presley, he came up from Jackson
With a brand new way of singing
A brand new way of dancing
And even from the waist up, he gave the world
A thrill... he ended up on alcohol and pills

Alcohol and pills
It's a crying shame
you'd think they might have been happy
with the glory and the fame
The fame don't take away the pain
it just pays the bills
and you wind up on alcohol and pills

Janis Joplin, she was a wild and reckless
Then there was Gram Parsons, 
then there was Jimi Hendrix.
The story just goes on and on.
I guess it always will... 
they ended up on Alcohol and pills

Alcohol and pills
It's a crying shame
You'd think they might have been happy
With the glory and the fame
The fame don't take away the pain
It just pays the bills
And you wind up on alcohol and pills

Sometimes somebody won't wake up one day
Sometimes it's a heart attack
Sometimes, they won't say
When they pulled poor old Hank Williams
Out of that Cadillac Coupe de Ville
He ended up on alcohol and pills

Alcohol and pills
It's a crying shame
You'd think they might have been happy
With the glory and the fame
The fame don't take away the pain
It just pays the bills
And you wind up on alcohol and pills.

Good stuff!

Casey Chambers
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Comments

viagra pills said…
Thanks a lot for this great informative post I like it so much....

Smith ALan
January 27, 2011 at 1:26 AM
cweaver5 said…
Statistics in a song. There really should be a law. That someone would see the pattern here, and make THE final call. It's not the individual, the fame or fortune, but the people that surrounded them that helped them make their fall. It's a sad repeated story. they were just like you and I, they trusted individuals, they didn't want to die. So this "Lost Gem" goes in the history books as a reminder of what happens when you think you have it all.
August 12, 2013 at 8:40 AM
Casey said…
yep, that's just about it. Well said.
August 16, 2013 at 7:36 PM
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