That's Right, I'm Writing About Tanya Tucker.

I hadn't thought twice about Tanya Tucker since I was a child and she was the Leann Rimes of her day in the early 70's. Fast forward to 2008 and the ridiculous availability of just about any song more than two people ever heard, and I'm plunking down a dollar to download a Tanya Tucker song.

I remember being five or six and entranced by her Would You Lay With Me (In A Field of Stone); the vocal, the melody, the arrangement, even the lyrics that I really didn't understand at that point. But, time marches on and so did my musical tastes, and until Amazon.com uncovered a wild hair in my ass a few days ago, it had been easily 25 years since I'd heard the song.

And, holy shit, it's even more jaw-dropping nearly thirty-five years later.

The opening moments, just Tucker's voice and (what I think must be) a triangle (!), sound like she decided to beat the Afghan Whigs to their arrangement for covering it. And those lyrics (by David Allen Coe, if you can believe it) are just fucking deadly:

Would you lay with me in a field of stone?
If my needs were strong, would you lay with me?

Now that I've got some context, historical and otherwise, just the fact this song was released and became a country hit for a 15 year old girl in 1974 renews my faith in America (cue patriotic music), that we as a people can continue to make hits of songs like this despite the social conventions and barriers of the day.

Seriously, check this jam out, even if you can't imagine what it would've sounded like on the radio when you were six.