Tuesday, March 10, 2026

Politics - Hank Penny

Politics - Hank Penny
2:57
single, 1947
Written by Phil Rickie

This is a rapid-fire talking blues with a pattern akin to "A Boy Named Sue," except with a sung chorus: "Politics oh politics / You've gotta know just how to vote."  Penny advises that for expediency's sake one should change one's vote to please the boss, an idea probably rejected by most progressive individualists.  But here's some timeless analysis too: "It ain't what you do, it's who you know / It's the same old thing wherever you go / If you've got connections then you're all right."  Then he pivots and goes into a riff about how if you have no money, your wife will leave you.  I feel like he went a bit off-script there, into something personal, or maybe just a little hilarious general misogyny.  So, not really the incisive skewering of the political landscape of 1947 America I was hoping for,

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