The Silver Tongued Devil and I, Joe

Silver-tongued... now there's a term¹ that I can get behind. Seems like a real writer's word. I did a quick blogpost search and saw that I have used the term exactly once on this blog, and that was in the context of the dirtiest, most heinous bullshit I ever pulled when I was drunk. It's pretty fascinating that Kristofferson uses the term in the same sort of context here. The official definition of the word is "marked by convincing and eloquent expression," but I've always seen the word used implying deviousness. I.e. you're convincing someone to do something that you know is wrong but you're convincing them to meet some other nefarious purpose.

That's what Kristofferson is talking about here too. He's trying to pick up some woman at the bar, and he's trying to say that he can't be held responsible for his actions, because he's intoxicated, and just because he's acting a little scummy by talking slick and trying to sleep with a stranger, that's not actually him, that's just the booze talking. That's the devil. He's not the devil, he's a good dude... but, ya know, he'll totally bone up if that's what you're thinking too.

This is all done in a winking manner, and I appreciate it. I love it, honestly. The winking part is that Kristofferson the songwriter knows that Kristofferson the character in the song is full of shit. The audience knows it too. We hear the song and it's impossible to actually believe that Kristofferson the character is talking about an actual devil. That's what makes it fun. Best of all, by singing in the first-person, it acts as a humbling exercise, ha ha ain't I a dope, etc. That's the keenest part about the term "silver-tongued." You can't use it without being self-aware. If you're saying someone is silver-tongued, then you're implicitly acknowledging that that person is full of shit, but also talented in conveying that bullshit. It's no wonder the now two instances on this blog where the phrase was used were both specifically about alcohol-induced seductive lying².

One might consider this entire album to be a silver-tongued exercise on behalf of the progressive country songwriter Kris Kristofferson. Perhaps you are like me and entered the week skeptical that outlaw country music from the early '70s could sound fresh or exciting or new, and heard something that, yes, featured the same soft acoustic-guitar country music tropes mixed with a trash of Mexicali trumpets and a little sad harmonica, but also, integrally, featured rock-solid songwriting, the words on the page making the songs pop, as opposed to the music itself. You needed convincing, and here's a cowboy that can do some serious convincing—drunk, sober, whatever³.

Just overall great songwriting, which is not a way that I would usually describe an artist's music or use as a compliment. There is a way to tell a good story and make the song pop, even if the instrumentation itself is rudimentary or something you may have heard before. I love "Good Christian Soldier." You take the lyrics out, and there's really nothing there, but the lyrics, oh boy. The way he so matter-of-factly says "Telling jokes and learning how to die" really cuts me deep, for no reason other than it's a good line, laced with a horrible truth. I also appreciated "The Pilgrim, Chapter 33," when Kristofferson names all his influences right there at the beginning (intrigued by the inclusion of King Koopa himself, Dennis Hopper), and how "He's a walkin' contradiction, partly truth and partly fiction" could apply to them, but also to himself, and the songs that he writes, and the song that he's currently singing. If the lyrics make you appreciate how good the lyrics are, then that's good songwriting⁴.

So I would absolutely argue that this is a successful album. I was skeptical, but now I am convinced. Bob Dylan once said that there was pre-Kristofferson Nashville, and post-Kristofferson Nashville, so impactful was this dude's presence in this scene. I listen to this album, and I can definitely see why. He's not changing the world musically speaking, but I get the sense that his lyrics brought something newer and deeper to the table.

GRADE<sup>3.5


1</sup>Sidenote but an important one: if it's being used as an adjective, as it is in this album's title, there should be a hyphen. I guess the one Hall of Fame that Kris Kristofferson would not be a shoe-in for is the Punctuation Hall of Fame.

²I was able to use that word in reference to my real actions because I legitimately don't remember anything that I said in any of those types of situations, both in that ill-advised monogamy-breaking incident and in any of the non-monogamous incidents that occurred previous to that, silver-tongued in a blackout state, the anecdotal evidence speaking for itself in terms of my interactions with women at various bars along the east coast, not knowing how anything happened but according to all lesser-BAC-ed eye-witnesses undeniably happening, right there in public, the silver tongue achieving what it set out to do.

³But hold up, wait, I gotta go back, sorry. I don't know why I'm still stuck on that first song. It's sticking to me in a similar but possibly opposite way that the first song on 2025's first country album that Record Club did. You remember, fucking Jelly Roll's Beautifully Broken. Bad album, but that first song, the one about Alcoholics Anonymous, that one surprised me. It surprised me in the same way that actual AA surprises me, how stone-cold clichés can still be effective even if they are clichés, because they wouldn't be if they weren't true, and they're still effective even if you're hearing them and acknowledging how trite they are, and even if some former white rapper lame-o is crooning them.

I felt triggered a little bit by the title track, if I'm being honest. Like in the same way, but this time it felt different because it felt more real. It wasn't cliché; I have never actually heard this specific self-effacing drunk sentiment expressed in song like this. But it hit me hard because I can still put myself in the mindset of the protagonist, and that hurts a little. In a good way, like how remembering hurts sometimes, like how growth hurts, bone growing under taut muscle. I can feel my brain as it existed right before the blackout, right before the silver tongue was employed, right before the devil appeared, and that scares the hell out of me.

⁴I probably would've skipped these supplementary beer-soaked footnotes if I hadn't caught half of a Love Is Blind (Season 9) episode that Pam was watching by the time I got the kids to sleep. There was a scene where all the engaged couples got together poolside for chitchat and drinks, and a couple of the guys got visible wasted. And the one guy—of course his name was Joe, which made it like ten times worse—was the drunkest, so much so that he had to go take a nap, and his new fiancée was concerned, especially when she got back to their hotel room and he was still drunk and half out of it and asking her where she'd been even though he was literally just with her at the pool party, and she's like, "what's wrong with you? are you okay? why are you acting like this?" and I'm like, "yo, has she literally never been in the presence of a drunk person?"

Which... I guess was a complicated response. It was aligned with how we usually watch this show—snarky questions allowed, because this TV reality show is fucking dumb, yo—but something about how the scene was triggering both Pam and I in different but interlocking ways made it sort of off-limits for further snark. Like, c'mon, how many fucking fights did me and Pam have that looked exactly like this, fucking exactly like this, down to the fucking name being said over and over ("Joe! Joe, please!")? That did a lot of damage, all of those times, and it took me a long time to understand my own actions. And seeing it acted out through another Joe on national television scared me, in the way looking in a mirror often frightens those who don't like what they see, and it triggered Pam too because how many times did she get worried about her drunk Joe? I think the show was trying to paint this as humorous, which is understandable. I was unable to see anything but a very ugly scene with two people who are being torn apart by something that I am very familiar with. A deeply uncomfortable watch for all us alcoholic Joeys out here.

But that's why I made the quip, right? "Has she never seen a drunk person before?" being my way of begging this lady to just call it what it was, don't prolong this any more than you have to, because it's hurting me to watch it unfold as it always does. Just call him a drunk loser and move on, please. Make it easier for all of us. Kristofferson, I think, is making it easy, which I'm thankful for. Especially if you can see the layers at work here. The way it's easy for the protagonist to make excuses, and the way it's easy to hear the songwriter make it clear that they are bullshit excuses, and the way the songwriter makes it easy to empathize with the need to make excuses in that situation, and the way the songwriter doesn't need to get all preachy about it, because of the narrative distance between singer and protagonist. Like I said, that's good fucking songwriting. I can feel that shit.

^3.5pukes out of 5