Marty Robbins

We didn't have a lot of records when we were kids. My parents had about two dozen, kept under the stereo in the living room. My dad had bought most of them, and they were an eclectic collection: Dave Brubeck, Rachmaninoff, the soundtrack from West Side Story. But I listened to most of them, perhaps none so much as an album by Marty Robbins called Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs.

Robbins was a country music singer (and successful race car driver on the NASCAR circuit), but his specialty was songs about the Old West, particularly Western legends. In addition to songs about real-life Western stories such as "Billy the Kid" and "The Ballad of the Alamo," Robbins wrote and performed songs that were like mini-Western movies, without irony, and the results were exemplary.

Consider "Big Iron," which is a ballad about a lawman tracking down an outlaw who has never lost a gun battle.

"In this town there lived an outlaw by the name of Texas Red
Many men had tried to take him and that many men were dead
He was vicious and a killer though a youth of twenty-four
And the notches on his pistol numbered one and nineteen more
One and nineteen more."

The lawman, an Arizona Ranger, carrying a "big iron" on his hip, meets Texas Red in a showdown:

"There was forty feet between them when they stopped to make their play
And the swiftness of the ranger is still talked about today
Texas Red had not cleared leather fore a bullet fairly ripped
And the ranger's aim was deadly with the big iron on his hip
Big iron on his hip"

The production of the song, and Robbins' perfect voice, make it a great listen. These ballads have no refrains, just verses, a kind of musical cowboy poetry.

His biggest hit, and one of my favorite songs, is "El Paso."

"Out in the west Texas town of El Paso, I fell in love with a Mexican girl," it begins. The singer is not a very bright guy. He falls in love with a girl in a cantina, but she isn't interested. When a cowboy makes a play at her he shoots him dead, and then flees to New Mexico.

"Back in El Paso my life would be worthless.
Everything's gone in life; nothing is left.
It's been so long since I've seen the young maiden
My love is stronger than my fear of death."

So he goes back, like a dope, and of course the cowboys shoot him dead:

"I see the white puff of smoke from the rifle.
I feel the bullet go deep in my chest."


Even if this not a smart guy, the song is a blast, and I could listen to it a thousand times. It was the first number one of the 1960s, hitting the top spot in January of 1960.


Robbins was also the best interpreter of the cowboy folk song "The Streets of Laredo," which has been covered hundreds of times but I've never heard anyone do it better than him. His voice, strong and clear, but also with pathos necessary. It's about a man who, on the streets of Laredo, finds a dying cowboy, who tells him:


"Oh, beat the drum slowly and play the fife lowly,
And play the death march as you carry me along;
Take me to the valley, and lay the sod o'er me,
For I'm a young cowboy and I know I've done wrong."

There are other songs of Gunfighter Ballads to enjoy as well. "A Hundred and Sixty Acres" is a joyful celebration of land ownership, while "They're Hanging Me Tonight" is decidely less joyful, the last words of a man who killed his girl and her lover. And while I'm not a Christian, "The Master's Call," about a cattle rustler who is saved from a stampede and sees the face of Jesus Christ, and is thus converted from his wicked ways, is pretty intense.


Robbins, sadly, died in 1982 at 57. I don't know of any other singer who so clearly defined this type of music.