Song of the Week: Jerry Reed - East Bound and Down [Smokey and the Bandit] 1977.

On the heels of the e-mail he sent out last week, I'll hand over the reigns to Huc-a-Poos barkeep and Savannah, Georgia legend, Coach Mike Watson, on this one. If your bar doesn't have this song on the jukebox, it's high time to find a new bar:

That’s right !! Hats off to two ‘70’s icons--You see, if you were a Southern boy, upright with a pulse in 1976-77, this film was a personal milestone --I mean, you wanted to be the Bandit...

-- outside of andy Griffith, this was my first lesson in bootlegging—the fact that it was illegal to run original Coors Banquet Beer west of Texas in that day was new and fascinating to me—combine that with the fact that there was an 80G bet that they couldn’t do it in 28 hrs., and you had all the fixin’s for a fine film—filmed mostly south of Atlanta—beaten only by Star Wars at the box in 1977--and yes—they should have never made #’s 2 and 3—an absolute disgrace—wiki the movie to learn all kinds of cool stuff…

It is a Universal Truth that Sheriff Justice was one of the finest characters ever to grace celluloid—I still use his lines often in the course of normal conversation—it’s one litmus test for cool, you see—anyone who recognizes them is instantly on my “AL-right list”—if you don’t, then you get the pleasure of discovering these lines—Gleason was an absolute American Classic—so many quotable lines—if you watch it again pay particular attention to his part—when he talks about how sally field left him in the church—sweet baby jesus—I’ve seen it 100x and I still belly-laugh—I’ve often wanted to hustle into some roadside BBQ dive, hurry up to the counter and tell the waitress “Gimme a Diablo sandwich and a Dr Pepper --and make it fast—I’m in a helluva hurry…” just to see if she gets it—then when she brings it to me, finish with “thank ya, nice lady…”

I was 9 yrs. Old and like most 9 yr. olds, heroes--especially outlaw heroes-- were legends—many a night I dreamt about runnin’ from sheriff justice in a bored-out black T/A, purty girl in the car, runnin’ blocker for 400 cases of illegal Colorado brew—and the big, fast trucks that bootlegged it were cool—bad-a** black T/A’s that could dust any cop were even cooler –in retrospect, I guess not much has changed…

i guess if you don’t like this film, the Bandit, or Sheriff Justice—then I’d reply with a classic line from Sherriff Justice—“…that’s nuthin’ but pure and simple ‘ol fashioned Communism…”

When I play “eastbound and down” by jerry reed from the film at huc-a-poos, every redneck in the joint starts singin’—it’s pretty sweet…