J. Randall Turner in “Anatomy of a Fight Song”
By Chuck Sweetman
[Mid-shot of J. Randall Turner, songwriter, in his private recording studio in front of a drum kit. He is in full guitar hero-stance: legs wide, head back, one hand thrusting a guitar pick at the ceiling, the other on the neck of a black Les Paul slung low. He windmills his arm once, striking a power-chord pose, and then holds the guitar up, wafting vibrato. A placard, pinned to his guitar strap reads “Motivation.”]
Fight songs used to be about your high school
or college hailing victory and other such glories.
The Air Force Men of Note. The Allen Eagle Escadrille.
In the old movies, friends sing them, smoking
cigarettes around a piano. They got you pumped
up and made you feel you belonged and believed
in what you all represented. Corny as hell sometimes,
but who cares? That’s how good it feels to root,
root, root for the home team. If they don’t win. . . .
[Close-up]
Now? . . . I don’t know. Fight songs today are more
about solo struggles. The push to overcome!
To overcome . . . some dire situation or bad actor.
Some dire situation thrust on you by said bad actor. . .
Probably best to be a bit vague writing a fight song.
Listeners can fill in the blanks. Motivation is what
we’re after. If only the juice to take on the stationary
bike, the treadmill . . . the elliptical. . . .
[He strums, eyes closed.]
First thing a fight song needs is righteousness.
[He sings.]
I wanted to love and to belong, / but I let other voices . . .
drown! But I let other voices drown my song. / I’ve been
away from . . . home? . . . from . . . me too long. . .
[He flips a switch to sample some gospel piano.]
Soul stirring. This journey is hard but worthy.
So I’ll start from scratch, / reach . . . come from
behind. / This is my . . . my walk on the glass? /
I’ve made up my mind. . . – But wait! Your journey
– no, worse – your belief in the journey is challenged.
. . . I don’t really care if it’s too much for you. /
Go ahead turn your back . . . walk away! /
Go ahead walk away. / It’s what I’ve got to do. . .
Now we’re cookin’. Let’s add a refrain that raises
the roof: Now’s the time for second-winds and poker-fa
– game faces. / It’s not too late to dust off. . .
to dust off. . . It’s not too late. . .
[Long-shot, Turner stands without guitar in the middle of his studio.]
Tell you the fight song I wish I would have written.
Might not seem like one. But it is. Carter Ready’s
“The Distance.” Yeah the dis-is-tance is the har-dest thing.
Remember? Starts with Carter’s typical working-class
guy in love with a working-class girl. And how good
that feels. Baby, I like how it is when you’re so near. /
Baby, you’re the only one who calms my fears.
But when you get to the bridge you realize it’s about
her. For reasons we don’t know, his girl is the one
feeling the distance. And he’s worried about her
and about what her struggles mean for him, too.
So he takes her hands, or as I imagine calls long-distance,
and says – pleads, Oh, don’t let them buy you, baby, /
Don’t let ‘em spit on you. (And here they are – the bad actors.)
Don’t let ‘em drive you, baby, / Don’t let ‘em sit with you.
He’s losing her to them. She’s cracking. What’s he
got that can help her in the real world? Double-quick!
No time for Kristofferson. Just say something!
I’ll be your raging truck. / I’ll be your mud bridge.
Don’t get too far away. / Step back from the ledge!
[Mid-shot]
Only way this makes any sense is that he’s desperate.
He’s throwing out anything he can to prove his love.
Problem is, he’s practically begging when he needs
to project confidence – competence. That’s where
Bill Driscoll comes in on lead guitar. Saves him really.
Gives this inarticulate, grasping soul a voice
in a solo that thunders like a chorus of bagpipes!
[Turner assumes a wide-legged guitar-hero’s stance and scats the solo in between singing, eyes closed, bending frets of an air guitar, which he keeps playing as he goes on.]
Reveille to her ambitions. An anthem to courage.
If only the courage yet to be born in her as he feels
it born in him as he reaches into the well-spring
of desperate hope. The same place where Dylan
and Springsteen reach when they need a street-fighter’s
reply to nothing left to lose. Tramps like us, losers,
boxers, tambourine men. . . Now’s the time for second
winds and game faces / It’s not too late to dust off
and rise. / We’ll . . . we’ll catch the wind, run
our races. / It’s our time now. Throw the dice.
[Randall lifts the neck of his air guitar high and strums quickly. He looks around as to gather the bass and drums in a big finale, then swings the guitar down in a flourish. Then, a bit out of breath, he turns back to the camera.]
It’s a young person’s genre – the fight song. . .
I like that about it.
[Fade]
