Song of the Week: King of Oklahoma

https://youtu.be/j4lEqjTkFr4?si=vgc_uuqZvssoKmys

https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/jasonisbell/kingofoklahoma.html

Hello everyone, I hope all is well. Today we are going to be tackling “King of Oklahoma” which is the second song from the band’s most recent album Weathervanes.

When this album was released it was clear what song the fans were going to clamor to the most. Was it going to be the song about a school shooting, the one about not washing a cast iron skillet or the one about Justin Townes Earle? No… of course it was going to be the one about a guy pissing from a ladder.

Okay but all jokes aside (because “Cast Iron Skillet” is a masterpiece), let’s see what Jason had to say about writing the song before we break it down:

“I was out there filming in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. There was a project that I had been asked to be a part of with Darius Rucker, Sheryl Crow and I think Mike Mills, and a couple of other people. For a minute there, I was like, ‘Well, if I can get home in time to record with you all, that sounds like a really fun time. So I will do that.’ But I was never home in time because they kept changing my filming schedule, so I just missed it. But I wrote that song thinking, ‘Well, maybe I need some songs for this; I don’t know if this is going to work for them or not.’ Eventually I thought this should be just a song of my own.”

The song starts off with a somber western sounding electric guitar progression backed by some haunting fiddles. Before Jason starts singing we get a solid drum beat, a tight bass groove and some acoustic guitar to fill out the song.

Lyrically this song tells a sad but unfortunately common story of addiction and the loss that comes with that. The main character of the song starts off by finding a worksite with minimal security so he can steal copper from it to make money for drugs. Because he’ll write his own prescriptions or else “shit’s about to get real hard.” We are then introduced to this character’s partner who is named Molly. She isn’t buying his lies about getting clean and threatens him that she’s going to take their kids and leave him. Yep, some really heavy shit indeed. So he puts some gas in his step side (truck) in hopes of stealing the copper and making money for drugs.

Now in the next verse we learn about the reason for y his character need for drugs in the first place. He was living a nice life when he decided to piss while working on a twenty foot ladder, causing him to fall and hurt his back. He went to the doctor and left home with a pocket full of pills. Except those pills weren’t enough to fully mask the pain and he had to quit his job which in return led him to fall behind on his bills.

After four devastating verses we finally transition into the chorus that starts off with a half time feel on the drums and Jason’s soaring vocals. He belts out about how Molly used to wake him up with coffee every morning and how she would make him feel like the “king of Oklahoma.” He even remembered the little things like the sound that her homemade house shoes would make as she’d “slide across the floor.” Sadly nothing can make him feel anything these days, not these happy memories and not even his pills.

Following the chorus we get a blistering solo from Jason that reminds us that he sure can play a mean guitar. Returning to the verse we learn that someone beat the song’s narrator to stealing the copper. This really puts him in a tough situation as he’s running out of money and the only thing he has left is the title of his truck. Although in a tweet by Jason, he mentions “loans don’t always come from the banks, also the title is sometimes right there in the song title.” Basically he means that this guy might have gotten a loan for his truck to some other shady person and that the only title he has now is the “king of Oklahoma.”

And in the last verse we see Molly finally making her threat real by taking the kids to Bixby which is a suburb of Tulsa, Oklahoma. She tells him to figure his shit out and he tells us that he’s finally being honest because at this low point of his life there’s nothing left to lie about.

The band goes back to the chorus a couple of last times, this time with some slightly different lyrics. Jason sings “and I’d act like I was sleeping till she’d walk back through the door.” To me, this shows the character at his lowest point in their relationship where instead of having her wake him up every morning, he would pretend to be sleeping to avoid seeing her or maybe to avoid letting her see how bad he was becoming. Addiction can make you retreat from your loved ones and family almost against your own will and this devastating lyric makes you feel even more sad for this character.

And then to end this gloomy story we get an explosive guitar solo to end the song. If you think it sounds great on the record then you really need to see it live to experience it first hand. I feel like the live version puts it to shame because not only does Jason solo for twice the amount of time but Sadler gets in on the action and the whole band just sounds lot harder and plays with some more complex rhythms and syncopations.

If someone was to say that this is one of Jason’s best songs, I couldn’t argue against it. When it comes to the story telling it’s like watching a movie. The characters are well written and the emotions throughout the song are hard hitting. I actually think the verses contains some of Jason’s catchiest vocal melodies. Not to mention he has so much passion when he’s singing the chorus. And speaking of the chorus, I love the dynamics changes in the music and how it gives the song a breath of fresh air. Plus you can’t forget about those guitar solos that have become iconic when seeing the band live. There’s a reason why this song is a favorite for most people on this album, why it got its own music video and why it’ll probably be a live staple for the next couple of tours.

But what do you think about this song? Is this going to be a classic Jason song for years to come? What do you think the song is about? Favorite lyrical or musical moments? And have you seen it live yet?