The album spent 23 weeks on Billboard’s charts, peaking at 36 (Billboard). The popular response to Good Old Boys was phenomenal given its sensitive subject material and as time’s progressed, the album’s status has become legendary. Similarly, Good Old Boys is a concept album whose witty lyrics ridicule Southern culture. One of his songs, “Short People” was one of his most popular songs and satirized prejudices in the country (Pareles). He was not shy about tackling issues plaguing America at the time of recording in a witty and satirical way. Oxford Music Online). Newman spent a lot of time in New Orleans as a child, learned piano and absorbed different jazz, blues and soul influences. Music was in Newman’s blood his uncles Emil, Alfred and Lionel all worked in Hollywood as writing and conducting movie scores (Pareles, Jon. He was born in 1943 in Los Angeles, California. Newman encapsulates that South in his album. The Equal Employment Opportunity Act was passed in the early 70s but Congress didn’t provide the commission with power to enforce the laws and blacks lagged behind whites in earning potential and education still halfway through the decade ( The African American Legacy and the Challenges of the 21st Century, U.S. In 1971, 9.2 percent of black children attended segregated schools in the South. It was also a way for whites in power to limit black’s voices (Coldough).
This significantly disparaged the black community, forcing them to live in poverty and thus limit opportunities later in life. Uneven Development and Racial Composition in the Deep South: 1970–1980.Rural Sociology.). It was done to “avoid ‘complications’ in plant start-ups and operations,” (Coldough, Gleana. Businesses would steer clear of areas whose population was over 30 percent African American. The South in the 1970s was predicated on discrimination against black people. The 1974 recording satirically addresses issues of deep-seeded racism, xenophobia, middle-class lifestyles and stubbornness of people to make social change. In his album Good Old Boys, Randy Newman does a masterful job describing the culture in the South during the 1970s.
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