Listen: Goog Golly

Clyde Langford lives in Centerville, Texas, childhood home of blues legend Lightnin’ Hopkins. It was Lightnin’s brother that taught Clyde his first notes on the guitar. Clyde’s style is all his own.

When I was a kid riding the bus to school, much to the bus driver’s chagrin, one of the older kids had a battery-powered Casio keyboard and he would more or less lead the rest of us in our emphatic renditions of our favorite songs. Good Golly Miss Molly was a persistent round. We would get yelled at from the front when one or two of us would show off our best imitation of Little Richard in the aisle.

That must be why I felt pang of nostalgia when Clyde’s “Goog Golly” came up as I was listening to his Music Maker release High Steppin’ Momma. He frails on an open tuned guitar while the low strings buzz and jangle like loose teeth. It’s the perfect compliment to his often sweet and clear tenor.  Clyde’s version of “Goog Golly” is plaintive and sad, I had never realized it as a young kid, but Molly is running around town and giving this songwriter a heartache. “Good Golly Miss Molly, sho’ like to ball, rockin’ and rollin’, pay me no mind at all.”  Clyde brings the true desperation to these lyrics “lay down last night, rolled side to side, my baby had me worried, couldn’t be satisfied.” How was I so blind? Molly, won’t you come on home? Give your man a rest.

— Aaron

Want more Clyde Langford? Buy his album here!