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"Okie from Muskogee" is a song recorded by American country music artist Merle Haggard, which he co-wrote with Roy Edward Burris. "Okie" is a slang name for someone from Oklahoma, and Muskogee is the 11th largest city in the state. The song was released in September 1969 as first single and title track from the album ''Okie from Muskogee'', and was one of the most famous songs of Haggard's career. ==Background== Haggard told ''The Boot'' that he wrote the song after he became disheartened watching Vietnam War protests and incorporated that emotion and viewpoint into song. Haggard says, "When I was in prison, I knew what it was like to have freedom taken away. Freedom is everything. During Vietnam, there were all kinds of protests. Here were these () going over there and dying for a cause — we don't even know what it was really all about. And here are these young kids, that were free, bitching about it. There's something wrong with that and with () those poor guys." He states that he wrote the song to support the troops. Critic Kurt Wolff wrote that Haggard always considered what became a redneck anthem to be a spoof, and that today fans — even the hippies that are derided in the lyrics — have taken a liking to the song and find humor in some of the lyrics,〔Wolff, Kurt, "Country Music: The Rough Guide," Rough Guides Ltd., London; Penguin Putnam, New York, distributor. p. 424 (ISBN 1-85828-534-8)〕 leading to cover versions of the song being recorded by such countercultural acts as the Grateful Dead, The Beach Boys, Phil Ochs, String Cheese Incident and The Melvins. Written by Haggard and Roy Edward Burris (drummer for Haggard's backing band, The Strangers) during the height of the Vietnam War, "Okie from Muskogee" grew from the two trading one-liners about small-town life,〔Janovitz.〕 where conservative values were the norm and outsiders with ideals contrary to those ways were unwelcome. Here, the singer reflects on how proud he is to hail from Middle America, where its residents were patriotic, and didn't smoke marijuana, take LSD, wear beads and sandals, burn draft cards or challenge authority.〔Malone, Bill, "Country Music U.S.A," 2nd rev. ed. (University of Texas Press, Austin, 2002), p.371.〕 While viewed as a satire of small-town America and its reaction to the antiwar protests and counterculture seen in America's larger cities, Allmusic writer Bill Janovitz writes that the song also "convincingly (gives) voice to a proud, strait-laced truck-driver type.... (I)n the end, he identifies with the narrator. He does not position the protagonist as angry, reactionary, or judgmental; it is more that the guy, a self-confessed 'square,' is confused by such changes and with a chuckle comes to the conclusion that he and his ilk have the right sort of life for themselves." Session personnel were James Burton, Roy Nichols and Jerry Reed on guitar; Chuck Berghofer on bass, and Ron Tutt on drums. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Okie from Muskogee (song)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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