Your Ultimate Big Dig Roadtrip Playlist

Summary

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The Big Dig – “Your Ultimate Big Dig Roadtrip Playlist”

Podcast: The Big Dig
Host: Ian Coss
Guest Curator: Eli Paperboy Reed (soul singer, musician)
Date: August 5, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this special episode, host Ian Coss is joined by acclaimed soul musician and Boston native Eli Paperboy Reed to curate “the ultimate Big Dig roadtrip playlist.” Inspired by a listener’s message linking the show’s themes to classic American music, this conversation moves through three main motifs—fishing, gambling, and highways—drawing connections between these themes and their rich representation in American roots, blues, gospel, and soul music. Together, they explore rare tracks, deep cuts, and personal favorites, weaving in music history, personal anecdotes, and the enduring power of metaphor in songwriting.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Origins of the Playlist

• Listener Inspiration: The concept arises from a fan who linked a song to the show’s “Scratch & Win” season—a rare 1969 Chess Records single only available on vinyl. (01:08)
• Eli Paperboy Reed’s Background: Reed is highlighted for his deep connections to American roots music—soul, blues, gospel—tracing his journey from Boston to the juke joints of Mississippi and Chicago.

  “Eli, as you may know, is a soul singer and songwriter who grew up right here in the Boston area, but who cut his teeth in the juke joints of Clarksdale, Mississippi...” (01:46 – Ian Coss)

Mixtape Formats & Music Sharing

• Music Sharing then and now: Both guests reminisce about the evolution from mixtapes to CD burning to streaming playlists.

  “I used to burn tons of CDs...I made mixtapes...honestly, any way that you can share music with other people is a good way, I feel.” (04:02 – Eli Paperboy Reed)

• Nostalgia for Physical Media: Discussion of the impermanence of burnt CDs and the loss of great music not available on streaming platforms.

Thematic Deep Dives

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1. Songs About Fishing (09:04–16:19)

Discussion/Tracklist:

• “Catfish Blues” (Bobo Thomas)

  • Widespread influence: Song theme goes back to the 1930s (09:33)
  • “I wish I was a catfish because then all the women would be fishing after me, you know...” (09:44 – Reed)
  • Catfish as a central figure in Southern music and cuisine.

• “Wrapped up and Tangled up in Jesus” (Rev. Charlie Jackson)

  • The “fish for souls” metaphor and tradition of guitar evangelists. (11:28)
  • “You want to get wrapped up. You want to get caught up by Jesus. You want to get hooked by the spirit...” (11:28 – Reed)
  • Enduring legacy of regional gospel records.

• “Just Like a Fish” (Junior Parker)

  • Song flips fishing metaphor; instead of being pursued, the narrator is the fish caught and trying to break free. (13:22)
  • Background: Junior Parker’s life, his influence on Elvis, and his status as a “chitlin circuit” artist. (13:59)

• Host’s Pick: “Fishin’ Blues” (Taj Mahal)

  • A Massachusetts connection; Taj Mahal as a local musician and a formative influence on Ian. (15:34)

Notable Quote:

“It's like you said, you could take it any way you want. You could go through all these different iterations of the fish metaphor, you know, from relationships to God or whatever.” (13:34 – Reed)

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2. Songs About Gambling (18:16–29:19)

Discussion/Tracklist:

• “Turn The Card Slowly” (Patsy Cline)

  • Country music’s metaphorical richness and narrative use of cards/gambling. (18:42)
  • “I'm trying to have a little bit more variety...when you get into gambling you can get a little wider...” (18:42 – Reed)

• “Gambling Man” (The Staple Singers)

  • Gospel’s focus on redemption, temptation, and backsliding. (20:32)
  • The Staple Singers’ unique crossover from gospel to folk to inspirational music. (21:44)
  • “There were not a lot...of any other artists that were making records that sounded like the Staples Singers.” (22:34 – Reed)

• “Who Got The Number” (Pigmeat Markham)

  • The original listener-submitted track; a proto-rap comedy-funk rarity from Chess Records. (22:53)
  • Markham as a comedian, not a traditional singer, but his rhythmic delivery prefigures hip-hop. (24:08)
  • “They’re just rap records. They’re just like heavy rap records.” (24:11 – Reed)
  • Decoding the song’s references: every lyric is coded language about the illegal numbers racket. (24:22)

• Host’s Pick: “The Gambler” (Kenny Rogers)

  • Referenced as a perfect turn-of-phrase for both life and the show’s season on state lotteries. (29:09)

Notable Quote:

“I think, because there are so many evocative turns of phrase...all the different things that you can say in a card game...all of those things can find their way into a metaphor about love or about something else.” (27:27 – Reed)

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3. Songs About Highways & Roads (30:09–40:24)

Discussion/Tracklist:

• “Christian’s Automobile” (Dixie Hummingbirds)

  • Explores driving as a metaphor for spiritual journey and staying on the right path. (30:14)
  • “They take that concept to the next level. You gotta, you gotta make sure that your oil's checked, you gotta check on your starter...” (30:35 – Reed)
  • The Dixie Hummingbirds as foundational to American soul music; gospel quartets as the backbone of soul singing. (31:19)

• “Mr. Highway Man” (Howlin’ Wolf)

  • The ‘highwayman’ as a coded warning: state troopers and the experience of Black musicians on the road. (33:14)
  • “He’s the police...that was a concept, a turn of phrase that they would still use...” (33:45 – Reed)
  • The physical and psychological realities of touring musicians, from segregation to grueling schedules.

• Tour Stories:

  • Reed shares a harrowing, humorous story about rushing from Texas to Oklahoma after a bandmate ends up in the hospital. (37:13)

• Host’s Pick: “White Line Fever” (Merle Haggard)

  • Haggard’s introspective take on life as a traveling musician and the existential experience of endless highways. (39:04)
  • “He writes these moment songs where it’s the reflection of the protagonist in that particular moment...” (39:36 – Reed)

Notable Quote:

“So much of what we know as foundational American music came around at the same time as the interstate highway system...it was only natural that when you spend your life on the road, you start writing about it and it becomes ingrained in your psyche.” (35:13 – Reed)

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Memorable Moments & Quotes

• Eli on American Song Metaphors:

  “You can't really have American music without them [fishing, gambling, highways] in some ways.” (36:46)

• On Sound and Place:

  “We recorded [Roamin’ and Ramblin’ Blues] at a studio right across from the Mass Pike...in the basement of my apartment building on Cambridge Street. You could hear the Pike when you didn't have the windows shut.” (41:08 – Reed)

• On Mixtapes and Generational Identity:

  “You can kind of get someone's age within half a decade or so by whether they were burning CDs in high school or whether they were making mixtapes...” (04:44 – Coss)

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Playlist: Ultimate Big Dig Roadtrip

Fishing:

• Catfish Blues – Bobo Thomas
• Wrapped Up and Tangled Up in Jesus – Rev. Charlie Jackson
• Just Like a Fish – Junior Parker
• Fishin’ Blues – Taj Mahal (host’s pick)

Gambling:

• Turn the Card Slowly – Patsy Cline
• Gamblin’ Man – The Staple Singers
• Who Got the Number – Pigmeat Markham
• The Gambler – Kenny Rogers (host’s pick)

Highways:

• Christian’s Automobile – Dixie Hummingbirds
• Mr. Highway Man – Howlin’ Wolf
• White Line Fever – Merle Haggard
• Roamin’ and Ramblin’ Blues – Honeyboy Edwards (performed by Reed)

“You could go down many a rabbit hole.” (40:40 – Reed)

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How to Access the Playlist

• Find the full curated playlist—including those rare tracks not available on streaming—on MixCloud (see show notes).
• Eli Paperboy Reed’s latest album “Getting There” is available on streaming services.
• For behind-the-scenes access and live events, listeners are encouraged to join the Big Dig’s member community, “The HOV Lane.”

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 01:08 – Episode opening, introduction to Eli and the playlist idea
• 04:02 – Sharing musical formats & nostalgia
• 09:04 – Start of “Fishing” theme and songs
• 18:16 – Start of “Gambling” theme and songs
• 29:09 – “The Gambler”/metaphors in songwriting
• 30:09 – Start of “Highways” theme and songs
• 37:13 – Eli’s tour adventure story
• 41:08 – Discussion of “Roamin’ and Ramblin’ Blues” recording location

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The Big Dig and Eli Paperboy Reed use this episode to highlight the intertwining history of American infrastructure, culture, and song—proving that highways, fishing, and gambling are more than literal topics: they are fundamental metaphors in the American experience and songbook. The companion playlist not only provides entertainment for summer roadtrips but serves as an oral history, alive with stories, traditions, and the voices of those who’ve traveled these roads before.

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Transcript

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[Ian Coss]

and also from the MIT Federal Credit Union mortgages designed to make your home financing journey effortless. Federally insured by NCUA equal housing lender NMLS number 699225 from GBH News, this is the Big Dig. I'm Ian Coss, and welcome to your ultimate Big Dig Road Trip playlist. So all this started because of a message that popped up in my DMs last year. It was from a listener who was in the middle of our second season, Scratch and Win, and wanted to share a song that the series made him think of. Now this was immediately exciting to me on several levels. As you may know, I spend a lot of time, maybe too much time, gathering and composing all of the music that goes into our show. So really, anytime a listener wants to talk music, I'm there for it. Even better was that this song our listener shared was not just, you know, an old standard about lotteries or gambling. It was a rare 1969 chess record single issued on 45 and not available on streaming services. So that's cool. But coolest of all was that the listener sending this song was a musician himself, who I immediately recognized the one and only Eli Paperboy read. Eli, as you may know, is a soul singer and songwriter who grew up right here in the Boston area, but who cut his teeth in the juke joints of Clarksdale, Mississippi and the churches of the south side of Chicago. Eli released his first album 20 years ago now. Since then he has toured on five continents and released many more albums, including a brand new one this year called Getting There. And I'm now excited to say that Eli, you can add to that bio the guest curator for the ultimate Big Dig Road Trip playlist. Thank you for doing this.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Absolutely. I was very happy to. I'm a fan, so I came to this as a fan of yours, so I'm glad the feeling is mutual.

[Ian Coss]

Very much mutual. So before we get into anything Big Dig themed or related, I feel like just to establish some basics. What is your preferred playlist for format? Are you, are you a mixtape person? Are you more of like a burnt CD person? You know, I'm guessing not, but maybe like a Spotify playlist person. What is your method of sharing a mixtape?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

You know, sadly or whatever, it's a streaming platform. Sometimes you gotta make Spotify playlists for people and there's lots of great music that's out there. I guess the thing that I find frustrating or something like that is that there is so much amazing music that has fallen by the wayside because it's not available on streaming services. So I like to make mixes from 45s. You know, I have turntables and I can kind of go straight in and then I can make a big long wav file or mp3 and send it to people that way. I used to burn tons of CDs. I burned lots of CDs before my wife, before we got married. So that, that worked. I made mixtapes. I mean all of the things in every which way. And honestly, any way that you can share music with other people is a good way, I feel.

[Ian Coss]

I feel like mixtape memories are a good way of dating people. You can kind of get someone's age within half a decade or so by whether they were burning CDs in high school or whether they were making mixtapes in high school. I will just out myself as the micro generation of people who bought an external CD burner in 2004 and downloaded songs from Limewire to load up onto burnt CDs that I still have some of. But unfortunately that form, that particular format has not aged well. And Most of those CDs do not play anymore.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

They don't play anymore. I mean, that's the thing about CDs are sadly not the best medium.

[Ian Coss]

Not for preservation.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

No. I'm apparently a geriatric millennial. That's what I'm referred to as. But I did burn a lot of. I made A lot of tapes actually. Made a lot of tapes growing up from my dad's records. I would tape records off my dad's and listen to those on Walkman. Basically, that was my teenage years.

[Ian Coss]

So when I was introducing you, I mentioned that you have kind of made a purpose, really, of seeking out, it seems to me, these wellsprings of American roots music, soul music, blues music. You spent time in Clarksdale, you spent time in Chicago, but you grew up. You went to high school in Brookline. How did you know that? There was this place called Clarksdale, Mississippi, that was a fountain of blues music. What was turning you on to that stuff as a teenager here in Brookline?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

I mean, I came to all of. All of the music that I love and still love, really, through my dad and the records that he had. I mean, there was a great record collection on the floor of my living room that I would dig through and this and that. And, you know, I didn't. It's hard to know what was out there, you know, especially kind of in pre or early Internet. So I didn't know if there was people still playing the music that I loved, if there was a real world that existed of that. And I happened to go to Mississippi. We went on a Southern road trip looking at colleges, and we just turned the radio on, and I was like, wow, this is a whole thing that still exists. And went to Clarksdale on that trip. And I was just like, man, there's still a thing here. And to make a long story short, I ended up picking up and moving to Mississippi a week after I graduated from high school. And I got there, I didn't really. Still didn't know what to expect. And I found just this amazing community of musicians and, you know, people who were interested in playing and singing blues or. Or really Southern soul music at the time, and still for. For pretty much exclusively Southern black audience. And that just kind of turned my whole world upside down.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Yeah.

[Ian Coss]

So just to sort of continue the story of how this came out, we had this back and forth about, you know, songs about the numbers and Harlem and blues. And then there was this moment that kind of clicked for me sometime earlier this year, that without even meaning to or on any conscious level, we had picked topics for all three seasons of this podcast that are. That just happen to be very rich topics in American songs. We're talking about highways, gambling and fishing. Right. So what we're going to do is we're going to work our way backwards, starting with songs about fishing, assembling our playlist theme by theme. To help us out along the way, I just want to shout out our producer, Isabel Hibbard, who's here with us, who will be playing DJ for the episode, and also with us, who I want to shout out. We have a live virtual audience who you cannot hear, but they are watching and listening along, who are members of our Big Dig membership program, the HOV Lane. So if you're listening to this later and you want to be part of special events like this in the future, sign [e-mail] Hovlane with all that covered, let's talk about fishing. First song in the list is Catfish Blues by Bobo Thomas.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Isabelle, Take It Away, Will I Feel Like It. Catfish. I have no more.

[Ian Coss]

Now, if I'm remembering right, this is one of those blues songs that's been covered. Like there's a Jimi Hendrix version or something. Right. But where does this song actually start?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

There are earlier versions than that. The theme, I would say, probably goes back to the 30s of this idea of a catfish.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Yeah.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Of I wish I was a catfish because then all the women would be fishing after me, you know, which is. I mean, it's a funny concept. And, I don't know. We used to play this in Mississippi. This was. I mean, still today is a song that would, you know, get people up and moving. And I still play it, you know, sometimes in my own sets. I love that. The Bobo Thomas version is probably my favorite. I mean, it's also. Muddy Waters did it as Rolling Stone. It's the same song. He uses the same verses, so it's a kind of a wellspring of verses with that same theme. I love it. I love everything about it.

[Ian Coss]

Can you talk about the importance of catfish to the local cuisine down there?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Absolutely. I mean, it's everywhere in the south, especially in the Mississippi Delta. I mean, you go out and fish. You fish for catfish or crappie or what? I fished a lot. I had never really fished before, but the guys I was playing music with would say, let's, you know, get up on the weekend and go fishing, you know, as just the thing that they did. So I would go along.

[Ian Coss]

Wow. Moving along. We have our next song about fishing, Wrapped up and Tangled up in Jesus by Reverend Charlie Jackson.

[Isabel Hibbard]

And I put my hook out in the water and something got a hold to it and tried get loose. When I pulled it up, it was a big fish on the hoop. He was twisting and turning down, trying to get a loose.

[Ian Coss]

Can you walk me through the, like, the Jesus as fish metaphor or what is the Lyrical play going on here.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

This is a fishing metaphor that you want to get wrapped up. You want to get caught up by Jesus. You want to get caught up in the spirit. You want to get hooked by the spirit. That's what he's talking about, you know, And I think that it's such an interesting concept and such a beautiful metaphor.

[Ian Coss]

So what do you know about this song? Wrapped up and Tangled up in Jesus.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Reverend Charlie Jackson was a pretty obscure singer and what they call a guitar evangelist, which are guys who were. They weren't. He was a preacher, but they weren't all preachers. And these were guys who would play electric guitar and sing in churches or acoustic guitar, going back to guys like Blind Willie Johnson and the 1920s. And they were essentially blues singers, but they were singing religious lyrics. And he comes from this. This tradition of guitar evangelists. And, you know, he was based in kind of South Louisiana. And these records that he made were extremely local, extremely. You know, they were regional at best. And people I know actually who found this music through whatever and kind of facilitated the reissue it, and they've become, you know, sort of legendary. And they put out a compilation of his called God's Got it that I highly, highly, highly recommend. Everything on it is amazing.

[Ian Coss]

All right, let's round out our fishing set with Just like a fish. Junior Parker.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Keep going for your life. Just like a fool the way I could go for your life.

[Ian Coss]

So it seems that now that the, like, desperate lover as fish metaphor has been flipped, and now instead of, like, the woman coming to catch him, he is the fish that keeps going after the same line over and over again.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

It's a negative and not a positive. Right. You know, he wants to get free. He's the fish. But he's caught up. He doesn't want to. He wants to get free, which is, you know, it's like you said, you could take it any way you want. You know, you could go through all these different iterations of the fish metaphor, you know, from. From relationships to God or whatever.

[Ian Coss]

So for folks who don't know, tell us about Junior Parker.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Junior Parker was born and raised in Clarksdale, Mississippi, where I lived. He made kind of his name playing in Memphis, and he recorded the original version of Mystery Train, which, obviously, Elvis is quite well known for these. And Junior Parker was quite a big influence on Elvis in the early 50s in Memphis. And, you know, he was kind of one of those guys that never really crossed over into, you know, pop or, you know, white success. He was, you know, pretty much exclusively you know, what they call a chitlin circuit kind of artist until the end of his life. And he died quite young. Sadly, he died in the early 70s. I think he was only in his 40s. But again, an extremely, extremely high quality catalog. Every Junior Parker record you can find is great. And I'm a bag. I'm a massive fan for sure.

[Ian Coss]

And he was doing that all out of Memphis in the 50s. Like when Elvis was there.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Oh yeah. Especially in the early 50s. And then, and then kind of as you know, Elvis went on and, you know, starting in the mid-50s. And then Junior Parker went to Texas and started recording for Duke Records, which he kind of became the. That. The sound of that kind of brassy blues records that they were making that became very influential.

[Ian Coss]

Yeah, yeah. Have you ever written a song about fishing?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

No, I haven't. I feel like I don't have the bonafides. I'm not. You know, you've got it. You've got to. You got to fish more. You got to know more about fishing.

[Ian Coss]

You'll probably earn that one.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

I don't have that one yet. Exactly.

[Ian Coss]

So if I can, I might contribute a couple songs as we go along the way you should. You're giving us the deep cuts, which I'm grateful for. I might offer a few more middle of the road choices, but the song I want to add to the playlist was Fish and Blues. By. I mean, I always loved the Taj Mahal version. Taj Mahal, obviously he grew up in Springfield here in Massachusetts. My mom had tons of Taj Mahal records. And when I was learning guitar as a, like a teenager, this was one of the songs that I wanted to learn. I always loved that line, you know. Many fish bites if you got good bait.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Many fish bites if you got good bait. Here's a little tip that I.

[Ian Coss]

So we're gonna take a quick break and when we come back, songs about gambling and songs about highways. Stay tuned.

[Isabel Hibbard]

I went on down to my favorite fishing hole, baby.

[Ian Coss]

Support for the Big Dig comes from the Cape Playhouse in Dennis Village. Now playing the Tony Award winner for best musical, Hairspray. Up next, Tina Fey's hit Broadway musical, Mean Girls. Tickets for Hairspray and mean [e-mail] and also from MIT Sloan Executive Education, offering dynamic short programs tailored for mid career professionals looking to build expertise in innovation, leadership and technology. Details@executive mit edu. So I kind of feel like we're working our way backwards in terms of the seasons of the Big Dig, but I also feel like we're working our way up. I mean, I hesitate to rank things, but to me it feels like we're working our way up the power rankings of just how iconic a topic this is. So there's a lot of songs about fish and fishing. I would say there are a lot of songs about gambling. I mean we were talking about Elvis earlier. I mean you could do a whole playlist just about Las Vegas, Sin City versus Las Vegas. The song is about cards, about dice, casinos, numbers, jackpots. So there's just a tremendous amount of ground, a tremendous amount of metaphorical potential here. So let's dig into the playlist. First up on your list we've got Turn the card Slowly, Patsy Cline.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Turn the card slowly while you're dealing darling don't go breaking lose right from the star the rambling gammon Reckless way you treat my heart to sin each night down on my knees I pray your gambling waves willing Turn the card slowly while you're feeling darling and if you stack the deck then I'll go.

[Ian Coss]

So why, why this song of all the gambling songs?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Well, I'm trying to, to have a little bit more variety in. When you talk about fishing songs, I feel like they're with. You can really dig deep into blues related fishing songs but when you get into gambling you can get a little wider and there's certainly a million great country songs. Another one that was I almost did was Deck of Cards by T. Texas Tyler, which is a story song where he goes into a church and he has his deck of cards. And they say, son, you're playing cards in church, you've got to get out. And he shows that each card represents a section or a story from the Bible. And he said, this is my Bible that I have with. And it's like, you know, it's a heartbreaking song. So there's again, you've got these really a lot of options in terms of the metaphors you want to create. And I love Betsy Cline. So that's the other reason.

[Ian Coss]

Do you, do you play cards?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

I spent some time playing in casinos. We used to go to Vegas at the time there was this, the casino, the Cosmopolitan that used to have a lot of bands like real good bands come and play and do residencies there. So I spent some time at the Cosmo in Vegas and learned pretty quickly that I wasn't going to make any money while I was there if I spent too much time at the blackjack table. So I learned to quit that pretty quick.

[Ian Coss]

Yeah. Next up, Gamblin man by the Staples Singers. So tell us. Tell us about this song. And like, who else is. Is this another one of the songs that a lot of people have recorded?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

It's another. I would say it's like traditional themes, you know, I think there's a discussion about. Especially in black gospel music. A lot of it had to do with. With the behaviors that were not acceptable in the church. And because there was so much to do with class, so much of being a church going person in the black community was about being an upstanding citizen. And gambling was frowned upon and looked down upon. So the idea of. And they also talk about backsliding, the concept of backsliding. Whereas, like, you're. You're in the church and then you backslide, you start gambling, you start drinking again. So it's this constant battle between good and evil, right? And you're trying to maintain and be a good Christian or a good church going person, but the temptations of evil follow you wherever you go.

[Ian Coss]

Now, the Staple Singers were one of these gospel acts that did cross over into more. Into more pop stuff. Do you recall, like, what period of their career this is from?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

This is. So they kind of started out really as strictly as a gospel group. And then in the kind of folk era, early 60s folk era, they tapped into the ability of. To play these kind of more not specifically gospel songs. You know, they covered Bob Dylan. And then later in the 60s, they kind of created this genre called inspirational music, basically, where it's not. They're not love songs and they're not gospel songs, but they are positive message songs. And obviously they were very active in the civil rights movement, so they really kind of invented Staples. Singers are like a genre unto themselves. And there were not a lot, I can't think, especially at the time, of any other artists that were making records that sounded like the Staples singers.

[Ian Coss]

And Mavis Staples is still at it, still kicking.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

She sounds great. Go see Mavis if you can.

[Ian Coss]

All right, so we're gonna round out our gambling set with the song that I believe. This is the song you sent me originally. This is the one. So. Okay, let's hear it first.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Who got the number? Who got the number? Everybody knows that Don Gaston Member now take a little water clean for a quarter. You want to be a hog when you first commence. Well, put me down there for 25 cents now you're stepping in the righteous path. You played for the quarter and I'll play it for the half. We're gonna break the bank down.

[Ian Coss]

Wow.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Such a monster. Oh, my God.

[Ian Coss]

So So who was. Who is Pyg Meat Markham?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

So I just want to say really quick, I love this record, and I've been playing it in my DJ sets forever. But when I listened to. To the podcast, that's when I started to understand the lyrics, because I don't. I didn't really. You know, playing the numbers was not something that I really like. There's so many nuances to the numbers. And if every single line in that song refers to a different kind of idea of the game and all that I collects in Brooklyn along the docks, like all this stuff that he's talking about, but so pick me. And Barkin was a comedian. He was pretty old at the time. This was recorded probably in his 50s, even maybe 60s. So he's born the very beginning of the 20th century.

[Ian Coss]

He's old enough to have truly experienced the numbers.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Oh, 100%, absolutely.

[Ian Coss]

In its true. In its heyday. Yeah.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

So he made. He made records going back to the 40s. And, you know, he was the kind of guy that would be on big shows as the MC or a comedian. But in the 60s, he made these records that basically sound like rap. So you have these, like, funk, like heavy funk grooves, drum grooves, and he's talking over them in rhyme, you know, they're basically hip hop records, you know, And I think I did this thing, a web series on my social media for the 50th anniversary of hip hop, where I talked about kind of the foundational elements of hip hop and American music. And you've got preachers, you've got disc jockeys who also did things like this, where they would talk over instrumentals and rhyme, and you got comedians. And all of those different elements became what we know as the mc. And like these Pygmy Markham records, they're just rap records. They're just like heavy rap records.

[Ian Coss]

So at the time, he would not have been identified as a singer or a musician. He would have been known. He's a comedian. He's a comedian, and sometimes he just gets up there and riffs with a

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

band, or people would call them an emcee, but, you know, he would be the emcee of the show.

[Ian Coss]

But Chess Records had the insight to say, like, this isn't just, you know, something that's fun for a live audience. This is something you could record and distribute.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Well, he was making comedy albums like him. And there's another comedian that they had on Chess, Moms Mabley, both very famous, like going back to the vaudeville era, and they were still popular. I Mean, Chess knew where their bread was buttered and they were recording popular acts. I mean, the idea of putting an old school comedian like this with like the Chess House Band, who were super funky at the time, I mean, that's Maurice White, who later went on to founder Throw In Fire, who's playing drums on that record. And it's produced by Andre Williams, who was like one of the preeminent R and B producers of the 60s and 70s. So somebody had the idea to take this band who sounds incredible and put them in, you know, behind Pygmy Markham. I don't know, maybe it was Andre Williams. But this, you know, it has this everything about this, the groove, but also kind of this whole ghetto travelog thing, talking about the numbers. Everything about that was so specifically geared to this inner city black audience, the people that were playing the numbers.

[Ian Coss]

Yeah, it's amazing how. And like you said, there's this whole kind of code to it where if you don't know, then, yeah, it doesn't make sense. And then you understand what the numbers is. And suddenly everything in there is explaining some piece of it.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Even when you do know, you've got to sit there and parse it. It's like a whole nother language

[Ian Coss]

when you step back and look at these three songs you picked, but also just kind of the larger catalog of American song. What does gambling kind of represent or why do you think it is such a rich topic, a rich well that people come back to again and again?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Well, I think as a songwriter, I mean, I have a song on my new record that has a gambling theme, a card playing theme. I think, because there are so many evocative turns of phrase. I think that's part of it. And as a songwriter, you look for the evoc, at least I do look for the Turner phrase that can catch someone's ear first. You know, if it's, you know, all the. All the different, you know, even turn the card, slowly stack the deck, all the different things that you can say in a card game or in a dice game, all of those things can find their way into a metaphor about love or about something else. So I just think there's. So it's such a rich language. I think that's the language of it is what makes it so powerful.

[Ian Coss]

So speaking of a good turn of phrase, there is a gambling song I have to contribute to the playlist for our listeners, which is in our story about the Massachusetts State Lottery. There's this moment, it's at the very end of the series. I Can't remember what episode but when Bob Crane, our longest serving state treasurer, finally stepped down from office after 27 years of running this thing, gave a press conference and he comes up to the mic and all the reporters are there and he just goes, there's an old song. You got to know when to hold him. You got to know when to fold them. You got to know when to walk away and when to run. So we'll have to contribute the Gambler by Kenny Rogers.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Know when to fold up.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Know when to walk away and know when to run.

[Isabel Hibbard]

You never count your money.

[Ian Coss]

So we have saved for last the topic of highways. The topic roads. Highways that really began this podcast. And I mean, for me, it's hard for me to think of a, an image or an idea that is more deeply ingrained in American song than the road. Talk about like Clarksdale, Mississippi, the crossroads, right? I mean, key to the highway, Ramblin Blues. Ramblin man. No particular place to go. I mean, just like that sense of motion journey that is sort of like the, the overarching master narrative metaphor, I feel like of. Of American song. So I'm excited for this one. So let's start with, with your picks. Christian's automobile.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Ah, yeah.

[Ian Coss]

The Dixie Hummingbirds.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Press on your starters and start your automobile. Put it in fresh air and go up the hill. Drive on, children, if I ever see you no more, I'll meet you when I pull in on the other shot.

[Ian Coss]

Oh, man. So tell me about Christian's automobile again.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Great metaphor, great metaphor. And you know, people talk about the gospel highway, staying on the right road. It's another, another discussion of not straying from the fold, right? So you've gotta, you gotta stay on the straight and narrow path. And this is the. They take that concept to the next level. You gotta, you gotta make sure that your oil's checked, you gotta check on your starter. You gotta do all you know to make sure that you're going the right way and you're getting there the way you need to be. And. But it's just, you know, a perfect performance. And again, every step of the way, the metaphor changes. I don't have to worry about my parking space. I just want to see my savior face to face. All that, you know, it's great.

[Ian Coss]

Who were the Dixie Hummingbirds?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Dixie Hummingbirds were a very foundational gospel quartet. And for those who don't know, I have to just say gospel quartet music is my passion almost more than anything, because I think it's one of the most neglected foundational Pieces of American music. Quartet gospel singers became soul singers, and soul music became the language of singing as we understand it today in pop music. That's basically. You can draw a through line from A to B. The Dick Sammy Birds were from Spartanburg, South Carolina, and the Carolinas were a real hotbed of quartet gospel. And the singer there, the lead, is the great Ira Tucker. And he sang with the birds for 60 years, you know, and. And just again, these are guys that. He stayed on the highway the whole time. He never. He never went secular. He never made R B records. He was, you know. But so many of the great singers that, you know, listen to Ira Tucker and learn from Ira Tucker, you know, So I think that's the gospel singers. They toil in the vineyards while the secular singers make all the money. I saw just a quick Boston reference. I saw the Dixie Hummingbirds play in a very small storefront church in Roxbury. It was for Little Joe Cook, who is no longer with us. Boston legend. It was Little Joe Cook's birthday celebration, and he knew them from when he lived in Philadelphia. So the Byrds came up and sang at Little Joe Cook's anniversary program. It's just maybe in 2004 or five. And it was one of the greatest things that I've ever witnessed in my life. It was absolutely life changing.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Wow.

[Ian Coss]

Your second song is Mr. Highwayman by Howlin Wolf.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Realize it. Stop realizing, go look at that man. That a man on the road. Got a highwayman parked on the road. You better drive that, Kelly. You better drive it right on the road.

[Ian Coss]

So who is Mr. Highwayman?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

He's the police. Mr. Highwayman is the police officer, the state trooper. So I was. When I lived in Mississippi, I got to be very close friends with two musicians, bass player, guitar player, and drummer, who were. We were all exactly the same age and. But, you know, they were young and black and grew up in the Mississippi Delta, and we got to be best as friends. And I took them to New Orleans to audition for this music school. And I remember very distinctly driving late at night. And my friend Anthony was like, you gotta watch out back there. That's that highwayman back there. Be careful. Slow down. And I just was like. It really stuck with me that he would still call him the Highwayman. That was a concept of turn of phrase that they would still use. And the musicians, especially, you know, in Howlin Wolf and stuff like that, they would drive back and forth across the Mississippi Arkansas line and to play in different places, and they would try to beat the highwayman across the bridge or to the ferry. So. Because if they got to the, you know, across the state line, then the highwayman couldn't catch him anymore.

[Ian Coss]

So what do you think it is about the road that pops up in so many songs? So just like with gambling, why is that a metaphor that you find yourself coming back to? So many musicians find themselves coming back to.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

I mean, the life that we as musicians have chose involves the road. It's just a real thing. And you know, obviously so much of what we know as foundational American music came around at the same time as the interstate highway system. So the ability to travel from one place to another effectively was also kind of new. So that was something that musicians were able to take advantage of. And it was only natural that when you spend your life on the road, you start writing about it and it becomes ingrained in your psyche, you know, that's what you write your songs in the car, you know.

[Ian Coss]

Right.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Even if it's about something else, that's. That's where you're at, you know. And sometimes, I mean, you. Even now, you know, touring, it was worse for them and they'd be do 41 nighters in a row or whatever, but sometimes you got to drive 10 hours a day and then do the show, you know. Yeah, that's, that's like, it's. It's not an easy life. And the road is your home.

[Ian Coss]

Yeah, there is something there about how the automobile, the highway system, all these things are products of that 50s 60s era when blues and rock and roll and gospel was crossing over into Seoul. And just like youth culture was exploding in a way that had not quite existed before that, like, yeah, the car, for better and for worse, is right up in there. Close to the heart.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Absolutely. I mean these are all the, all three of the concepts that we're touching upon are, you know, you can't really have American music without them in some ways. You know, these are the things that people were writing about and talking about.

[Ian Coss]

So what's the craziest tour drive that you can remember? Craziest single leg burn that you can recall?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Well, there's a. So I'll tell a story that involves. It's a little bit more complicated, but I'll try to keep it brief. So we were playing in Austin, Texas and my saxophone player at the time, he had met this girl the last time that we played in Austin, Texas. And we were about to go, we finished the show, we're going back to the hotel, whatever. And he's like, you know, I'm gonna go with this girl. And I'm like, all right, we'll talk in the morning. We'll come and pick you up. What? So he calls me seven o'clock in the morning. He said, man, I'm at the hospital. And I was like, you're at the hospital? What are you talking about? He's like, well, you know, her ex boyfriend came and busted down the door and punched me in the face. And he got his lip all cut up and he plays the saxophone, so it's a big problem. So he's at the hospital and so he's waiting at the hospital forever. And we have to, you know, we have to be in Oklahoma city, which is 360 miles away. So we're sitting there waiting for him to get out of the hospital and get stitched up and this and that. And finally I think it, it was like maybe 2 o' clock in the afternoon and we had to be there at 7:30 or something like that. So we've got five and a half hours to drive 360 miles, or maybe even it might have been less time than that. But all I know is I remember driving 95 miles an hour on I35. But we got there, we literally pulled in, grabbed our stuff out of the van and ran on stage and played.

[Ian Coss]

Now there are a lot of 360 mile stretches that you could not cover in that time. But that stretch, I guess from like East Texas to Oklahoma, UK, when the

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

speed limit's 80 and there's no traffic. Right. I've also had 10 hour drives going from Boston to New York, so.

[Ian Coss]

Right, exactly. So I think that that is a perfect segue to our final song of the playlist, White Line Fever by Merle Haggard.

[Isabel Hibbard]

I wonder just what makes a man keep pushing on what makes me keep on humming this old highway song? I've been coast to coast a hundred times or more and I found one single place where I.

[Ian Coss]

So what is it about this song for you?

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

I mean, I love Merle. My last album that I made was called Down Every Road was a tribute album to Merle Haggard, where I did all Merle Haggard songs done in my own kind of style, including I'm a Lonesome Fugitive, which is another traveling song. I love Merle because unlike a lot of country songwriters, he writes the. I feel like people talk about country music and story songs, and story songs are wonderful. But Merle writes kind of what I call moment songs where it's the reflection of the protagonist in that particular moment, reflecting on his life reflecting on his relationship, whatever it is. So this is just a guy talking about how he feels about his life being on the road all the time.

[Ian Coss]

Yeah. Thank you so much for doing this. I feel like I learned so much and also I got so much like each and every one of these songs you shared. Feels like that's gonna now need to be a whole evening of listening and exploring.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Oh, man. You could go down many a rabbit hole.

[Ian Coss]

Many rabbit holes you teed up for us. So I thought we could end the episode. We go out on one of your own early recordings made right here in Boston. I believe that is also about this theme of traveling and roads. The song Roman and Ramblin Blues.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Thank you for doing that. We recorded that at a studio right across from the Mass pike, actually in the basement of my apartment building on Cambridge Street. In all you could hear the pike when. When you didn't have the windows shut. And yeah, there was. It's a cover of Honey Boy Edwards, who recorded that in Clarksdale, Mississippi in 1941.

[Ian Coss]

Amazing. Well, knowing that it was recorded within earshot of the Mass pike, absolutely. Even more on brand for our show. Thank you again for doing this, Eli.

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

Happy to do it. This is really fun, man. Thank you for having me.

[Ian Coss]

If you want to listen to our entire Big Dig themed playlist, including all those songs not available on streaming platforms, just follow the MixCloud link in the show notes for this episode. We'll also put the individual song and artist names in there. If you want to seek any of them out, you can find Eli's own music, including his latest record, Getting there by searching Eli, Paperboy Reed. And finally, if you want to join our membership program so that you can be part of special events like this one and also get early access to new episodes. All the Info is at wgbh.org hovlane the Big Dig is produced by Isabel Hibbard and myself, myself, Ian Koss, with support this episode from Tyler Sucrali. Our executive producer is Devin Maverick Robbins. We are a production of GBH News and distributed by PR.

[Isabel Hibbard]

Yes, I feel like rounding really cold and around Be love be like rounding baby baby.

[Ian Coss]

Hey I want to make sure that you know this series you're listening to right now is part of an ongoing feed telling stories from the past to help us understand our present. Our first season is all about infrastructure. The second season is about gambling and we've got more seasons planned. So if you want to stay on top of what the team and I are doing, go ahead and follow or subscribe to this podcast, wherever you listen. We've got some really exciting stories coming up and I hope you'll stay with us. Thanks

[Eli Paperboy Reed]

from prx.