round 1

(5) bonnie raitt, “angel from montgomery”
rolled by
(12) anthrax, “ball of confusion”
262-76
and will play on in the second round

Read the essays, listen to the songs, and vote. Winner is the aggregate of the poll below and the @marchxness twitter poll. Polls closed @ 9am Arizona time on 3/8/22.

Katerina Ivanov Prado on bonnie raitt’s “angel from montgomery”

Sometimes, when I feel like I’m drowning in deep blue grief, I drive around until I can find a mostly abandoned parking lot. Usually outside the abandoned concrete giants that once housed Staples and OfficeMax and Circuit City. The buildings they can never quite fill. Anyway, I park and turn on 92.9—The Bull: Number 1 for New Country!—and lean my front seat all the way back.
My favorite is when they play the country music that came before 9/11, before the hyperpatriotism and formulaic advertisements for Chevy Silverados and light beer ruled the charts. That’s the country music I like best: baritone notes brushing the bottom of the staff. Heartbreak acoustic guitar. The voice of a croony tenor, explaining how hot his wife is. A fiddle interlude. A raspy little alto saying she loves her man, but she’ll kill him if he ever strays.
When I admit I listen to country music, I get a lot of confused looks like, you? Liberal arts degree, academia dwelling, Mexican you? I have to explain: it’s situational. I’m from Florida.
There’s a saying in Florida: the more North you go the more South you get. I grew up in shooting permits for children and purity ring ceremonies and megachurches with tax exemptions, Florida. Confederate flags. Low rise jeans. I hated it all. Hated how my mom got pulled over constantly for tags that weren’t expired. Hated how casually white people would grab a fistful of my hair to feel the texture. Hated how calmly slurs fell from their tongues while singing along to the radio. I prayed that my mother would move our family: to New York, to Chicago, to L.A. Somewhere with culture, not QuikMart.
This was, of course, a child’s wish, a selfish wish. New York and Chicago and L.A. were expensive. After a devastating 2002 that left half the country bitter and barely employed, my parents got work in Florida, so in Florida we stayed. In high school, I met Jamie, who was not exactly a great love of my life, but his mother Kristen might have been. Kristen looked like the statues of white Virgin Mary at church. She wore shoes that matched her purses and never had a peroxide-lightened hair out of place. She told Jamie how proud of him she was—Jamie, who was just sliding by with C’s in school and killing lizards for fun—and soon started telling me the same. She gave away affirmation like she was tossing petals, like there was an infinite supply of it. 
Kristen was a stay at home mom, something I was also fascinated by. My parents both worked full time, so I was always at Jamie’s house: doing homework and sticking my tongue in Jamie’s mouth and helping his mother fix dinner. Sitting at the counter, shelling peas for Kristen. Making pie dough with Kristen. Drinking cokes with a splash of vanilla rum, that Kristen made us swear not to tell anyone about. Loretta Lynn or Patsy Cline or Dolly Parton would be playing. Reba and Barbara Jean were always on the TV. To this day, if I hear the beginning of the Reba theme song—a single mom who works too hard—I’ll start crying.
Kristen drove us everywhere in her Town N Country minivan, radio tuned to the country station on default. That was the first time I heard “Angel from Montgomery.” I didn’t know it was a cover. I didn’t know Bonnie Raitt was singing. I didn’t know that John Denver had recorded it first; I had no idea who John Prine, the original writer, was. But I remember tearing up, because back in high school I felt everything too intensely, and I remember Kristen said “now enough of that,” but that she was crying too. She didn’t really talk to anyone but Jamie and I. Her husband—who I knew drank heavily—was away more often than not, working for an oil and gas company in the Gulf that would one day be responsible for spitting up black sludge on Florida beaches. I knew that when Bonnie Raitt asked to be made into an angel, so she could fly away, Kristen considered it too.
The whole song is about being stuck, feeling old and washed up. Wishing it were anyway else, hoping that someone listens when you pray. It’s about what it’s like to beg for something better. And Bonnie Raitt begged like church bells. When John Prine wrote it, he said in an interview he thought of a woman with her hands in a sink full of dishes who seemed much older than she actually was, worn down from the constant clawing at survival. I read that interview and I thought, that’s every woman I’ve ever known.
It’s about loneliness. And god, we were lonely, Kristen and I.
Good country music was usually some seriously sad woman shit, although I didn’t register that until years later. It was all songs about being left and losing a man and longing for a better one. My mom had bought copies of The Dixie Chicks’ Wide Open Spaces and Taking the Long Way  simply because they spoke out against George W. Bush, and never listened to them. But I did. And it sounded like a kind of secret grief language, some impossible sadness that answered my own. Everyone was miserable in a country song, everyone was getting fucked over, everyone was poor. I felt more seen by this kind of music than anything else. And with that came a terrible resentment that it would never really be mine, because I knew the kind of people who liked country music and I knew that they didn’t like people like me. I don’t often admit my love for country music, because it has always been theirs. I know it was once Appalachian working class and blues players and Cajun musicians and Mexican corridos and cowboy stories. But now it’s lifted trucks, American flags, dead deer heads on the wall. And what am I supposed to do with that?
I thought about Kristen for the first time in years when I was in a cowboy bar in Southern Arizona. A little old Mexican lady sang a heavily accented Miranda Lambert song about a childhood home and a dead dog. And she didn’t have a sheet of blonde hair or a pastel skirt set, but she reminded me so much of Kristen that it stung. Kristin, who crooned along to lyrics like all I've seen of this old world is a bed and a doctor bill. Kristen who was my confidant, the adult who wouldn’t judge my mistakes. The adult who didn’t need anything from me. Kristin who held me when I cried because someone asked her if it bothered her that Jamie was dating out of his race right in front of me; Kristen who murmured I’m so sorry sweetheart into my hair.
After about six beers, I grabbed the karaoke mic and did Angel from Montgomery and tried not to choke up on the line that always got me: if dreams were thunder and lightning was desire, this old house would have burnt down a long time ago. Like, fuck. Listen to that.
Another writer told me that my work sounds like a country song: someone is always in mourning, someone is always in danger, someone is always in love. It makes sense that I write like this—I was raised on songs with a minor harmony and a speaker in mourning. Songs where there is always a snapped chicken neck, a numbered county road, an ex-boyfriend drunk stumbling outside the town bar. A house that creaks when it gets cold. Some girl sitting by the door with a gun and a cigarette dangling from her lips. Something unpaved, six pack from the Quik Zip, a .22 Long Rifle. Ladies in the kind of thick makeup that runs down your face when it’s humid or you cry, and it’s always humid and you’re always crying. There’s a congregation where everyone bites their lip. There’s a dead girl, or dead deer to compare her to. There’s a live oak. Everyone in town believes in angels.
Kristen friended me on Facebook a while back, and one of the first pictures on her page was of her in a red hat captioned “Keep America Great.” It broke my goddamn heart.

Katerina Ivanov Prado is a writer from Florida. Her multi-genre work has been published in Brevity, the Florida Review, the Nashville Review, Passages North, Iron Horse Literary Review, The Pinch, Joyland, The Rumpus, and others. She has won the John Weston Award for Fiction, the 2019 AWP Intro Journals Award, The Pinch Nonfiction Literary Award and the Florida Review Nonfiction Editors' Award, and a LitUp Reese's Book Club Fellowship. You can find her @kativanovwrites for hot takes on both reality and reality TV.

A Perpetual “Ball of Confusion”: tim states on Anthrax’s “ball of confusion” & Life

 In the pantheon of thrash metal, it’s always been Metallica at the top and everyone else scrambling for second place. In the late eighties and early nineties, Megadeth, Slayer, and Anthrax were neck and neck for the runner-up slot, but there was a time when Anthrax was ahead of the curve. The 1990 release, Persistence of Time, was their third of five consecutive albums to be certified gold, and in 1991 Attack of the Killer B’s, a compilation album that contained their version of the Public Enemy song “Bring the Noise”, would be the fourth. Not only were they a metal band covering a rap song, but Chuck D and Flavor Flav appeared on the track, and then included it on their next record, Apocalypse 91: The Enemy Strikes Black. Sure, Run DMC and Aerosmith teamed up for “Walk This Way”, the Beastie Boys used guitars on their first album, and the vocals of Red Hot Chili Peppers vocalist Anthony Kiedis were somewhere between rapping and singing, but never before had the aggression of heavy metal melded together seamlessly with rap. In 1992, Anthrax appeared on an episode of the popular sitcom Married…with Children, signed a multi-album deal with Elektra Records, and then promptly fired their lead singer, Joey Belladonna.
When I first encountered Anthrax in 1988, at the age of ten, they were welcoming. My brother and his friends were listening to Metallica and Judas Priest, and even the mention of those bands made me feel like I was on the bullet train to hell. But Anthrax? They had a t-shirt that featured all the band members in caricature form. They had a song about Judge Dredd (I Am the Law) and found time to sing about how America screwed over the indigenous people on this continent (Indians). You know what else? They wore shorts on stage. I remember seeing pictures in Metal Edge magazine of their lead guitarist, Dan Spitz, wearing a football jersey while shredding during a concert. These guys were having fun, and for a ten-year-old worried about the eternal destination of his soul? That sounded like good news.
There were rumblings of drug or alcohol problems with Belladonna, but by all accounts, his ouster was a case of the band wanting to go in a different direction. He could hit the high notes like Steve Perry of Journey, but Anthrax was moving into darker, heavier territory. Many have said this was a result of the onslaught of grunge bands dominating the rock world, but a more likely influence was the rise of Pantera. Rather than play fast for the sake of being fast, Pantera focused more on a heavy, crushing groove. When Anthrax parted ways with Belladonna, they enlisted the lead singer of Armored Saint, John Bush. To emphasize what Anthrax was going for, drummer Charlie Benante said this of Bush’s vocals: “He adds an emphasis on the ballsier, heavier side…”
Ballsier. Heavier. Darker. When Anthrax announced John Bush as their new singer, I was excited. I was a worldly fourteen-year-old, ready for the next step. I thought Armored Saint was a cool band, and John Bush a great singer. I couldn’t wait. I was still worried about my soul, but I had been knee-deep in Anthrax and Guns N’ Roses for the past four years. I liked Nirvana, until Kurt Cobain decided to talk shit about Axl Rose, and then Dave Grohl took it upon himself to taunt Axl from the stage at the 1992 MTV Video Music Awards. For me, the saving grace of that night was seeing Nirvana’s bassist, Krist Novoselic, throw his instrument in the air, fail to catch it, get hit in the face, and end up a crumpled mess on the floor of the stage. I was easily entertained, but sometime after that glorious night my parents (not fans of any music past 1965, as far as I could tell) found my stash of hard rock and metal tapes. For some, that kind of development may have pushed them further into teenage rebellion, but for me it coincided with a fiery, incendiary church sermon I heard one Sunday morning in early 1993. I was convinced the preacher from Texas was clued into all my sinful behaviors and I needed to repent. So, I walked the aisle, got on my knees, and swore off rock music.
The first Anthrax record with John Bush would be Sound of White Noise, released in May 1993. It was the band’s fifth consecutive album to be certified gold, and their highest-charting effort, debuting at #7 on the Billboard 200. It would be the last time Anthrax went gold, and the highest they would ever chart. Over the next few years, the band that had been ahead of the curve for a moment fell behind. The executives at Elektra that brought Anthrax in were either fired or quit, and the next album, Stomp 442, quickly fell off the charts. Lyrically, the record was dark, but more so in an introspective way. No matter the direction they were going in, the relationship with Elektra was severed, and Anthrax signed with an independent label called Ignition, an imprint of Tommy Boy Records. Their next album, Volume 8: The Threat is Real, debuted at #118 on the charts. It had moments of darkness, but the variety of their earlier work was back. They seemed to be having fun on the record, but shortly after its release, Ignition folded. The album was dead. At that time, in 1998, Metallica was playing a brand of music closer to hard rock than thrash metal. Megadeth was mostly following that formula, and Slayer, although experimenting with their sound, was still Slayer, i.e., dark and heavy. Anthrax had tried to reinvent their sound, and lost a lot of ground to their contemporaries, let alone newer bands in the metal world. After the debacle with Ignition, they signed to another indie label, Beyond Records, and planned to release a greatest hits compilation. The album, Return of the Killer A’s, was released in 1999 and focused more on songs from the John Bush era, but still had classics from the Belladonna years, including their version of “Bring the Noise”. The hook, though, was a cover of “Ball of Confusion” by the Temptations.
After a few years of being immersed in the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement, I slowly worked my way back into a relationship with the devil’s music. I started off, in late 1996, with four tapes. I went to a store called Waxie Maxie’s, in Waldorf, Maryland, and bought two albums by Tesla: Five Man Acoustical Jam and Time’s Makin’ Changes - The Best of Tesla. Kind of a bare bones rock n’ roll band, I couldn’t jump right back in with Guns N’ Roses, and Tesla seemed a solid choice. If my parents saw me with a Guns N’ Roses tape they would lose it, but Tesla? They didn’t even know who Tesla was. The other band felt like the least incendiary metal band I could choose: Anthrax. I wanted the familiarity of the Joey Belladonna era, so I bought Live: The Island Years. It had some of my favorite Anthrax songs from my youth, but I also wanted to hear what they were up to with John Bush. My brother had told me how much he liked Stomp 442, so that felt like a safe move. For someone moving into an uncertain time, spiritually, a song like “In A Zone”, which talks about forgetting to pray and just trying to get through life on a daily basis, shot through my ears and burrowed into my brain. I was connecting to the band in a more meaningful way than ever before, and I was an instant convert to Bush-era Anthrax.
The original version of “Ball of Confusion” reached number three on the pop charts and was, in effect, the hook for the second compilation album from the Temptations, Greatest Hits II. Released in 1970, this was after the departure of lead singer David Ruffin, who had fronted the group for some of their biggest hits, like “My Girl” and “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg”. “Ball of Confusion” was written by Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong, and with production from Whitfield, their recorded output continued to move further from the classic R&B sound of the 1960s, and more toward psychedelic soul. There were still elements of the classic Temptations sound, but the bass line was a little funkier, the guitar rocked a little more, and four different vocalists took the lead, which was becoming increasingly more common in their songs. With artists like Miles Davis and Ornette Coleman experimenting with different sounds, and the Parliament-Funkadelic collective on the way up, the Temptations were successfully updating their sound.
If the Temptations used four lead vocalists for their version, how could Anthrax do justice to “Ball of Confusion” with just one? Turns out, they wouldn’t have to try. John Bush was the lead singer, but the band thought it a good idea to bring Joey Belladonna back to handle the high notes. After years of trying to forge a new path, they were reaching back to their glory days. It was a one-off recording, but they also planned a tour with both Bush and Belladonna singing. They would split the set and then close the show with “Ball of Confusion”. As far as the actual song, the band delivered on all fronts. Bush’s voice, deeper with a bit of rasp to it, handled the lower register with ease, and Belladonna sounded at home. Like it was still 1992. Musically, Anthrax added their own crunch to the song, and Dan Lilker played the bass line with funk intact. They honored the original while making it an Anthrax song. Hearing it made one think they could pull off a tour with both singers.
I bought tickets to the first show on the Killer A’s tour, slated for the Jaxx Nightclub in Springfield, Virginia (hometown of the one and only Dave Grohl, that old asshole). It was scheduled for January 16, 2000. Of all the days of the week, of course it would be a Sunday. I was back at home, living with my parents, and going to a metal show on the Lord’s Day didn’t please them. As a soon-to-be-twenty-two-year-old, though, they agreed I was old enough to make that decision. The show was only about a week away when the news broke, probably on a Geocities fan site, that Joey Belladonna pulled out of the tour. Was I let down? Sure. But I was, after all, a true believer in the Bush era. I went to the show and was blown away. They didn’t play “Ball of Confusion”, but they did play a lot of my favorites from Belladonna’s time in the band. I walked away convinced those old songs were better off with Bush on the mic, and I believed it with an evangelistic zeal.
Shortly after this, Beyond Records went under. Anthrax was on the hunt for a new label. Again. They signed with Sanctuary Records and made a cool album in 2003, We’ve Come for You All, which managed to chart even lower than Volume 8, at 122. In 2004, they released a compilation album called The Greater of Two Evils, with John Bush singing songs from the Joey Belladonna, and pre-Belladonna, eras of Anthrax. Pretty clear that the band agreed, then, that they were better off with Bush on the mic, right? Not so fast. In 2005, they reunited with Belladonna for a tour. They put out a greatest hits package, Anthrology: No Hit Wonders, with only Belladonna-era songs included. After the reunion tour, though? Belladonna was out of the band. Again. Bush declined an offer to come back. After a few years of uncertainty, Belladonna was back.
Recently, Anthrax celebrated their 40th anniversary. They’re a rejuvenated band, and for an avowed fan of the Bush-fronted version, I admit it: they sound good. John Bush has been touring and recording with Armored Saint ever since leaving Anthrax, and he’s said that things are where they should be. Belladonna in Anthrax, and he in Armored Saint. For me, I wonder if Anthrax is settling for the lesser version of what the band can be. They’re playing larger venues and selling more records than they did for at least 15 years before Belladonna rejoined, but at what cost? Have they lost artistic credibility, and does anyone even have the right to make that judgment
I haven’t bought any Anthrax records since John Bush left the band. Up until about 2005 or so, I still felt guilt for listening to rock music. Occasionally, I would thin the herd and trash certain CDs I felt were problematic. From about 1997 to 2000, though, I would get a garbage bag full of CDs and smash them with a Louisville Slugger. Really let the devil know I meant business. These days, I buy records or the occasional CD, but they never get smashed or trashed. I haven’t reverted to fundamentalism, and I’m not even a churchgoer. But sometimes, I think about how Anthrax went back to Belladonna, and how happy they are. I think about how nothing has filled the void that was created when I moved on from the belief I once had. There is still a belief, but not one I recognize. I don’t think the earth is 6,000 years old anymore, but God, well, we can’t prove that God does not exist. Anthrax regained relevance by going back to their past and making something new. It’s one thing to do that with art, but what about a soul? How many times can one be born again?

Tim States lives in Tucson with his family, and can be found on Twitter as @epmornsesh.