I always listen to music when I write. My gears turn slowly enough as it is, the thought of spending two hours staring at a blank screen, in silence, is too painful to consider. Often the genre of music I listen to while writing doesn’t exactly mesh with the subject matter. My novel Beartooth is set in rural Montana and centers around two brothers facing financial hardships after the death of their father. After getting approached by a shadowy figure named The Scot, they set out on a risky (and illegal) poaching mission into Yellowstone Park. Premise thus established; it might surprise some people to know that I wrote a good chunk of this book while listening to classic Studio One reggae/rocksteady playlists on YouTube. Does the music inform the writing? Maybe not. I don’t really know. That being said, in compiling this list, I wanted to come up with songs that fit the world and worldview of Thad and Hazen, the two desperate brothers at the heart of Beartooth’s plot. Some of the songs actually appear in the book, others just compliment the vibe.
Remember jukeboxes? Not those TouchTune things with unlimited options that bars have these days, real jukeboxes where you put in the quarters and punch in the numbers. Twenty years ago, most watering holes in Montana still had a jukebox. Some bars leaned more country, some more rock, some more pop. Every bar had an identity and a large part of that was based upon the jukebox and the songs it played. Anyway, I miss jukeboxes. In my dreams, there still exists a bar where the pool is free, a bottle of Coors is a buck-fifty, and the jukebox gives you three plays for a dollar. In that dream, the jukebox has these songs.
Big City—Merle Haggard
When Merle sings Turn me loose set me free somewhere in the middle of Montana, he pretty much sums up the place that Montana seems to occupy in the imagination of many urbanites. Montana: a place you can go to escape the hustle and bustle. (Or, more accurately, these days, a beautiful place you can go to work remotely and still make your Bay Area tech paycheck while driving up the cost of living so longtime locals can no longer afford to rent, let alone buy, a home.) Cheers.
Tradesman—Zach Bryan
Zach Bryan’s lyrics are infused with a certain working-class desperation that seems to speak directly to the circumstances in which Thad and Hazen find themselves. Work as salvation is a common theme and the flip side is work as damnation. Either way, the job a man does, in many ways, defines the man.
Setting Forth—Eddie Vedder
From the phenomenal Into the Wild soundtrack, Vedder manages to capture something of what it feels like to start a journey into the unknown. I don’t know exactly how it works, I’m not a musician, but to this day just hearing the opening chords of this song elicits a Pavlovian urge to throw the computer out the window and, well, set forth.
Scotland the Brave—Clan Sutherland Pipe Band
Ok, so admittedly, this one is unlikely to appear on any jukebox in the West, or even the world. That being said, I’ve always had an affinity for bagpipe music. My father was in a pipe band when I was a child, and so I was exposed to it a lot, probably that has something to do with it. Beartooth features a sketchy kilt-wearing bagpipe player (not based upon my father), and at one point he plays Scotland the Brave. If you’ve never had the pleasure of listening to a good piper play outdoors, especially against a dramatic highland backdrop, you’re missing out. Guaranteed chills.
China Grove—The Doobie Brothers
This one appears in the Beartooth. Early in the novel, Thad and Hazen’s absent, hippie mother returns, and this song is playing in her broken-down van. This is not a song that Thad would enjoy. He has no love lost for hippies in general, and his relationship with his mother is strained to say the least.
Living on the Sand—Colter Wall
When Colter Wall sings, he sounds like he’s seventy years old and has been chain smoking for at least fifty of those years. In reality, he’s a Canadian cowboy in his late twenties. Songs about hard luck and hard work are always in heavy rotation on any good jukebox. This song drips desperation.
Black Betty—Ram Jam
Another song that actually has a brief mention in the book. At one point Hazen, the somewhat “unpredictable” brother is trying to steer a raft loaded with contraband and his injured, unconscious, brother down a dangerous river at night. He sings out loud to keep himself awake and his spirits buoyed. This one hit wonder released in 1977 (actually a remake of a classic Leadbelly song) has always buoyed my spirits, so it seemed like a natural choice for inclusion.
Fire on the Mountain—The Grateful Dead
As anyone who lives in the west knows, wildfires are a serious and constant danger in summer months. At one point in Beartooth the brothers have become separated by the consequences of their decisions. Thad searches for Hazen in the backcountry as the hills burn. There’s something about this song that gets stuck in my head, and the opening lyrics–Long distance runner, what you standin’ there for? Get up, get out, get out of the door — put me in the shoes of Hazen, running from the law, as well as his brother, and the only life he knows.
Lungs—Townes Van Zandt
There are a few musicians I can’t listen to while I’m actually writing, and Townes Van Zandt is one of them. Basically, his songwriting is so damn good the lyrics distract me. I find myself listening too closely, and my productivity tanks. That being said, Townes might be my all-time favorite lonesome rainy afternoon jukebox bar selection. I chose “Lungs,” but pretty much any one will do. Can’t go wrong.
Wolves—Ryan Bingham
Beartooth, in part, is an exploration of the bonds of brotherhood and the difficulty of providing for one’s family. Thad, the older brother, feels the weight of responsibility and this song speaks to that.
The Mountain—The Heartless Bastards
In writing Beartooth, I wanted the landscape to play a big role in the action. The Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness is huge, the largest expanse of wilderness over ten thousand feet of elevation in the lower forty-eight states. This song could easily be an ode to this place, a vast, beautiful, harsh area that Thad and Hazen call home.
Enough to Leave—Billy Strings
