THE GREATEST SONGS IN HUMAN HISTORY: "PFFT YOU WERE GONE"

Gordie Tapp and Archie Campbell, eloquent troubadours of the broken heart.

I've been told over the years that I'm a complete and total failure as a black man for a number of reasons and one of those reasons is my undying love for that paragon of redneck humor, HEE HAW. Inexplicably running from 1969-1992, that weekly show was an hour-long showcase for the country music world's best and brightest to strut their stuff, but while that was all well and good what made me a fan for life were the incredibly lowbrow blasts of cornpone humor that were basically a self-deprecating form of minstrelsy about white folks. My late granddaddy Ozane — himself a self-described "Injun" who was also a Lawrence Welk booster — was the member of my family who turned me on to this stuff (much to my mother's eternal chagrin) and while we both enjoyed the drawled antics of the borderline-mongoloids on display, we laughed our asses off whenever Archie Campbell showed up in farmer gear to sing "Pfft You Were Gone."

Depending on where you look, "Pfft You Were Gone" is credited to Buck Owens, but I'd be willing to bet a finger or two that Archie Campbell came up with it in the first place, by virtue of him having a career as a country music humorist well before HEE HAW as well as him having recorded the song on one of his albums back in 1966, three years before the advent of HEE HAW. And while I do remember Buck Owens singing it a couple of times, it was nearly always Archie Campbell who would give voice to the plaintive lyrics, usually accompanied by Gordie Tapp.

"Pfft You Were Gone" pokes fun at one of the most venerable of country music subjects, namely that of a man being left by his wife for whatever reason, and over the years the song provided a virtual laundry list of causes for the unnamed wife's desertion. And funny though the template version of the song is, it only got better when damned near every guest ever to appear on HEE HAW got a shot at singing along with it. Many were the country stars and Hollywood celebs who donned overalls and stood before that famous picket fence to bemoan being jilted, including Connecticut Eye-Talian Ernest Borgnine,

— yes, I said ERNEST FUCKING BORGNINE!!! — but my personal favorite was when ultra-serious and deep-voiced Ponderosa patriarch Lorne Greene willingly sent his dignity rocketing straight down the bowl by accompanying Campbell.

As the years went by, the lyrics became more and more absurd, and I earnestly hope that some day a triple album will be released of nothing but multiple versions of "Pfft You Were Gone," just so I can sit there and laugh like a moron while wishing Granddaddy Ozane were still with us. Anyway, here are the song's initial lyrics, from which sprouted a musical kudzu of silliness:

Down here on the farm the weather gets messy 
Laying around with nothin' to do 
When you went away, you took my cow Bessie 
I miss her darling, more than I miss you  

You took off your leg, your wig and your eye glass
And you shoud've seen the look on my face
I wanted to kiss, I wanted to hug you 
But you were scattered all over the place

Chorus: Where, where, are you tonight? 
Why did you leave me here all alone? 
I searched the world over, And thought I found true love. 
You met another and Phht! you were gone.

I know that you loved me, here's my way of knowing 
The proof's hanging out right there on the line 
When I see the snow and feel the wind blowing 
Your nightie's hugging them long johns of mine  

The noises you made at our supper table
Your habits, my dear, were surely absurd 
But how many times do I have to tell you 
Soup is a dish to be seen and not heard  

Chorus: Where, oh where, are you tonight? 
Why did you leave me here all alone? 
I searched the world over, And thought I found true love. 
You met another and Phht! you were gone.  

Remember you phoned me a-sobbin' and cryin' 
The dog bit your maw, and drug her around 
You said she looked pale and thought she was dying
I said "Don't worry, I'll buy a new hound."

I had six kids and you had eleven 
And we had a boy, and they grew like flowers
I wish you'd come back, without you ain't heaven
'Cause your kids and my kids are beatin' up ours

Chorus: Where, oh where, are you tonight? 
Why did you leave me here all alone?
I searched the world over, And thought I found true love. 
You met another and Phht! you were gone  
I searched the world over, And thought I found true love. 
You met another and Phht! you were gone...

Johnny Cash joins Archie Campbell: the only possible way to improve upon this perfect song.
 (Well, Johnny Cash or Devo. Or maybe the Mentors.)