Ten Favorite Song Songs: The No-No Song (#10)

Tweet

I played like someone who hasn't played this course in a year. I came in dead last, but that's okay. We are back and better than ever! Meanwhile, I'm starting my countdown of favorite songs that have "song" in the title. Here's the song to kick it off. #10: The No-No Song - Ringo Starr Probably no surprise to anyone. I am quite the fan of Hoyt Axton, both as a songwriter and a singer. (His acting wasn't too bad, either: he had numerous bit roles [including Jennifer's jealous boyfriend in an episode of WKRP in Cincinnati], but his best-known role was as the inventor dad in Gremlins.) He wrote this song with something that was a recurrent theme in some of his songs: an anti-drug message. (If you didn't know, he also wrote Steppenwolf's "The Pusher"; and his great song "Della and the Dealer" has "the dealer" getting his at the end.) This song was perfect for Ringo. It has a lighthearted feel, not unlike a lot of the songs he sang lead on with the Beatles. In the song he has three encounters with various people who were in Columbia, Spain, and Tennessee, offering him (respectively) pot, coke, and moonshine. He refuses each time: "No, thank you, please, it only makes me sneeze, and then it makes it hard to find the door." With the light tropical rhythm, it may have been good for Jimmy Buffett, too; but we all know how he feels about those "indulgences." The No-No Song Written by Hoyt Axton and David Jackson Recorded by Ringo Starr From Goodnight Vienna, 1974 A man I know just came from Nashville, Tennessee-o: