James Gale Hills of West Virginia ( Phil Ochs)

All the news that s fit to sing could have been the late Phil Ochs motto, as well as the title of his first album on the Electra label in1964. The FBI, CIA and various other acronyms didn t like a lot of the news he sang He wrote some beautiful non news songs too though, and this is one of those although it does contain some social comment in passing. Phil had a bit of a raw deal from life one way and another and he committed suicide in 1976. I met him briefly a couple of times in the late 60s; he was a nice guy very genuine, with his heart in the right place.