The Day Bear Bryant Died
On a wintry day in 1983, songwriters Buddy Buie and Ronnie Hammond were holed up in a cabin on Atlanta’s Lake Lanier, working on new songs for a possible Atlanta Rhythm Section album, when they saw on TV that Paul “Bear” Bryant, the legendary Alabama football coach, had died following a heart attack.
They stopped what they were doing to write a song called “The Day Bear Bryant Died” mainly for themselves, just as a way of dealing with the loss… yes, you read that correctly. They had to deal with the loss.
I suppose writing a song is cheaper than a therapy bill or a bottle of whiskey. But come on.. wouldn’t you rather down the whiskey? In any case, more than 23 years after Bryant’s death, their song is finally being released. And that song, boys and girls, is high comedy — if you’re not a ‘Bama fan.
Here’s a clip (and lyrics). While you listen, close your eyes, sit back, and imagine the scene — thousands of Alabamans pouring out of their shacks, trucks, and plantations to do a Hands Across America-esque vigil.. quietly swaying back and forth with candlelights and Stars and Bars flickering in the background:
I’ll never forget
The day that I heard the news
Bear Bryant has died
Funny, I thought he’d refuse
I watched as they laid him to rest
In ol’ Alabama
Oh, how I cried
The day Bear Bryant died
Buddy Buie & Ronnie Hammond – The Day Bear Bryant Died
Ya know, it’s not quite Don McLean’s “American Pie.” Actually, it’s not even close. But I have to admire the effort. After all – what have I written, right? Well, wake me up when Al Davis dies. The piece I pen when he’s shuffled loose the mortal coil will put the 1812 Overture to shame.
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I am a jaded, sarcastic girl prone to unreasonable fits of rage. This site is my outlet. I am not classy, nice, or fair. It's best you know that up front.
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If Bear Bryant REALLY died in 1983, when the song was written, why is the copyright on the picture of him for 1994? Just as I suspected… Bear Bryant DID refuse to die!
“Bear Bryant has died
Funny, I thought he’d refuse”
I just about pissed myself there. These guys aren’t serious are they??
Of course they’re serious AJ. The loss of Bear Bryant is the biggest tragedy in the history of the world to those people. JFK and MLK were just blips on the screen in comparison and probably good riddance anyway if you ask most.
Give it a month and this will be the new state song.
If anyone will refuse, it’ll be Al Davis. He’ll outlive us all!
What was up with the delay? Did it take 23 years to perfect this piece of shit?
“thousands of Alabamans pouring out of their shacks, trucks, and plantations to do a Hands Across America-esque vigil”–masterful writing indeed. I have been there..and lived to tell it.
All I can say is … DEAR … GOD. You people have no idea. Bear Bryant is referenced in other songs, such as the Drive-By-Truckers song, “The Three Great Alabama Icons” (which are George Wallace, Ronnie Vanzandt of Skynyrd fame, and Bear incidentally).
The Bear is the greatest thing that EVER happened to this state I currently reside in, and there is probably not a week that goes by that someone doesn’t bring the Bear up. During football season, I am talking multiple times per day.
It borders on pity, what I feel for them. They claim they have all this “tradition” all the time, when in fact their tradition is equivalent to Bear Bryant. Without Bear there is no tradition.
We should at least give them credit for actually knowing how to put pen to paper, right?
Hey Terry I hope you enjoyed this.
Go get em’ Flash
By the way, you got that drawing done yet?
FSU, what drawing?
A beautiful song and a nice tribute to a man of great character. Sorry some of our friends don’t get it. We have some great role models in the south. Bear was certainly one of them.
Sure, there’s a ton of role models in the south. Bear’s just the only one who didn’t have a white sheet and hood.
I was on athletic football scholorship at the University in 69. I was going to be redshirted in 70. I decided not to stay. My senior playing year would have been the 73′ Championship year. I don’t know much about Coach Bryant but from my two years there I bet he’d shit himself before he gave an iota of credence to this bunch of self serving profiteers using his death as a money making scheme. If they donate all proceeds to the University, then I’ll recant. I predict snow will be flying in hell before that happens.
Later…
rbiii
Speaking as a shack-dwelling, truck-driving, plantation-working Alabamian, I need to inform everyone that when Alabamians talk about Bear Bryant, it’s really secret code language for other Alabamians who understand it to mean “Tennessee Sucks”. It’s sort of a private thing that anybody else wouldn’t understand. Oh, and by the way, “The Pen”, consider this a formal invitation from all Alabamians, to get the hell out of our state since you don’t like it, and take your moonshine, banjo, cousin-wife and your inbred kids with you. You’re stinking up the place…the Bear says so.
P.S. Ronnie Van Zant is from Jacksonville, Florida you stupid hillbilly.
Yes, we barely made it back from Gatlingburg over the weekend where the snuff dripping off the car windows caused major pileups on the dirt roads but there were plenty of T(hug) orange flags to warn of the inpending hazards. At least in Alabama there is a variety of colors to enjoy, not just pumpkin orange. Come on, admit it, Crimson is so much easier on the eyes than that ugly orange. My God, someone from Tennessee criticizing Alabama is sort of funny from the land of Hee Haw and as far as the lizards from sand state go, I’ll take my memories of Coach Bryant, Wallace Wade, and Frank Thomas over cry baby visor boy, thank you. At least we had a football history before Steve Superior.