OMG IS THIS A TRUE STORY? BOBBIE GENTRY - ODE TO BILLIE JOE (REACTION)

Comments · 1.1K

• TH

  @TheDivayenta · 4 years ago

  “ Pass the biscuits please” - apathy in the face of tragedy.    This Southern Gothic tale by her was so popular it was made into a movie!

  615

• JA

  @jameswaddell3348 · 4 years ago

  This lady has my respect 100%....She didn't sell out, and after the late 1970's....SHE DISAPPEARED!! I believe it was 1979 or 1980 was the last time she came out in public. She has been a quiet, do not disturb recluse for 40+ years. It's an amazing story.

  388

• MI

  @michaeltaylor8835 · 3 years ago

  She was one of the first female artists in America to compose and produce her own material.

  51

• TR

  @trentbobo4171 · 4 years ago

  True story: me and my wife celebrated our 24th wedding anniversary last May. We knew we wanted to go away for a couple days but had no destination. I told her to get behind the wheel and just drive. We ended up in Clarksdale Mississippi. We stopped at a restaurant to eat. A block away we heard some live music. Turns out it was a blues club owned by Morgan Freeman. As God is my witness, he was there that night to celebrate their anniversary. I didn't get to meet him but I was in the same room with him. We ended up in Greenwood the next day and found the bridge that Billy Joe jumped off. Moral of the story, take random drives every once in a while and just see where you wind up.

  386

• SN

  @snownurse · 3 years ago

  bobby gentry was a real story teller

  65

• SC

  @ScottHeasley · 2 years ago

  Imagine turning on your TV to tune into a variety show and trying to process this.  I was 9 years old when this came out.

  28

• RE

  @rebeccaphelps3196 · 4 years ago

  She knocked The Beatles out of the number one spot on the billboards with that song

  44

• SO

  @southernsass2937 · 4 years ago

  I STILL get chills...<br>After all these years.

  48

• LA

  @LadyGator1983 · 4 years ago

  History<br><br>In this song, a family finds out about the death of Billie Joe and shares gossip about him at the dinner table along with their other mundane concerns. Bobbie Gentry explained: &quot;The message of the song revolves around the nonchalant way the family talks about the suicide. The song is a study in unconscious cruelty.&quot;<br><br>Gentry later clarified that she intended the song to portray the family&apos;s indifference to the suicide in what she deemed &quot;a study in unconscious cruelty&quot;, while she remarked the object thrown was not relevant to the message of her composition. Gentry&apos;s writing was adapted for the 1976 film Ode to Billy Joe.

  196

• ST

  @stevehammond8393 · 3 years ago

  Bobbie Gentry, whew! She can tell a story, play guitar and sing while she,s sitting there just being Miss Gentry

  5

• IW

  @iwaly444md · 4 years ago

  As Gentry told Fred Bronson, “The song is sort of a study in unconscious cruelty. But everybody seems more concerned with what was thrown off the bridge than they are with the thoughtlessness of the people expressed in the song. What was thrown off the bridge really isn’t that important. <br> <br>“Everybody has a different guess about what was thrown off the bridge—flowers, a ring, even a baby. Anyone who hears the song can think what they want, but the real message of the song, if there must be a message, revolves around the nonchalant way the family talks about the suicide. They sit there eating their peas and apple pie and talking, without even realizing that Billie Joe’s girlfriend is sitting at the table, a member of the family.”

  77

• DO

  @donaldleider7382 · 4 years ago

  The song is beautifully haunting and raises more questions than it answers!

  95