Yesterday, I knew nothing of Tennessee Ernie Ford. But after spotting this old LP in a thrift store, I now know that he is the master of a certain facial expression, hard to describe in words, but encompassing emotions such as "WTF," "Huh?" and "Christ, not this shit again!" Religious awe is a possible explanation, but I soon figured out the true context: Ernie has clearly just seen his reflection in the mirror after trying out a new artificial tanning lotion. It may be said that these explanations are not necessarily incompatible with one another. This complex and multi-layered expression is now rarely seen in the wild, as it is the intellectual property of Dreamworks and may only be used in animated feature films. Ernie has several other noteworthy facial expressions.

Read more in Music at Boing Boing

⟿ Follow Rob Beschizza on Twitter.

MORE: music

More at Boing Boing

Ants and Stars: Bruce Sterling and Jasmina Tesanovic visit the Sardinia Radio Telescope in Italy

The Snowden Principle

obdan

or.. he sharted
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  That first one really does have vibrator malfunction all over it.
Anonymous

Wait 50 to 60 years and then see what the young people think of your favorite music stars.
Anonymous

He was the one afraid that Lucy was going to “vamp” him.
BookGuy

He’s looking bemused over Charlie Sheen’s latest antics.
mudpup

I like to visit history with music. Ernie Ford had fun with his music and his Tennessee persona. Do a search on you tube. Check out Sixteen Tons and Shot-gun Boogie.
kichigaijin

Gawd! Is it just me, or does he look like the love child of Slim Whitman and Ron Jeramey?
- burritoflats
  
  I don’t see Ron Jeremy, but I do see a bit of Ernie Kovacs in Tennessee Ernie. Those half-mustaches sure were big back then.
Anonymous

my good friend Max Serota makes amazing wood sculptures from record covers

for example:
Armando Manzanero has become a wooden person.
He used to be on an album cover.
Now he can live in your closet, giving you fashion tips!

http://www.etsy.com/shop/whylifeissogood

I know he has one of that Tennessee Ernie Ford record. Check out the rest!
phlavor

To me it looks like he thought he just saw The Light of Jesus but then realized it was just a regular old light.
Donald Petersen

Is it me, or is there a whole lot of Nic Cage in that first one?

Maybe one of the altos in his choir off to the left just hit the brown note.
- facetedjewel
  
  The brown note? ‘The theoretical infrasonic frequency that would cause humans to lose control of their bowesl due to resonance’. – Wiki
  
  Funny!
Don

When I was 16 and staying for the summer with my grandmother, I got a serious sunburn that basically had me in bed for two days. This was the album she played. Over and over. Impossible to escape as it bored into my brain. I can still remember the lyrics almost 40 years later, or, I should say, I still can’t forget them despite my best efforts.
glamaFez

The word is “Christlike”.
joeyjoseph

Speaking of looking forward to heaven. I was in Saul’s Deli in Oakland the other month, and they had this amazing album by Mort Sahl titled “Look Forward In Anger”. It contains one of the strangest facial expressions I’ve seen this side of the Mississippi. I posted a pic here: http://www.joeyjoseph.com/post/4029092977/what-is-that-face-angry-to-be-happy-with-me
Ultra Fem

“Shot-Gun Boogie???”
Slightly Askew

Close call on the Dreamworks, but this one is total Pixar. Mike Wazowski (Billy Crystal), in the Yeti cave, when he says “You’re on your own” in the movie Monsters, Inc.
Anonymous

My daughter, now 10, used to love listening to “Shot Gun Boogie” on Saturday nights on our local, read small Tennessee town, am radio station. We were flipping channels one night on our way home and found an oldies show when that song came on. From then on, my husband would call into the show and request it for her. So even the young ones love a little Tennessee Ernie Ford.
Godfree

In my humble opinion, this is one of the funniest BB threads ever. I wish we could upvote comments! To me, the top pic of Ernie looks like someone walked in on him while he was using the potty.

PS. Yes, I have kids.
Antinous / Moderator

Lucy picking crumbs off the table to convince cousin Ernie that the Ricardos are broke is one of the funniest bits in all of I Love Lucy.
Anonymous

I see Ernie’s ex-girlfriend telling him she’s engaged to the biggest bastard he can think of. Trying to keep a politely pleasant face while experiencing a wave of disgust and disbelief.
Mark Crummett

His tagline was “Bless your little pea-pickin’ heart!”
That always kinda creeped me out.
Anonymous

I dare you to watch the entire video and not have a soft spot for Mr. Ford . . .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwqWcn2gbTM
- igpajo
  
  That is an awesome video! I’ve seen it before a long time ago but it definitely brought a smile. That kids got rhythm!!
gwailo_joe

“One fist of iron, the other of steel

If the right one don’t get cha, then de left one will.”

TEF FTW
goblinbox

Funny, sure, but this is a Boing Boing-quality article? Really?
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  Boing Boing and ‘quality’ in the same sentence? What are you on?
Anonymous

What I always remember about Tennessee Ernie Ford is he seemed to sing a lot of songs about being poor and getting new clothes. Off the top of my head I can only remember “One Suit” and “Ivy League” both of which are pretty catchy and extremely silly.
Franks

Tennesse Ernie Ford was one of those people who always seem to have a presence in one’s life when one is growing up. Being a child of the 50′s Ernie Ford was one of those “someones” for me. I remember my father humming “Sixteen Tons” and seeing Ernie on TV doing his thing and hearing his famous saying “Bless your little pea-picken heart!” numerous times. I loved it.
He was a great guy and had a wonderful voice-proffesionaly trained by the way. As a child then I only truley appreciated who he was and what he did much later in life and I still do. It brings back good memories that I wonder if some of the present day “children” will ever have?

One last comment-please don’t profane a good man or religious music just because you can.
- robulus
  
  If you are referring to my comment about the Holy Mothers bazoongas, I just call them like I see them. Look at those images and tell me I’m wrong. Just look at them.
  - robulus
    
    Preferably, while looking at the images, imagine the sound first of a Holy choir of angels, followed by a Warner Bros cartoon dooiiiiiiinng!!! And olden days car horn.
gornzilla

I remember reading his autobiography years ago. Hell, maybe it’s been 20 years. He talks about going to church and the preacher started with, “Will all the women in the church please cross your legs. Now that the gates of hell have been closed….”
buddy66

He’s just realized he sat down on an Eskimo Pie.
Anonymous

My mum and dad had a copy of Ernie Looks At Love, which I always liked as a kid, but I absolutely have to find a copy of “Stares Menacingly Into The Distance” – sounds like a great LP!
Snig

He’s watching a scientist hose down a happy lady in a dress.
Anonymous

Is his hair detachable?

And (forthuluvogawd) what has this to do with Disney(corp)?
Andy

Ugh, his records are the WORST.
- boo
  
  Compared to what, exactly?!
robulus

He kind of looks like he’s had a vision of the Virgin Mary, and is just a bit taken aback by her massive bazoongas. In all of them.
CarnyTrash

He’s loaded 16 tons and this is what he gets.
dculberson

You had not heard of Tennesee Ernie Ford before now? I’m not making fun of you, I’m just surprised. To me, that seems like not having heard of Aretha Franklin. Shocking.
- yosemite
  
  “tennessee ernie ford” = 611,000 Google hits
  “aretha franklin” = 7,930,000 Google hits
  - burritoflats
    
    “tennessee ernie ford” = 611,000 Google hits
    aretha franklin” = 7,930,000 Google hits”
    
    Tennessee Ernie Ford didn’t star in a viral Snickers Bar commercial last year.
    That would explain the statistical disparity.
  - dculberson
    
    I thought this was appropriate:
    
    http://homepage.ntlworld.com/jonathan.deboynepollard/FGA/google-result-counts-are-a-meaningless-metric.html
    - dculberson
      
      Oh, and that was kind of my point: everyone knows Aretha Franklin, and I *thought* everyone knew Tennessee Ernie Ford. Apparently I was wrong, at least amongst the still-ovoid Brit-born gadget-bloggers, Mr. Ernie Ford is the lesser well known of the two.
- noah django
  
  seconding.
Don

I don’t dismiss his religious music “because I can,” but because it’s pedantic Christian propaganda which discourages rational responses to problems.

Liked him as a comedian, though. “Are you vamping me?”
Jewels Vern

Tennessee Ernie Ford was THE biggest corn pone character on radio until the mid 50s (until “16 Tons”) and then he switched to gospel music.

As for LP covers, people weren’t used to much in those days. Just the fact that it was printed in full color was considered a treat.
- grimc
  
  Blue Note album covers suggest otherwise.
JhmL

’tis the patented ‘embarassed gene wilder thousand yard stare’.
Gutierrez

Tennessee Ernie Ford: Suckerpunched
Zan

Up until now, I thought he was just an I Love Lucy character.
Grognard

I’m a big Tennessee Ernie Ford fan here. The album covers don’t seem very out of the ordinary with other covers of the period… But I’m biased.
nemryn

Look at this Tennessee Ernie Ford. Just look at him.
facetedjewel

Be kind, ya’ll. Rob is still just an egg.

What made Tennessee Ernie Ford noteworthy in retrospect for me, is that he enjoyed so much popularity as a bass singer. Usually the tenors get all the love and adulation.
igpajo

Makes me think of that scene in Fisher King where Robin Williams is describing how the Fairies came to him at the climax of a particularly satisfying crap.
Mark Frauenfelder

My mother met him in Moscow. He autographed a ruble for her.
- boo
  
  And I guess this happened on Valentine’s Day. and your Mom reminds you of it every year.
  
  Tennessee Ernie Ford was actually:
  
  Born in Bristol, Tennessee, to Clarence Thomas Ford and Maud Long, Ford began his radio career as an announcer at WOPI-AM in Bristol, Tennessee. In 1939, he left the station to pursue classical music and voice at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music in Ohio. First Lieutenant Ford served in World War II as the bombardier on a B-29 Superfortress flying missions over Japan. After the war, Ford worked at radio stations in San Bernardino and Pasadena, California. In San Bernardino, Ford was hired as a radio announcer. He was assigned to host an early morning country music disc jockey program titled Bar Nothin’ Ranch Time. To differentiate himself, he created the personality of “Tennessee Ernie,” a wild, madcap exaggerated hillbilly. He became popular in the area and was soon hired away by Pasadena’s KXLA radio.” Et cetera.
  
  I am seriously hoping the Wikipedia got at least most of it right.
  
  And to all the young cynics out there: your parents (sorry, -grandparents-) thought that this man was ‘cool’.
  
  And they still love you.
Anonymous

Kind of neat, Tennessee Ernie Ford and the Everly Brothers play the same guitar all at the same time. TEF seems pretty cool…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2q3eTObNiUU
Editz

Inspiration?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/telegraph/multimedia/archive/00661/news-graphics-2008-_661337a.jpg
Editz

Better:

http://craftwirexs.divby0.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Charlton-Heston-as-Moses-0011.jpg
Laura P

He was also featured in this somewhat ill-advised commercial for the coal industry: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1A146sANdg (it’s a real commercial, not a parody).
yosemite

My favorite is the arranger/conductor’s name: Jack Fascinato.

Ladies and gentleman, conductor and arranger Jack Fascinated!
justawriter

This seemed a bit like making fun just to be cruel.
Rob Beschizza

My guess is he was not a success in England! I was also a kid when he died.
Orpheline

Few things are so joyous as mid-Twentieth century album covers.. Ladies and Gentlemen, the Faith tones!

http://lpcoverlover.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/img_2317-498×500.jpg
- dculberson
  
  The one on the right looks like Jonah Hill if he lost some weight .. and shaved.
  
  http://www.topnews.in/files/images/Jonah-Hill.jpg
jphilby

Luckily for his family, he didn’t owe his sizeable estate to the company store.
burritoflats

Tennessee Ernie Ford was sort of the JIM NABORS of his day. On the one hand he would play the goofy backwoods yokel and then he was able to switch into an elegant bass/baritone singing voice. Once of his most famous roles was on a couple of episodes of “I LOVE LUCY” where he played Lucy’s nutcase cousin from the sticks. His albums are standard fare at thrift stores and garage sales, so he must’ve sold a heckuva lot of LPs.

That first record cover you’ve posted actually looks “squished” horizontally. In person it looks perfectly normal. Ernie’s voice is quite beautiful. Remember, you can’t tell a record by it’s cover!
warreno

Ford’s expression is one I’ve often seen on the faces of born-agains and other evangelicals.

It’s a cross between “childlike innocence” and “my brains have fallen out”. I call it being vapid for Jesus.

Mike Huckabee is another one with this look.

http://www.orlandoreport.com/profiles/images/mike_huckabee.jpg
- burritoflats
  
  One of the few things I collect are 60s and 70s family Gospel LPs (I have a couple of hundred) and “the look” is caused by a few things. First of all, the performers want to portray a sense of looking towards Heaven or gazing towards the Great Beyond…these performers wanted to instill a feeling of timelessness in their covers. Secondly, I believe there was more of an awkward self-consciousness in the 60s-70s when it came to portraits. Also, photographers of the day (and our day, too) encouraged more heroic poses than might commonly be seen today. High school yearbooks of 50 years ago also contain student poses such as Tennessee Ernie Ford’s and I think his covers are simply wonderful and mostly likely appealed to his audience which was mainly composed of over-40 women and serious-minded religious types.
  - warreno
    
    Fair enough, I suppose, about the “looking toward heaven”, though I’m not sure about the self-conscious thing.
    
    I’ve met people in real life who have that same scary, crazy, empty-around-the-eyes quasi-happy look, and it’s usually symptomatic of being “in touch with Jesus”.
    
    Oddly enough, the other place I’ve seen that look the most is among Amway distributors.
    - burritoflats
      
      ” the other place I’ve seen that look the most is among Amway distributors”
      
      Yes, Amway sales people and Mary Kay cosmetics distributors have that dazed look.
      
      People who use the Internet for long periods of time also get that empty eyes expression
obdan

having the good fortune of being named after a state, muppet character, and an automobile has given the man powers even beyond a golden voice
franko

my french neighbor rocks that same moustache. not many can pull that one off.

What is up with Tennessee Ernie Ford's expression on this album cover?

Read more in Music at Boing Boing

More at Boing Boing