Songs from the County Hell: The Devil Mixtape

Stay on the other side of the road
'Cause you can never tell
We’ve a thirst like a gang of devils
We’re the boys from the county Hell
--THE BOYS FROM THE COUNTY HELL, 1984

I admit it, I looked at someone else’s devil tape. It’s the only way to explain how Van Halen appears below. Plenty of better artists on that other list, but somehow it inserted that song directly in my head and now I can’t get it out. It’s ironic because that was an embarrassing mistake of a schoolboy album purchase, the first VH LP was, but now it’s come back to, ahem, haunt. Please don’t click the link.

Similarly, “Devil With a Blue Dress On” is included here for one reason only, and that’s the rare mention of a wighat. I’ve only ever come across the term here, in the Cramps’ “Call of the Wighat”, and in Tommy Tucker’s “Hi-Heel Sneakers”. Seems like something the devil would don.

The Pogues like to sing about the devil and about hell. They even use "Straight to Hell" by the Clash as their stage entrance music. "The Boys From the County Hell" could win the Grammy for Best Insult in a Lyric, should it ever be nominated:

At the time I was working for a landlord
And he was the meanest bastard that you have ever seen
And to lose a single penny would grieve him awful sore
And he was a miserable bollocks and a bitch’s bastard’s whore

Robert Johnson was the bluesman who was said to have sold his soul to the devil in return for talent – a talent which included writing at least three haunting tunes about his mythical benefactor. Jeffrey Lee Pierce was a California kid who I found unappealing – the way he looked, the way he sang, and the way he appropriated from Robert Johnson for his band, the Gun Club (pictured above with Kid Congo Powers, seated)—but in "Preaching the Blues," he (along with Ward Dotson on slide guitar) got a truly diabolical result.

"Handsome Devil" is one of the Smiths harder rocking songs; I’m pretty sure it was the B side of their first single. Morrissey would hate being on a mixtape right next to someone like Tricky. I don’t think "Hell is Round the Corner" mentions the devil, but Tricky (pictured, left) does a nice job looking like him in the video, while producing a song that sounds like it's coming from an underworld cave.

The Devil Mixtape

Devil’s Haircut – Beck
Devil Dance – The Devils
Race With The Devil – Gene Vincent
Friend of the Devil – Grateful Dead
Preaching the Blues – The Gun Club
Devil with a Blue Dress on – Mitch Ryder & the Detroit Wheels
The Boys From The County Hell – The Pogues
Whiskey You’re the Devil – The Pogues
Hellhound on my Trail – Robert Johnson
Me and the Devil Blues – Robert Johnson
Preaching Blues (Up Jumped the Devil) – Robert Johnson
Sympathy for the Devil – The Rolling Stones
Makin' Deals – The Satans
Handsome Devil – The Smiths
Hell Is Round the Corner – Tricky
Runnin’ With the Devil – Van Halen

Here’s a link to BD’s The Devil mixtape. I did not look at this list (which has four of the same songs) before I made this tape.