Panama Red visits Joe Bageant in Belize

Panama Red, who has been traveling the world and making music for more than 40 years, somehow got the idea that his life would be more complete if he visited his friend Joe Bageant in Hopkins Village, Belize. The plan was to spend a week with Joe in Hopkins and learn something about the music of the Garifuna poeple -- and it was a good plan, with some bumps and detours along the way. Panama Red has written several great articles on his visit to Belize, posted on his web site, that are well worth reading.

In the early 1970s, Panama Red became Billy Joe Shaver's guitar player. He and Shaver wrote a couple of songs together, one of which was Bottom Dollar that has now been covered by 40 other bands. "It has become a standard country song," Panama says, "but standards don't pay. Hits pay, but not standards."

Then, Panama Red was one of the original band members of Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys. This was when he started using the stage name Panama Red. Then, while working on Kinky's second album, he heard Peter Rowan's tune, "Panama Red" and thought it would pass. Wrong. "The idea of Panama Red as an alias has so grabbed the imagination of the masses that there must be a million of us out there," Panama says. "But I was the first, I think, anyway, predating the song. No matter."

Here are links to four of Panama Red's posts about visiting Joe in Belize.

• Under The Blue Mango Tree: Panama Gets His Surf On And Goes To Belize
• Chasing The Inner Monkey Down The Mosquito Coast
• How The DEA Came To Belize And Spoiled The Party While Making America Safe For Democracy
• Panama Gets Down And Gets Down Down In Belize

In a brief email, Joe reports that he is doing well in Belize, getting healthy, dropping weight, and he says he is finishing another essay to be posted here in a week or so.

-- Ken Smith