Folk Legend Utah Phillips Dies at Seventy-Three

Folk singer Utah Phillips, the "Golden Voice of the Great Southwest," died of congestive heart failure Friday night at the age of seventy-three. Over the course of his forty-plus year career, Phillips often supported peace groups and labor unions, as evidenced by "Moose Turd Pie," his biggest hit in folk circles. Phillips collaborated with Ani DiFranco on two albums, the second of which, Fellow Workers, was nominated for the best contemporary folk album Grammy in 2000. Phillips also ran for U.S. Senate in 1968 and in 1991 recorded an album in one take about his anger toward the Gulf War called I've Got to Know. Later in his life, Phillips started a folk music radio show and even helped start a homeless shelter in Nevada City, California. Phillips is survived by his wife and three children.

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Song Stories

“Satisfied”

Tom Waits | 2011

Only the genius of Tom Waits could combine the subject of mortality, a reoccurring theme in his work, with wordplay that name checks both Mick and Keith, whom he calls "Mr. Jagger" and "Mr. Richards," and the title of their magnum opus, "Satisfaction." And to show just how cool Waits really is, he even got Mr. Richards to play along, one of nine guest appearances the guitarist has made on three Waits albums. "This growling roadhouse stomp is a late-breaking response to the Stones' greatest hit," Rolling Stone said of the track.

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