1990 The Steve Miller Band: The Joker

Another song to benefit from dubious exposure at the mercenary hands of a Levi's jeans ad campaign, 'The Joker' is a tune I seem to have known for about forever yet for most of that time I'd always assumed its title was either 'Space Cowboy' or 'Gangster Of Love'. Can't blame me for that, both are there in its opening "Some people call me the space cowboy yeah, some call me the gangster of love" and both titles appeared as songs in their own right on the 'Best Of The Steve Miller Band' album that I'd seen knocking around. It was only in 1990 and this number one that the scales fell, though my confusion would no doubt have given Miller a wry chuckle at my mistake; 'The Joker' is song as lighthearted autobiography and the namechecking of his own previous output is deliberate.

Casting himself as the eponymous grinning, sinning, smoking, joker, high on life and whatever he was toking, 'The Joker' to these ears is so achingly seventies and so achingly American post hippy burn-out as to border on parody. In it's good time shuffle and bounce I hear Matthew McConaughey's drug taking, high school girl loving (though old enough to know better-ing) 'David Wooderson' (from Richard Linklatter's own homage to the seventies 'Dazed And Confused') fronting Credence Clearwater Revival in an alternate universe.

Miller's casual drug taking and sexism ("You're the cutest thing that I ever did see I really love your peaches, want to shake your tree") may seem a tad objectionable and/or quaintly offensive to the more conservative, and maybe they are, but there's no malice or evil in his song ("I sure don't want to hurt no one") to raise it to the level of offence. Neither, to be honest, is there any indication that he'd give much of a shit what you thought anyway - 'The Joker' wasn't high art first time round in 1973, it's Miller poking fun at himself and encouraging his fanbase to join in with him at the altar of the Church of Slack, preferably with beer in hand. The recurring guitar wolf whistle is a joke too far maybe, but nobody here is taking anything too seriously and neither should we - it's a guilty pleasure, but not one you should be hanged for liking.