Song of the Day 6/5: Edgar Winter’s White Trash, “Cool Fool”

Here’s how hard up Trump is for acts willing to play his big birthday party for America: He’s enlisted Lee Greenwood, of “God Bless the USA” fame, to warble that 1984 hit again, as he has at various Trump rallies since 2016.

If Trump wants old white guys who sing and play saxophone (early in his career Greenwood played sax in a Dixieland band), I’d prefer he enlist Edgar Winter, who should appeal to Trump on the basis of skin tone alone – there’s nobody whiter than an albino. Winter also called his early-career band White Trash, the perfect theme for holding UFC fights on the White House lawn. The musicians were from Louisiana and East Texas, and their mix of blues, funk and boogie-woogie would fit right in with the down-home flavor of this trailer-park to-do.

On the other hand, MAGAts might be put off by the band’s popularity with black audiences. Part of the live double album “Roadwork” was recorded at Harlem’s Apollo Theater, where they kicked off their gig with this dose of horn-driven funk.

Alas, Winter disbanded White Trash in 1972, and a comeback is out of the question. Edgar is still around, but his co-lead singer and saxophonist, Jerry LaCroix, died in 2014, and guitarist Rick Derringer died last year. Given that the band was noted for its high-energy stage show, maybe it’s better to remember how they sounded when they cut this track in 1971, when it somehow made it only to No. 70 on the Hot 100.