“Pretty Good”: A Wry, Humorous, and Profoundly Human Acknowledgment of Life’s Mundane Realities.
There are songwriters who paint in broad, epic strokes, and then there are those who capture the truth of the human condition with a series of quiet, insightful brushstrokes, finding profound meaning in the seemingly mundane. John Prine was the undisputed master of the latter, a writer whose wit, empathy, and poetic eye made him a “songwriter’s songwriter.” His 1971 track, “Pretty Good,” is a prime example of his genius—a wry, humorous, and deeply relatable anthem that cuts through pretense to land on a simple, universal truth: that most of life, despite its ups and downs, is just “pretty good.” For older readers, this song isn’t about big events; it’s about the quiet, day-to-day rhythm of existence, a mirror to our own journey of accepting life’s inherent sameness with a shrug and a smile.
Upon its release as a track on his iconic self-titled debut album, John Prine, in 1971, “Pretty Good” was not a single and therefore did not chart on any major commercial singles charts. However, its impact was felt as a key part of an album that was a critical revelation and a foundational text for the burgeoning Americana and folk-rock movements. The album John Prine was a sensation, receiving rave reviews and establishing Prine as a major new voice. It was ranked as one of the greatest albums of all time by publications like Rolling Stone, and its songs became staples for generations of songwriters. The album’s commercial success was more of a slow burn, but it cemented Prine’s status as a formidable new talent. “Pretty Good” found its audience as a beloved album cut, a track that fans would seek out and cherish for its honest, unpretentious charm, and its ability to find the humor in life’s steady, unchanging pace.
The story behind “Pretty Good” is classic John Prine. By the time of his debut album, he was a Chicago mailman who had a side gig playing his songs in local folk clubs. His writing was born from a keen observation of the everyday lives of the people he encountered on his mail route—a rich tapestry of human experience that he distilled into song. The core idea of “Pretty Good” came from a simple, repeated conversation. The narrator has a friend who calls him up “twice a year just to ask me / ‘How’d it go?'” The response, “pretty good, not bad, I can’t complain,” is a refrain that we all know, a verbal shrug that masks a much deeper sense of apathy or resignation. Prine’s genius was in taking this small, universal interaction and building a poetic, almost surreal narrative around it. He turned a common platitude into a philosophical statement on the human condition.
The meaning of “Pretty Good” is a profound and beautifully subtle rumination on the balance of life. Prine presents a series of surreal vignettes—a girl from Venus with “insides… lined in gold,” an “Arabian rabbi” feeding “Quaker oats to a priest”—each one a wildly different experience. Yet, when asked “How was it?” the answer is always the same: “Pretty good, not bad, I can’t complain / ‘Cause actually everything is just about the same.” The song suggests that no matter how extraordinary or mundane our experiences may be, the ultimate takeaway, the net sum of it all, is a feeling of neutrality. It’s a comedic, yet deeply insightful, commentary on our tendency to view life’s grand dramas as more significant than they are, while Prine argues that it all shakes out in the end. It’s a song that laughs at the world’s absurdities and finds a quiet comfort in the fact that, in the grand scheme of things, our joys and sorrows often balance each other out, leaving us with a feeling that’s just “pretty good.”
For older readers, “Pretty Good” is a song that grows more and more poignant with time. It might stir memories of our own paths, the wild adventures and quiet struggles, and the realization that the final assessment of it all is often far less dramatic than we once believed. It’s a song that invites a deep, knowing chuckle, an acknowledgment that Prine, with his unmatched wisdom and humor, perfectly captured the essence of a life well-lived: it wasn’t a fairy tale, nor was it a tragedy. It was just “pretty good,” and that, he reminds us, is more than enough. It stands as a timeless and essential piece of his legacy, a comforting and honest whisper from a truly great American voice.