John Prine’s eponymous 1971 debut is a masterclass in songwriting, and “Hello in There” is no exception. The song showcases Prine’s ability to paint a scene with just enough detail that the listener can picture it (but not so much that people can’t envision themselves in the image). It describes the way older people can often become overlooked, introverted, and lonely as they age, something Prine describes beautifully in the chorus.
As John Prine would later recall in an interview with Paul Zollo, he had The Beatles to thank for the idea of “Hello in There”.
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From “Across the Universe” to “Hello in There”
John Prine played The Beatles’ track “Across the Universe” countless times upon its 1969 release. During his interview with Paul Zollo, the songwriter said that John Lennon’s voice was particularly striking to him. “He was already putting a lot of echo on his voice on different songs, you know, experimenting with his voice. It sounded to me like somebody talking to a hollow log or a lead pipe with that echo. I was thinking of reaching somebody, communicating with somebody, like, ‘Hello…hello, in there…’”
As a child, Prine always felt a kindred connection to older people. While helping his friend with a paper route, Prine would deliver newspapers to residents of the Baptist Old People’s Home. “Some of the people, I guess, they didn’t have many visitors,” Prine said. “And to their other friends in the home, you were like a nephew or a grandson. I picked up on that, and it always stuck in my mind. I guess that’s what it’s like inside any kind of institution.”
While thinking about the residents he met on his paper route, Prine began contemplating the long lives each of these lonely individuals had lived up to that point. “They’re not writers. But they all have stories to tell. Some are very, very down deeper than others. You gotta dig, you know? That was all going through my mind when I wrote ‘Hello in There’.”
Bob Dylan Helped Influence John Prine, Too
The Beatles’ “Across the Universe” wasn’t the only contemporary song that helped inspire John Prine to write “Hello in There”. Bob Dylan’s early work also played a key role in Prine’s songwriting. “I was a big fan of Bob Dylan early on,” Prine explained. “His song, ‘The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll,’ was a big model for me. I modeled ‘Donald & Lydia’ after that song, as far as telling a story and having the chorus be the morale to the story. A wider morale than what the story’s saying.”
Thus, the narrator spends the verses talking about Loretta, John, Linda, Joe, Davy, and Rudy. With each chorus, he reiterates the idea that isolation and loneliness become worse with age. And in doing so, he encourages the listener to call out, “Hello, in there,” to older people they encounter in their lives.
“You know that old trees just grow stronger, and old rivers grow wilder every day. Old people just grow lonesome, waiting for someone to say, ‘Hello, in there, hello.’”
Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
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