Twenty men had tried to take him twenty men had made a slip/Twenty one would be the ranger with the big iron on his hip

I was of an age where I had a record player as a kid, rather than a tape deck, CD player or mp3 player.  I had a couple albums that I played over and over. One of them had Queen's Another One Bites the Dust. Another was Marty Robbins' Gunfighter Ballads & Trail Songs. It had Big Iron on it, and I would play that, and El Paso for hours at a time.

(I still do that. There was a day when I listened to Amy Rigby's Like Rasputin over a hundred times. It's only two and half minutes long. It was at a terrible job where nobody talked to each other. I just put the song, on repeat and listened to it until my shift was over.)

It's a short ballad about an Arizona ranger who comes to town and kills the outlaw who had been terrorizing the place. Man, let's unwrap what I love about this song.

It's one of the few songs not improved in a cover by Johnny Cash.

I was already favorably inclined towards "rangers", knowing them from the Lord of the Rings and Dungeons  & Dragons.

The song always made me think of the cover art from Wasteland, which may not be a coincidence, seeing as the PCs are "Desert Rangers".

 
Wasteland inspired Fallout (my understanding is that they couldn't get the rights to Fallout when creating Fallout, so they just filed off the serial numbers and gave it a different name.)  Things come full circle with Fallout: New Vegas, where it's one of the songs in regular rotation on the radio stations. It happened to play when I was organizing the townsfolk to defend their city from some bounty hunters. It was very High Plains Drifter.

In theme, it very much reminds me of Snoopy vs the Red Baron, another song I like quite a bit.

I don't know if this song influenced me or if these traits were already present and that's why it resonated with me, but I liked the idea of an agent of civilization riding in to restore order. It seems like such a Will Rogers idea of capital D Democracy, that you're free to act as you please, but when you start using your power to oppress the people around you, someone is going to stop you. (Also, “I like to pay taxes. With them, I buy civilization.” Oliver Wendall Holmes.)

I hate modern country music, but I love this song and could listen to it endlessly.

To the town of Agua Fria rode a stranger one fine day
Hardly spoke to folks around him didn't have too much to say
No one dared to ask his business no one dared to make a slip
For the stranger there among them had a big iron on his hip
Big iron on his hip

It was early in the morning when he rode into the town
He came riding from the south side slowly lookin' all around
He's an outlaw loose and running came the whisper from each lip
And he's here to do some business with the big iron on his hip
Big iron on his hip

In this town there lived an outlaw by the name of Texas Red
Many men had tried to take him and that many men were dead
He was vicious and a killer though a youth of twenty four
And the notches on his pistol numbered one an nineteen more
One and nineteen more

Now the stranger started talking made it plain to folks around
Was an Arizona ranger wouldn't be too long in town
He came here to take an outlaw back alive or maybe dead
And he said it didn't matter he was after Texas Red
After Texas Red

Wasn't long before the story was relayed to Texas Red
But the outlaw didn't worry men that tried before were dead
Twenty men had tried to take him twenty men had made a slip
Twenty one would be the ranger with the big iron on his hip
Big iron on his hip

The morning passed so quickly it was time for them to meet
It was twenty past eleven when they walked out in the street
Folks were watching from the windows every-body held their breath
They knew this handsome ranger was about to meet his death
About to meet his death

There was forty feet between them when they stopped to make their play
And the swiftness of the ranger is still talked about today
Texas Red had not cleared leather fore a bullet fairly ripped
And the ranger's aim was deadly with the big iron on his hip
Big iron on his hip

It was over in a moment and the folks had gathered round
There before them lay the body of the outlaw on the ground
Oh he might have went on living but he made one fatal slip
When he tried to match the ranger with the big iron on his hip
Big iron on his hip

Big iron Big iron

When he tried to match the ranger with the big iron on his hip