California Stars

Having first heard this song very shortly before we moved to California, it's long been one of my favorite Wilco songs—I won't claim it's one of their very best, but it's definitely got a very special place in my heart.

But this live version from a few years ago, featuring the great Jason Isbell guesting on guitar, is really something else. While, sure, it could have been even better if Isbell had joined in on vocals, even without that, it's a lovely version of a lovely song.

Until the end. Isbell plays a nice if occasionally meandering solo. But then impossibly fantastic guitarist Nels Cline—who's already played a sweet solo earlier in the song—joins in, and the two guitarists engage in an absolutely perfect dialogue, reminiscent of the end of "Sultans of Swing," if that were a meditatively melancholy duet. Absolutely the only flaw is that it doesn't go on for another hour.

Favorite Song Friday: Sandusky

I've probably listened to this more than any other Uncle Tupelo song. I don't know if it's their best song, but it surely is my favorite.

Wrote a Song for Everyone

Recently a writer I greatly respect wrote this about B.J. Thomas' rather pondersome, "(Hey Won't You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song": Goddamnit, another song about songs. It's not horrible, but please make this trend stop!

To an extent he's right. Writing a song about writing a song can be such a colossal example of self-flagellation that it can be hard to take. The song "If" by Bread ("If a picture paints a thousand words, why can't I paint you?") is Ipecac for the soul. "Just An Old-Fashioned Love Song" gets old...really old...after about 30 seconds. Donovan's "I Sing For You" is pretty and all, but it's just so...so...so Donovan-y. And much as I love Barry Manilow (and I do...I do!!!) one of my only real problems with him is one of his biggest hits, "I Write the Songs," is a song he didn't write! (I know, I know, it's still a lovely song. And one Mr. Pincus sang a cajillion times better than author Bruce Johnston ever could). I'm just sayin'.

But then there's the other side of that tricky little coin. There are some songs about writing songs that are just, well, that are just so damn good. "Dancing in the Dark" certainly touches on the difficulty of writing a hit record, not to mention having the right image and a sense of being that can make one happy. Suzanne Vega's glowing "Gypsy" ends with a promise to write a song for an an old, lost love somewhere down the road, and it works so beautifully. And at the end of one of his finest solo tracks (1993's "Things" from 14 Songs), Paul Westerberg touches on the subject too ("Things I can never tell you, down the line someday, you'll be a song I sing, a thing I give away.")

Not only does the idea of a "song about a song" work in these instances and others, it works brilliantly. It depends on the artist, I suppose. And the reason the song is being written.

With that in mind, here's a song about writing a song. But also about so much more than that. Done to perfection. By someone who possessed such a classic American voice and was blessed with such wondrous songwriting abilities, it's a shame this song isn't better known. John Fogerty is great and CCR was great; I don't know if they were ever better than this track.

But amazingly enough, this flawless song almost gets an even better telling from Jeff Tweedy and the magnificent Mavis Staples. Watch and appreciate: