18 Lovely Love Songs We Love to Love

You know. For Valentine's Day.

Here are our offerings of our favorite of the love song genre. Not all happy, not all sappy, but all indeed involving the "L" word. Our 18 favorites, to be exact.

Why 18? Because 19 would be ridiculous.

18) “Angel Eyes”—John Hiatt: This was the first dance for my wife and me at our wedding. Such a perfect tale of the underdog winning out. - DT

17) “Black Eyed Susan”—Paul Westerberg: What says "romance" more than a guy serenading a young junkie? Weird choice, I know, but the tenderness with which Westerberg treats the girl, while never shying away from the very real problems, gets me every time. And, of course, it's a lovely recording, suffused with that very late night/early morning feel from the very first sound. — SP

16) “If I Had $1,000,000”—Barenaked Ladies: Not-so-deep down it really is a pretty simple love song, all these things one would do for the woman (or man) he/she loves. And “I’d build a treefort in our yard; you could help, it wouldn’t be that hard” is just so adorable. – DT

15) "Martha My Dear"—The Beatles: Potentially the single most misogynistic song in the rock and roll catalog becomes instead an unbelievably sweet paean to the various kinds of love when you discover that Paul was (mainly) singing to his beloved sheepdog. Silly? You bet. But also overflowing with the kind of joy that can't be faked. — SP

14) “Because the Night”—Bruce Springsteen: No one said love couldn’t be desperate. This isn’t candies and flowers love. This is using your last dime at the payphone to desperately call her and tell her what you need to tell her love. – DT

13) "Wonderful Tonight"—Eric Clapton: Sure, it's overplayed to death. So what? Get past the fact that you've heard it a few hundred times more often than you'd have liked and you find a gorgeous melody caressing some of the sweetest lyrics ever, one of those few gushy gushy love songs that's not cloying. (And not just because the song's autobiographical and he was actually annoyed by how long she was taking to get ready when he wrote it...although, yes, that makes it even better.) — SP

12) “Golden Lady”—Stevie Wonder: “You Are the Sunshine Of My Life” is better known and equally brilliant. But Stevie never wrote a more beautiful song. And just think what a mouthful that statement is. – DT

11) "Freak Scene"—Dinosaur Jr: J Mascis seems to be one of rock's great misanthropes, which ain't no small feat. And yet this ode to his long-time, vitally important yet troubled friendship with bassist/singer Lou Barlow ("Sometimes I don't thrill you, sometimes I think I'll kill you, just don't let me fuck up, will you? 'cuz when I need a friend it's still you.") stands out as one of their sweetest songs, as well as the crunchiest rock and roll on this list. — SP

10) “The Luckiest”—Ben Folds: When you know, you know. Even if you’d never met, you still somehow know. Ben and his piano deliver the goods without lapsing at all into cheesiness. – DT

9) "Oh My Love"— John Lennon: The loveliest melody Lennon ever wrote—you heard me—set against an impossibly delicate musical backdrop, with his piano and George's guitar spun together like the most fragile gossamer, all married to simple lyrics that sound like an ancient Buddhist koan. — SP

8) “You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go”—Bob Dylan: Even when everything falls apart, love remains. “I’ll see you in the skies above, in the tall grass, in the ones I love” is a stunning sentiment. - DT




7) "The Heart of the Matter"—Don Henley: ...really? Don Henley? Hey, even a blind pig and all that, and in this case he found an Italian White Alba truffle. — SP

6) “Unsatisfied”—The Replacements: Sad as hell, to be sure. But you can only write something this lost and lonely if love was once there, and once meant an awful lot to you. – DT

5) "I've Been Waiting"—Matthew Sweet: In which the Brian Wilson of the post-punk era creates a simple love song that puts its hooks into your skin from the first moment and never lets go, pristine harmonies, funny lyrics and a searing guitar solo combining to perfectly encapsulate aurally the feel of new love after a long, lonely spell. — SP

4) “Woman”—John Lennon: Maybe not his most poignant love letter to Yoko (that would be “Oh My Love”) but it's his last one, and maybe his most direct. And that matters. A lot. – DT

3) "Two for the Road"—Bruce Springsteen: When Springsteen, long-time famous loner, invites someone along for the ride, you know that ain't an offer extended lightly. That the guy who wrote "Born to Run" seemed to finally be advocating for the deep-seated need for a partner ("I didn't see it coming but, girl, now I know it takes one for the running but two for the road") actually made me reconsider my plans for life. — SP

2) “All My Loving”—The Beatles: Sweet, pop, heartfelt and perfect. The Beatles have about 60 that would qualify for this list. I choose this one. – DT

1) "God Only Knows"—The Beach Boys: Simultaneously the most romantic and the most realistic take on love from a band still generally best known for their simple songs of fun, fun, fun. "If you should ever leave me, well, life would still go on, believe me." Bwah? No, no, no. That's not how love songs are supposed to go. "The world could show nothing to me, so what good would living do me?" Ah...there 'tis. Yes. If you leave me, I'm not going to just curl up and die, victorian notions and Harlequin romances to the contrary. But I might as well, since I could never, ever be happy again. Yeah. That. That's love. — SP

Favorite Song Friday: Weather With You

Favorite Song Friday kicks off today with a question.

Whither Crowded House?

Shouldn’t they have been huge?

Granted they came about at a time in the late 1980s when glam/Aquanet rock ruled the roost, but still, they had the pedigree and the talent to shine through any era of musical darkness.

For starters, they hailed from Down Under at a time when things from Down Under were pretty popular. Sure, Men at Work had already come and gone, but Paul Hogan had thoroughly (if inexpicably) enraptured America by this time with his “Crocodile Dundee” movies, and even something or someone called Yahoo Serious had broken out as a multi-media star. Australia and New Zealand, they were happening places at the end of the Reagan era.

That’s where Crowded House came from. New Zealander Neil Finn, the front man, joined with Australians Paul Hester and Nick Seymour (and later Neil’s brother Tim) to form a band that seemed to have it all. The songs were catchy and bright, and even when they slowed it down for the ballads there was an easy hummability to it. They employed Beatle-ish harmonies as few bands of that day could. They knew how to write meaningful lyrics—sometimes funny and sometimes quite obscure, they always fit in with the quirky sensibilities the band clearly felt at home catering to.

Hell, they even had an impressive past—the Finn brothers had been responsible earlier in the decade (and even a little before, I think) for post-punk forerunners Split Enz, a gonzo little band that traversed the lines between prog and new wave and was responsible for one of the most irresistible songs of the 1980s or, frankly, any decade: “I Got You.”

Crowded House’s eponymous debut came out in 1986 and it was among the first CDs I ever recall listening to. And I will insist today and tomorrow and forever that few bands ever began their recording career as audaciously as this band did, where from the very first moment the music begins (with leadoff track "Mean to Me")  Neil Finn owns the room, belting out with nothing else around him, “She came alllllll the way from Ameri, she had a blind date with destiny...” From that moment you began to listen, Crowded House was exciting and delightful and begged you to hear more.

It’s their third album (and arguably their best), 1991’s Woodface, that delivers to us today’s installment of Favorite Song Friday.

Favorite Song Friday – Crowded House – “Weather With You”

“Weather With You” is one of the most unusually structured songs I have ever heard. First and foremost it really is more like three different songs in one, and each movement is somewhat detached from the other. Which is not uncommon when listening to, say, a song by Yes (think “And You and I” or “Starship Trooper”) or something else in the prog variety. But a 3:45 radio-friendly song? Much more unusual.

The song begins with a vaguely Eastern tint to it, a loping and curious beat that doesn’t give much of a hint as to where the song is headed. Particularly once the cryptic lyrics start:

Walking ‘round the room singing ‘Stormy Weather’

At 57 Mount Pleasant Street

Well it’s the same room but everything’s different

You can fight the sleep but not the dream

The second movement section of the song kicks in with a much more deliberate signature, one that seems more in touch with the band’s new wave roots. Its one consistency with the first part of the song is something that quickly becomes one of the song’s trump cards: the airtight harmonies of the Finn Brothers. Even though the lyrics, again, don’t give much of a clue as to what is really going on.

Things ain’t cookin’ in my kitchen

Strange affliction wash over me

Julius Caesar and the Roman Empire

Couldn’t conquer the blue sky

The writing is really kind of exquisite, even if it doesn’t make much sense, with an interior meter and rhyme scheme that helps to build a tension that makes us truly curious as to what’s coming next.

And then, we’re back to part one, those Eastern inflections in the guitar line taking us back out of the more standard rhythm and into, yet again, more strange but highly enticing images:

Well there’s a small boat made of china

It’s going nowhere on the mantelpiece

Do I lie like a loungeroom lizard?

Or do I sing like a bird released?

The “Huh?” factor hits record levels as the Finns sing those gorgeous final two lines, and then, in astonishing fashion, the song instantly launches into the third and final part. It turns on a dime and brings us to a place where everything we have invested in this song pays off in spades.

The third section, which also serves as the chorus, somehow, someway perfectly resolves the first two by simply delivering to us glowing pop splendor. This final part, where the song’s title at last comes to the fore and where we will remain until the song is over, is a magnificent and soaring affirmation, with sweet bounding chords backing the Finn Brothers as they sing over and over again the same odd but, somehow, wonderfully fitting lines:

Everywhere you go

Always take the weather with you

Everywhere you go

Always take the weather

They sing the verse through twice, and then pause for some spooky instrumentation, before coming back in full tilt with another eight-line reading that makes “Weather With You” indelible and infinite. A final run-through of the chorus, first from Neil in near a cappella mode and then finally with the full band joining in, ends the song with an almost redemptive joy.

Again, the beauty of “Weather With You” is how all three parts somehow work together and ultimately blend seamlessly into a fully realized (albeit very much offbeat) love song. No answers are given as to what a china boat has to do with it, or where Mount Pleasant Street might be, or why we're involving Julius Caesar at all. But we don’t really need to know, do we? Because like with all great music, the finished product is all that matters, and we get it. Somehow through all the obliqueness and the stylistic irreverence of what we just heard, we get it.

A song like "Weather With You" (not to mention other magnificent tracks from throughout their career like "Distant Sun" and "Better Be Home Soon" and their first and biggest hit, "Don't Dream It's Over") really make me wonder why Crowded House wasn't bigger, why they weren't, say, one of the bigger and more popular bands of the 1990s.

But like the magic of "Weather With You," the answer is something we likely won't find. And likely don't need to.

“Everywhere you go, always take the weather with you.”

Sounds good to me. Whatever it means, it sounds so, so good.

R.E.M. and the "What If..." Game

What if Elvis sought help in 1970 or so and was able to live as long a life as a recording artist as, say, Johnny Cash?

What if Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain had made it past 27? What might their music over the 10-15 years that followed have sounded like?

What if Buddy Holly lived to see 23?

What if the Rolling Stones actually acted like they gave a shit starting in, say, 1973 and running up to present day? Or at least through the 80s?

What if ABBA hadn’t made that deal with Satan and instead had focused on selling farming equipment?

And the biggee—what if John Lennon wasn’t killed? Would/could those rumors of a Beatles reunion have come to fruition?

It’s a fun one, to be sure, and can lead to hours of fun parlor game-type scenarios. What would that next Beatles record have sounded like, if they took the best of everything they were doing as solo artists? What would SMiLE have sounded like had Brian Wilson been able to keep himself together, or if Mike Love had been left in a shallow ditch outside Bakersfield in 1964 and therefore rendered unable to question, undermine and torment Brian for all those peak creative years? What might the follow-ups to Electric Ladyland and In Utero have sounded like? And on and on.

Here’s one Scott and I have kicked around. Not quite possessing the gravitas of a Beatles reunion or a long-lifed Elvis, but still, an interesting one.

What if R.E.M. had called it quits when Bill Berry left the band?

That would mean the band would have existed from 1980 to 1997, and would have offered a career discography of 10 albums, plus an EP (Chronic Town) and a collection of B-Sides (Dead Letter Office). It would have placed their overall output somewhere in the ballpark of The Who (pre-Keith Moon death ) and not far from that of The Beatles. It would have made for quite a full career, that is to say.

To many, including the two of us here at Reason To Believe, R.E.M. kinda did cease to exist as R.E.M. after Bill’s departure following the 1996 album New Adventures in Hi Fi and the ensuing 1997 tour. Yes, they produced some fine music (“Imitation of Life” is one of the best songs they ever did, and any band would have loved to have “Daysleeper” and “The Great Beyond” in its canon). And they always conducted themselves well in that they never short-shrifted the fans or, really, gave way in terms of integrity. They toured, they released albums and they kept themselves out there as an active, relevant part of the scene. All cool.

  

Two things:

1)     Once Bill Berry left they simply weren't as good. Tried and true and earnest and all the rest, but just never again quite as good as they were. They never produced an album without Bill Berry on drums that outdid or equaled anything they did with Bill Berry on drums. And Lord knows they tried—five full albums followed his departure.

2)      Pre-1997, this was a band, in the truest and rarest sense of the word – they were as fine an example of the “sum of the parts” equation any band that ever lived, including the Beatles and U2. (The list of bands that never changed parts during their full run—sorry Pete Best, but I’m afraid you don’t count—is ridiculously short). And R.E.M. made such an amazing effort over its career to focus on the band—every song credited to Berry-Buck-Mills-Stipe speaks wonders to that—that it really is hard to imagine an incarnation of R.E.M. that didn’t include one of these four members.

So. In this “What if…” scenario. Let’s say New Adventures in Hi Fi was in fact their final album. It would have been quite a final record, to be sure, as it was by all accounts at least a B+ effort, very possibly even higher (I for one grade it as a 4 ½ star album, using the tried and true Rolling Stone 5-star system, which would mean it’s right around A- range).

New Adventures represents much of the very best of what R.E.M. did; it can be looked at as a sort of offbeat career retrospective with its 14 songs. In some ways it plays almost like a “Greatest Hits" album made up of entirely new material, if that makes sense.

It had shout-backs to their early baroque southern gothic style (“Undertow,” “Be Mine,” and the piano on “Electrolite” even loosely evokes “Perfect Circle.”) It had the melancholic moodiness that came to define their early-90s sound (“New Test Leper,” “E-Bow the Letter”). It had glam-infused ragers that would have been right at home on Monster (“The Wake Up Bomb,” “Leave”) and guitar-heavy windups that easily recalled the best of Life’s Rich Pagent (“Departure”). And it had the mid-tempo folk-flavored sound that, jangle or not, became R.E.M.’s brand (“Bittersweet Me”).

So as a parting shot from arguably the greatest American band in rock-n-roll history, it had it all.

And if we play this scenario out to the fullest…what if “Electrolite,” the final song on New Adventures, was the last we ever heard of the band?

Hold that thought for a quick digression.

Whichever way you look at the end of the Beatles career, either by the last album they ever recorded (Abbey Road) or the last album they ever released (Let it Be), no band will ever offer a farewell to their fans the way the Fab 4 did. Whether it was John remarking at the end of “Get Back” that “we hope we passed the audition,” or the entire band joining behind Paul at the end of “The End” for “And in the end the love you take is equal to the love to make,” a more perfect or poignant departure will never be offered. It’s just not possible.

R.E.M. would have come close, though, with "Electrolite."

20^th Century go to sleep

Really deep—we won’t blink

Your eyes are burning holes through me

I’m not scared

I’m outta here

That’s how “Electrolite” ends.

Imagine if that was the last we ever heard of R.E.M. Bidding farewell to the century that made them, announcing in their always cool and somewhat oblique way that they are not of the next century, that’s it's been real but…bye y’all. We're outta here.

It almost seems by design to be intended that way. Michael Stipe repeats the final line, sans band, at the very end—“I’m outta here,” his voice echoing alone in the studio.

Not at all unlike the way things started more than a decade earlier, when "Radio Free Europe" opened up Murmur and introduced R.E.M. to the world with a two word declaration,  “Decide yourself.” The first echoey words we ever heard from Michael Stipe, at the very beginning of the very first song of the very first album R.E.M. ever offered, were those. “Decide yourself.”

We did, of course. We decided we wanted them to stick around for a long, long while.

R.E.M. bucked convention for its entire career. From the early muted lyrics to the ending that came 31 years later with a press release (seriously, in rock-n-roll, who does that?), to crediting every single song to all the band members to eschewing band cover photos to never once being knocked off their trajectory of doing the kinds of music they wanted to be doing. They did things their way, from beginning to end. And that it indeed one of the most basic things we love(d) about them

But if a career that began with “Decide yourself” had ended with “I’m outta here?”

As Papa hisself once offered with his own unique ending, “Isn’t it pretty to think so?”

Favorite Song Friday: too late to turn back now

The mind goes strange places as you're drifting off to sleep. I was thinking of the song I was going to write about this Favorite Song Friday when one of the following songs suddenly popped into my head, the first time I've thought of it in quite a while. It led to one of the others which led to the final, the first time I'd thought about the connection between the three, songs I love by three different artists, two of whom I like and one I really don't. And now it's all this.

I'd never heard of David Ackles until a few years ago, when his 1972 album, American Gothic—produced by Bernie Taupin—got a rave write-up in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. Elvis Costello and Elton John gushed to each other on Spectacle, the EC talk show, about how great Ackles was. And it turns out Phil Collins was a huge fan, too, so what more recommendation did I possibly need?

I was so excited when I finally scored the album. And then it turns out he's not for me. He's very good, I guess, but when I later learned he'd gone into musical theatre after his recording career stalled, it made sense: that's what his stuff sounds like, like a singer-songwriter doing musical theatre. And since that's maybe my least favorite genre, it wasn't likely we were ever going to connect the way I'd hoped.

With one exception. "Waiting for the Moving Van" knocked me out the first time I heard it and has continued to ever since. It's still got that show tune vibe but without the big production, the lyrics are the focus... and, my God, the lyrics.

The front door has that noisy hinge I never did repair.
You used to hear it late at night and meet me on the stair.
Well, I work the daylight, now; I'm always home by six.
Now, there's lots of time and nothing left to fix,
Except the things I am trying not to think of while I can,
Waiting for the moving van to come.

The false bravado at the end, when he claims he's got so much to plan and do to get ready for his new life, when it's clear to everyone except him—and probably even him himself, deep down—that it's just a front, and that he's got nowhere to go and nothing to do and no one to see, is just heartbreaking. Because who hasn't been there? Even those of us lucky enough to have never really been there have been close enough for jazz.

The death throes—or, in the case of "Waiting for the Moving Van," the wake, I guess, maybe the sitting shivah—of a relationship is usually sad, maybe even tragic. But that doesn't begin to touch the horror of Okkervil River's "Savannah Smiles."

I like Okkervil River. I both love and hate "Savannah Smiles." Love it because, well, it's amazing. Hate it because I find it hard not to cry when I hear it—and I wish I were exaggerating. It deals with a father stumbling upon the diary of his daughter, home for a visit, and discovering to his bewilderment, shock and horror, that she's become an adult movie star.

Photos on the wall—she's my baby, she's my baby doll
Is she someone I don't know at all? Is she someone I betrayed?
It's a grey day in the fall and the radio's singing down the hall
And I rise to turn it off 'cause all I'm seeing is her face age eight 

My God, the ticking of the clock in the background and the melody mirrored on a child's toy xylophone as he desperately tries to figure out what he did or didn't do that could have possibly led her down this path is just...I can't even. I can't even.

And we're ending with the song that kicked the whole train of thought off, since it's positively cheery by comparison. Another relationship is dying or dead but this time the singer's raging against the dying of the light...or, more accurately, crooning warbly his resistance with the kind of nimble wordplay I normally dislike but which here seems wonderfully elegant and appropriate.

I haven't seen you in ages but it's not as bleak as it seems
We still dance on whirling stages in my Busby Berkeley dreams

The tears have stained all the pages of my True Romance magazines
We still dance in my outrageously beautiful Busby Berkeley dreams

Sure, he's lying to himself even more bluntly than the singer of "Waiting for the Moving Van" but he's doing it so darn defiantly and so gosh darn romantically. If a relationship has to die a painful death, best to paper it over with a fancy façade, I think. Illusion is what keeps us going, and sweet is better than bitter. 

We're #6! We're #6!

You were probably wondering, "hey, which blog is the sixth hit on Google in the Netherlands for 'bruce springsteen songs on infidelity'?"Well, wonder no longer: it's us. We are.

True story.

Favorite Song Friday: The Rake's Song

In rock-n-roll, the subject matter is not always clean and lovely. Of course it isn’t.

Because for all of the lovey-dovey splendor of, say, “Love Me Tender” or “Peggy Sue” or “I Want To Hold Your Hand” or “God Only Knows,” there is always the grittier, less pleasant underside that is so prevalent and so powerful on rock’s landscape it’s impossible to fully tell the story without it.

Hence “Gimme Shelter” and “For What It’s Worth” and “Revolution” and “Freddie’s Dead.” And “Like a Rolling Stone” and “Anarchy in the U.K.” and “Living For the City” and “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” And so on.

And there’s love and the darkness it brings with it. Jealousy. Obsession. Sickness. Rage. Maybe even…MURDER???? (cue scary music)

But seriously. In even the prettiest rock-n-roll people get stalked (“Every Breath You Take.”) In rock-n-roll people are beset with blind fits of jealousy that leads them to madness (“Alison” comes to mind, to name just one). And in rock-n-roll, people sometimes even die. And not cleanly and wussily like “Seasons in the Sun.” No, I’m talking rage-filled death like in “Hey Joe.” Or cold, detached murder like “Nebraska.”

Rock-n-roll. An American Killer! (cue music again…no, Scott, not the Benny Hill theme…fine, forget it!)

This happy topic leads us to this week’s installment of Favorite Song Friday.

The Decembrists – “The Rake’s Song”

If you don’t know the song, I implore you to listen to it and to admire its power and the sheer virtuosity of one of the most talented American bands to come along in years.

And I apologize for making you listen to a song about infanticide.

(Oh, and the video, I just noticed, is also the stuff of nightmares. Win-win!)

Not unlike (coincidentally, I swear) the choice of “Cannonball”  in the first installement of Favorite Song Friday, “The Rake’s Song” is propelled along by a thunderous bassline that dominates the entire song, this time courtesy of Nate Query. Colin Meloy’s acoustic guitar sits neatly on top of it as it pulsates three notes at a time, again not at all unlike the way Kim Deal does in "Cannonball."

The similarities end there.

Where “Cannonball” was, as discussed, an exercise in restraint, “The Rake’s Song” is a gorgefest of sinful malevolence. Everything about the song is violent.

Colin Maloy's nasal sneer has never sounded more sinister and downright sadistic as he does in spitting out the story of the evil and unrepentant rake, who feels burdened by his three kids after his wife dies so he decides to dispatch all three with brutal haste. Jenny Conlee’s Hammond Organ roars in at each chorus and cloaks the bass and guitar chords in evil grandiosity, the kind of sound you expect to hear when entering a haunted house. And John Moen, while remarkably restrained on drums at first, eventually hits them so hard I think you actually hear the snare say “ow” at the 2:02 mark.

The lyrics, of course, are all Colin, and represent the Decembrists at their high-English, hyper-literate best, telling the tale of a man who simply wants to live “easy and free” and is never bothered by his decision to snuff out his entire family. A sampling:

One can one do when one is a widower?

Shamefully saddled with three little pests?

All I wanted was the freedom of a new life

So my burden I began to divest.

Charlotte I buried after feeding her foxglove,

Dawn was easy, she was drowned in the bath

Isaiah fought but was easily bested

Burned his body for incurring my wrath.

Yikes. Someone has anger issues. And commitment issues. Despite his lovely taste in flowers.

None of this would work, of course, if “The Rake’s Song” weren’t so meticulously and exquisitely crafted as a standalone rock-n-roll song. It’s downright catchy, from the thumpity bass to the “All right, all right, all right!” chorus to the power chord-driven mania of it all. If it weren’t for the high-test rock opera that surrounded it on their wondrous 2009 The Hazards of Love album (something about a forest and a queen and bad people doing bad things…trust me, it works) you could easily see something like this falling into one of the Ramones' sets. Or Lou Reed’s.

It’s brutal and it’s ugly and its subject matter caused the band to be lambasted and vilified by the self-righteous faux moralist crowd who denounce the evils of rock-n-roll and Hollywood while doing things like cheering on American wartime violence in their next hypocritic breath. Fine. Good for them. Yawn.

But it works, truly. It works in the sanguine, subversive spirit in which rock-n-roll was founded—getting into those bad, nasty areas we don’t really like to talk about, but damned if we can’t sing about them. “The Rake’s Song” not only embraces bad behavior, it practically throws it a graduation party.

Shiny Happy Losing My Religion

I'm...having trouble processing this. This song is so ingrained in my DNA from hundreds upon hundreds of times listening to the studio recording, as well as dozens of live recordings, even scores of times playing it (poorly) myself. And then...this.

I...I...I don't know if I can do it... 

I  think I thought it's fascinating, the way altering the pitch of a just a few notes completely and totally changes our perceptions of the whole structure. Honestly, listening to this really does make me feel slightly woozy.

The results are even more dramatic, I think, if less intestinally-jarring, when it comes to Metallica's "Nothing Else Matters" and "Riders on the Storm" by the Doors

but since I don't have anything like the same emotional attachement to those bands, it doesn't affect me nearly as much. Still worth a listen or three, of course.

Favorite Song Friday: Sick of Myself

When DT first suggest Favorite Song Friday, I immediately thought, "you're an idiot." But, to be fair, that's only because that's always my first thought every time he suggests something and, again, to be fair, only because he is. (The fact that he's less of an idiot than I is immaterial.)

My second thought: wow, great idea. Love it.

My third: what'll my first favorite song be?

My fourth and last ever thought: duh.

When it comes to things I really love, it's not unusual for me to not know how I feel about it for a while. I rarely go from disliking something to loving it, or even from liking it okay to loving it, but I very often go from "I don't know how I feel about this" to "oh my God, I love this."

"Sick of Myself" is not one of those. It's one of those fairly rare instances where I fall deeply, madly, head over heels in love within seconds.

I loved the opening, the chicken scratch guitar count off, instantly. By the time the chord progression had been played through once, I was all in. When the entire band kicks a few seconds later, I was ready for marriage. By the time we got to the first line of the chorus I'd amended my will. By the end of the second chorus, with its cool extra line in the minor, I'd transfered all my earthly possessions. And after the entire thing was over—including not one but two false endings! two of them, for pete's sake!—I had my tantō in hand, ready to disembowel myself, if that's what the song demanded. Fortunately (for me, at least), it didn't.

I'm not exaggerating. (Okay, well, maybe slightly.) The first time I put it on the stereo, as the count off started, I remember nodding my head. When the guitar started, I actually said out loud, "oh my GOD." We were made for each, this song and I.

Everything about this song is amazing. The melody is irresistible without being cloying, the lyrics are clever yet insightful (an interesting and rare look at the way early infatuation can actually make one question one's own self-image) without ever veering close to the pretentious, and the playing is simply spectacular—including the incendiary Richard Lloyd playing a bitingly angular solo that would seem completely out of place in such a poppy tune, yet which instead manages to elevate the entire thing emotionally and conceptually.

I've listened to this song hundreds of times and I don't think I've ever been in any mood where I wouldn't be delighted to hear it. A song like this—or pretty much his entire Girlfriend album, an utter masterpiece—makes you think Matthew Sweet would and could have been heir to the Brian Wilson/Paul McCartney pop-rock crown, something which clearly didn't happen. At times that seems like it's a shame. But when you've got even one gem this flawless, well, that's more than enough.

Girls

So my six-year-old comes up to me as I'm watching the new David Bowie video.

"Why can't girls be in bands?" she asks.

I'm not thrown by this. A few of her three older sisters have asked this when they were about her age, so I'm feeling fairly confident I know how to answer.

"Of course girls can be in bands," I say. "You want to see some examples?"

"Yes, please," she replies eagerly, the unprompted politeness indicating she really means it.

So we pull up the YouTube and start taking a tour. We view some Kim Gordon fronting Sonic Youth, then watch Tina Weymouth driving Talking Heads, which leads to my viewing this utterly charming video for the first time ever and how have I never seen it before and doesn't it just make it all the sadder that Byrne left a band this great?



We check out Chrissie Hynde leading the Pretenders and then I go back and we watch some Janis and some Joni and the Wilson sisters from Heart and then first Stevie followed by Christine with Fleetwood Mac. By now YouTube seems to have caught on to what we're doing because the recommended videos in the sidebar are tending to be conveniently on point.

She enjoys seeing artists she's heard many times but never actually seen, such as Cyndi Lauper, Aretha Franklin and Kathleen Edwards.



Perhaps showing she's really her father's daughter—and, just as crucially, her mother's—she loves Shirley Manson with Garbage.



We've spent a very pleasant hour this way and it's about time to set the table for dinner, so I agree to click on one more video. She points to the one she wants. Barely thinking—clearly—just remembering that I always loved the song and haven't heard it in years, I click on it. Her eyes light up. Naturally, it's her favorite of them all. Long blonde hair, glamorous dresses and a pink guitar: what's not to like, right?



I am in so much trouble in a few years.

Favorite Song Friday

A new weekly feature here at Reason to Believe, at least for this week (no, I haven’t cleared this with the site’s co-founder, though I sense he’s watching me and quietly smoldering right…about…now…) will be “Favorite Song Friday,” where I (or we…or I) pick a favorite song every week and write about it. Simple, right?

And we’ll (or I’ll) try to make them less than obvious choices, just so we’re not always writing about, say, “Born to Run” or “A Day in the Life” or “Radio Free Europe” or “Fernando.” (Hee. I kid. Just making sure you’re paying attention).

This week, up first, one of my absolute lock-down rock-solid favorite songs of the 1990s.

The Breeders - “Cannonball”

In Almost Famous, in a deleted scene that ranks as one of the great cutting room floor scenes in movie history, lifelong friends and Stillwater bandmates Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup) and Jeff Beebe (Jason Lee) have a discussion that could have been a movie unto itself—they talk about the how the greatness of rock-n-roll, and all that we love about it, can be found in the subtleties. Or, as Russell puts it, “It’s not what you put into it. It’s what you leave out….That’s what you remember. That’s rock-n-roll. What you leave out.”

Hence "Cannonball" by The Breeders.

“Cannonball” is an unbearably catchy song, so utterly pop in form and sound. It propels along like a joyride on Josephine Wiggs' jaunty and unforgettable bassline and some awesome little fishhook guitar notes that the Deal sisters bend over the rhythm lines, with cryptically distorted vocals that would have made 1984 Michael Stipe proud.

But “Cannonball” is also brilliant example of what a song doesn’t need to succeed. What it leaves out.

Like guitar solos. There isn't one in sight. Just those great little hooks they occasionally drip in over the crunchy rhythm line, though even those are used sparingly, sometimes showing up and sometimes not.

And drums fills, which barely exist. (Only once, I think).

Or a bridge. Which doesn’t exist.

Or, really, much in the way of lyrics. As best I can tell there are four lines in the song, not including the megaphone-induced chorus so delightfully embeds itself into the listeners’ minds. Though even the sparse words contains a gem like "I'll be your whatever you want." And multiple references to someone being a "little libertine."

And there’s even more (less) in the form of some awesomely unique touches. Like the way Wiggs teases us with two five-note-intro basslines, only then stops and resumes and establishes the song's tempo in a different key. I don’t recall this happening that often in pop songs, if at all, and the result is so jarring and so irresistible that it adds one more delectable layer to the song.

There's also what happens after the 2^nd “verse,” which ends with the line, “The bong in this reggae song.” At that moment the music drops out completely, leaving only Kim and Kelley to sweetly harmonize before a fuzzed up runaway guitar explosion snaps us full speed into the chorus again. Only this time, the chorus starts with its second section first (“Hey now – in the shade, in the shade”) before finally immersing itself in the full glow of the chorus (“Want you, coocoo, Cannonball”). It’s a subtle changeup, but it’s there, and it adds a level of anticipation that the best of pop-rock always has to offer.

A third verse repeats pieces of the first and second, followed one final time by the chorus, which only comes once before the bass takes back over and the song ends, abruptly, on the off-beat. And that’s “Cannonball.” Three and a half minutes of strange and slightly unconventional pop that works to an absolute tee.

The Breeders probably didn't have the prime they deserved. Initially an early 90s supergroup where Kim Deal from the Pixies and Tanya Donnelly of Throwing Muses joined forces (along with Kim’s twin sister Kelley, Josephine Wiggs and drummer Jim MacPherson), but by the time Last Splash and “Cannonball” came out in 1993, Donnelly was gone, leaving the Deal sisters to do their thing. And after this song, which was huge on 90s alt-radio and huge on MTV, The Breeders never really landed a second punch quite like the first glorious blow of “Cannonball.”

But man. For at least one moment, they put out a song that was sheer perfection in pop structure, playfulness and, more than anything, restraint. And the result is just a great, great song.

Whole Lotta Helter Skelter

When DT and I did our Top 50 Beatles Songs, our most concise write-up was for "Helter Skelter." We wrote, in its entirety: "In which the Beatles invent grunge." It's a funny line, and a catchy one. And the fact that it's true doesn't hurt.

One of the interesting things about getting old is being able to actually witness trends. And one of the things I've noticed is fewer and fewer music fans seem to realize just what a rock and roller Paul McCartney is. He's well past the Wings period—and that, too, seems almost forgotten by rock fans these days, actually—and beloved, not just for his work with the Beatles, but as an elder statesman still bringing the goods live.

But—pace John Fogerty—Paul was the world's greatest Little Richard student and, with "Long Tally Sally," perhaps the only artist ever to cover one of Little Richard's greatest hits and actually top it. And when Paul decided he wasn't going to let any Who song claim the mantle of "heaviest rock song ever," he was a man on a mission. And damn if he and the lads didn't succeed.

But, as I say, even as music fans know the song "Helter Skelter" inside and out, it feels like the importance of it, and the sheer audacity, sometimes gets missed. Which is why pairing McCartney the vocalist (as well as, in places, Lennon the bassist and Harrison the guitarist) with the unquestioned all-time hard rock kings is a welcome corrective. Any vocalist replacing the ingrained-in-the-DNA vocals of Robert Plant has to be able to bring the goods.

He does.



Yes, she is. 

Why I Hate ABBA (Part 1, I think)

“I can’t do disco, man. I’d rather sell vacuum cleaners. They make better music!” – Dr. Johnny Fever, “WKRP In Cincinnati”

I don’t hate disco. Far from it, actually.

But I do hate ABBA.

Or, okay. Given that I am a practicing Christian who genuinely does try (and usually succeed) at loving his fellow man, I suppose I shouldn't (and therefore don't) technically hate anything or anyone.

So, okay, I'll amend that thought. When it comes to ABBA...how to put this properly...I...um...I...

...no. No. I hate them.

I was out the last night at a gathering and was talking with a couple of very cool pals before I left. We were talking about music and the stuff that did it for us. We mentioned all of our favorites and talked about what it was about music that pressed our buttons. Soulfulness, honesty, talent to be sure, connection with the fans, as well as that indescribable something that sets off tripwires in our brains and draws us forever to certain bands and certain singers. Certainly I've had many of those, one of which I wrote about it depth here a few months ago. It was a cool discussion, one I hope we continue.

But when we got around to discussing stuff we didn't like, I instantly offered up, "My absolute basement is ABBA. Nothing is worse than that for me."

They didn't object, but they were surprised. And one of them asked why. He was just curious.

And I...I had no real definitive answer.

I mean, I talked in broad strokes about how sanitized and phony it sounds to me, even telling him, "I'd rather listen to a truck backing up for three hours." I talked about how soulless it was, how squeaky clean and detached. But I didn't have that absolute locked down Grade A reason for it. Something like "They killed my whole family and left me alive to be haunted by it when I was a child." Or something maybe a little more harsh.

So. Why do I hate ABBA so damn much?

Hmm.

It's easier first to say what the reasons are not.

It’s not the super-heavy production. Hell, tons of legendary artists have had high levels of production gloss placed atop their music. Like, say, The Beatles? Or U2? Pink Floyd? Or Bruce Springsteen ever since he discovered Brendan O’Brien? And the results with all have been pretty amazing. So it’s not that.

It’s not that it's so wrapped up in disco or dance. Hell, I really like good disco. And dancing is good! I mean, no, I can't do it, and I dance like an arthritic goat on ice, but it's still a very good thing. As for disco, sure, there was a lot of slop offered up in disco's mid-70s heyday, but any moreso than all the lousy hair/glam rock of the late 80s? Nope.

And despite all the bad stuff, there were simply rock solid awesome tunes like "Don't Leave Me This Way" and "Turn the Beat Around" and "Jungle Boogie." Not to mention supreme artists like Donna Summer and Chic and, hell, the Bee Gees? No, no. The outright hatred of disco (despite Dr. Fever's noted objections above, which were obviously done for comic effect) were often rooted in homophobia and racism, and the blanket dismissal of it all (again, Johnny Fever made his comments in a sitcom for laughs, and plus he was a whacked out old rocker, so I'll excuse it) was highly unfair. So disco, dance music? No. Not why I can't stand ABBA.

It’s not that it’s pop. Again, weren’t the Beatles pop? Wasn’t Elvis? Isn’t U2? Hell, wasn’t REM and Nirvana before too long? All of them charted, and high. So no, it’s not that ABBA was so very pop.

It's not even that it sounds so...cheesy. I like cheese! (Scott doesn't, but that's just an issue for him to work out in psychotherapy). Musical cheese can be enjoyable and filling, if not exactly healthy. But take Barry Manilow. While my love of him isn't quite as far-reaching as Scott's (he knows Barry will one day come for him), I genuinely appreciate and enjoy Mr. Pincus. He's talented and he sings well and he has a good voice and seems to enjoy himself and seldom take himself too seriously. Cheesy can be good. Yes, it can be bad too (see Diamond, Neil).  But that's not the reason.

It’s not even the ridiculous costumes ABBA wore. Because lots of bands had ridic...

...

...

Okay. Maybe the costumes had a little to do with it.

All You Need Is Love

Watching the Christianist below, I thought of the words of a few noted philosophers. Not so much my normal standbys of "seventy times seven" or "turn the other cheek," notions so radical that virtually none of even the most dedicated of that philosopher's adherents are able to really follow them fully.

No, instead, I listened to this sad little man, and I thought:

Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. In the end, cowards are those who follow the dark side. 

Beware of the dark side. Anger, fear, aggression: the dark side of the Force are they. Easily they flow, quick to join you in a fight. If once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will.



Or, to put it another way: it's easy—all you need is love. 

Brand New Day (Please)

It will never make sense. Ever. It happened 60 miles away from me and 3,000 miles away from Scott, but I can say with certitude that it hit us both equally. Which is to say, it devastated us. And our families. And everyone we know. And everyone we don't know.

We pray. We try to give comfort where we can and find comfort where can. And we hope - we hope - that someday soon we do better. That we are all able to do better by our fellow citizens. We have no choice.

Tomorrow is a brand new day. And may it please, somehow and someway if only for a fleeting moment, be a better one.

David Bowie on the Pixies

I'm not sure I agree with everything he says here but I'd still pay a pretty penny to hear David Bowie talk at length about, well, pretty much every artist there is or ever was.

Looking at this and how damn gorgeous a physical specimen he is, in addition to his obvious intelligence and musical talent and sheer charisma, his absence from the public stage these many years suddenly struck me as especially ominous. He's going to be gone one day, hopefully not for a long time, but...but in the meanwhile, I hope someone's getting his autobiography out of him in some fashion.

And just because, here's Frank Black and the Thin White Duke getting fashionable. Of special note is just how much Reeves Gabrels shreds it here, and—in stark contrast to the late and not at all lamented Tin Machine—in a good way.

They're doing it over there but we don't do it here. 

Your Time Is Gonna Come, Loser

The mind is an odd thing. How many times have I heard each of these songs without hearing the connection between them?

The other night, I was hit with the urge to put this on one (along with the out-of-the-blue suspicion that my daughters would love it instantly—I was right).

The moment the drums kicked in, I started wondering what it was reminding me of. The vocals added to the mystery. But once the chorus kicked in, I got it.

Because I think of Beck as being part of the whole alternative rock scene with his emphasis on irony and collage, the incredibly obvious comparison to Led Zeppelin never struck me before, but both are musical omnivores whose deepest, most lasting bedrock loves are the blues. Layer some hip-hop beats, or Joni Mitchell-inspired acoustic guitar over that foundation, and the results can be gloriously transformative, bringing something new to the table while retaining the utmost reverence for those that came before.

You can't write if you can't relate and my time is a piece of wax. 

You're a loser, baby? Not to worry—your time is gonna come.

Frank Zappa

Scott recently sent me a post from RockTownHall.com entitled “Did Frank Zappa Actually Like Music?” Here’s the link.  

The point was yes, he was an amazingly proficient guitar player who attracted crazy-talented musicians to carry out his musical visions. But does it sound like he was really enjoying himself? Was he emotionally invested in it?

And I have to say, after thinking about it…no. I don’t think he really did. I don't he was as crazy about music as he should have been. And I don't even think it's that close.

I think he liked being good at music—he liked playing the guitar and tossing off killer riffs and creating intricate sounds with monster studio players. But with a few exceptions—most notably his earliest stuff with the Mothers of Invention—his music, while to be appreciated, always left me a bit cold.

Take the Joe’s Garage albums, no doubt one of his most popular recordings. At the outset he has three absolutely Grade A rock songs, bawdy and nasty and rock-n-roll to the core: “Joe’s Garage,” “Catholic Girls” and “Crew Slut.” And at the end you have a stunningly gorgeous piece of extended guitar work called “Watermelon in Easter Hay” that goes on for close to nine minutes and is mind-boggling in how moving it is. And throughout you have this dead-on statement about the evils of censorship. But in that middle 60% of the album(s) you mostly get sexual innuendo-rich musiporn. You get extended sophomoric jokes that only he seems to be in on. And it’s not bad—it’s just…cold. And it’s a shame.

Or take this clip from Saturday Night Live in 1978, when he first gives a monologue and then offers up soon-to-be-hit “Dancin’ Fool.”

Zappa comes across as 100% too cool for school throughout, starting with his cue-card focused monologue reading and extending all the way through this somewhat funny song. But rather than deliver it with the drollness we hear on the Sheik Yerbouti record, he delivers everything—monologue, lyrics, and particularly the interplay with the young woman at the end—with this clipped, detached, “let’s get this over with” level of apathy.

Zappa comes across as the eye-rolling senior at a freshman party, who doesn’t need to be there but keep showing up anyway, if only to point out how stupid this all is.

Which is a damn shame, really. Because holy crow could the man play. Check out the studio version of one of his finest hours, all the way back from his debut album Freak Out! in 1965. Yes, it’s got a social pulse—a rather hard look at the Watts riots of that year. But there is a soulful menace in Frank’s voice—save for the sarcastic “Blow your harmonica-phone!” at the end—that propels the song every bit as much as the thunderous bass and chaotic guitar.

He sounds pissed, and he sounds invested. Once more, the man had chops most could only dream about. He was an intelligent and thoughtful advocate for free speech and he attracted only the very best of the best of musicians for when he felt like playing. It’s just a shame we didn’t hear more stuff like his in the quarter-century of his career that followed. More music that sounded like he cared, rather than just reminded us how smart and talented he was.

Giving Thanks

With apologies to my family and friends, this year I think I'm most thankful to have discovered that this brave new world has such creations as this in it.



I've got to be free...

Such a Long Way To Go

If there was ever an award given called, "The Greatest Six Word Backing Vocal Line For a Hideously Bad Song In Music History," I think it would be this right here.



(I have watched this about 5 times now and I cannot stop laughing. The way he runs in there? The way he looks straight up at the mike and so earnestly belts it out? The soundless argument with the engineer? God SCTV was funny!)

Seriously though. Christopher Cross gets a backup singer as great as Michael McDonald in the studio to somehow help to help rescue this musical equivalent to a bowl of stale mayonaise, and all he asks him to do is SING SIX FREAKING WORDS???

What a waste. And how amazing is it he makes it in there for that final time? Thought for sure he'd miss it.

Bob Dylan and Election Day

For a number of years now I have tried to make it a point of listening to Bob Dylan on Election Day. Not that Bob (to the best of my knowledge) has ever really come out and injected himself into political races. But something about the way he writes, something about the universal iconoclasm of what he’s been doing for half a century just makes me want to listen to him when each major election roles around. It makes sense because even decades detached, Dylan seems to get the sheer brilliant chaos that accompanies this country around every corner. And on Election Day, for me, it works.

In 2006 it was just as personal as it was political. I was in my 10^th year of working in politics and I felt the oncoming need for a change. And the same time the country was starting to make a change as well; the Senate and House went back to the Democrats that night and the repudiation of the Bush/Cheney years was beginning to take hold. So with all of this going on I put on his transitional masterpiece Blood on the Tracks.

In 2008, knowing that full level of change was about to be realize with the election of Barack Obama as the nation’s first ever black President, I went lo-fi and obvious, listening to The Times They Are-A Changing.

In 2010, with things swinging back to the right and the Tea Party entering a period of full-bloom, I went back to Bob’s beginnings and listened heavily to The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan. The album is an odd but lethal cocktail of whimsy, nihilism and pure prescience, and I used it as a chance to re-ground myself in this latest new reality. And one song, well, stood out amidst all the madness of the day. “Down the Highway.” For me it was wistful hopefulness.

Well I’m bound to get lucky, baby,

Or I’m bound to die tryin’.

Alas…no. Didn’t help in the end.

This year I dug back into vintage mid-60s Bob again, playing bits and pieces of Another Side of Bob Dylan and Bringing in All Back Home and Highway 61 Revisited to get myself primed for the historic night. And various disparate lyrics stood out to me.

One struck me when thinking about voting and the absolute necessity of that right:

Striking for the gentle, striking for the kind

Striking for the guardians and protectors of the mind.

— "Chimes of Freedom," 1964

One about the President, facing his last ever Election Night:

Even the President of the United States sometimes must have to stand naked.

— "It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)," 1965

And even one about the challenger:

You try so hard but you just don’t undertstand

What you’ll say when you get home.

Because something is happening here, but you don’t know what it is,

Do you, Mr. Jones?

— "Ballad of a Thin Man," 1966

And today, with the election once more behind us and a decisive victory at hand, I specifically wanted to hear one song. One somewhat buried track from the magnificent Bringing it All Back Home.

The rumbling blues of “On the Road Again.”

Where Dylan captures the sheer indescribable madness all around him and wonders how in the hell anyone can put up with it.

I wake up in the morning there’s frogs inside my socks,

Your mama she’s hiding inside the icebox,

Your Daddy walks in wearing a Napolean Bonaparte mask.

And you ask why I don’t live here?

Honey, do you have to ask?

Your grandpa’s cane, it turns into a sword,

Your grandma prays to pictures that are pasted on a board,

Everything in my pockets your uncle steals.

And you ask why I don’t live here?

Honey, I can’t believe that your for real!

Well there’s fistfights in the kitchen, they’re enough to make my cry,

The mailman comes in, even he has to take a side,

Even the butler, he’s got something to prove.

And you ask why I don’t live here?

Honey, how come you don’t move?

That is the vibe I got last night from watching the returns come in and the Electoral Map got bluer and bluer, and Senate candidates who actually made lame excuses for acts of rape and called legitimate dissent un-American and allowed millions and millions of nameless, faceless “dark money” to be spent on their behalf with little regard for the truth kept losing and losing.

And I thought, “Why are they all losing? Why is America saying no to them?”

And my answer, inside my head? “Honey, do you have to ask?”