Tom Petty - "Free Fallin'" (1989)
Will always be associated with Jerry Maguire after Tom Cruise fails to sing along to "Bitch" by The Rolling Stones, "Angel of the Morning" by Merrilee Rush, and Gram Parsons' "She", he finally celebrates by singing this song at the top of his lungs.
Tom Petty and the Hearbreakers had recorded several successful albums, and Petty had not planed to go solo at all, but in 1988 he joined supergroup the Traveling Wilburys. One of the people he worked with was Jeff Lynne, songwriter, singer, and record producer most associated with the Electric Light Orchestra. Petty and Lynn wrote some songs together after they recorded the first Traveling Wilburys album and Petty decided that they didn't sound like 'Heartbreaker' tunes, so he decided to do a solo album. Most of the members of his band did record something for the album, but it started a rift that took some time to eventually clear the band. Adding ELO's Lynn on songwriting and producing duties means the entire album Full Moon Fever has a smoother sound, with more layers and less of the rougher sound of early Petty.
The jangling guitars almost never stop in the whole song, they provided the dreamy cloud that the rest of the song sits on. Even the verse with the military snare drum has the guitars under it. The bass is slow and you can hear it bend from one note up to the other, which just adds to the dream like effect of the song. The lyrics are dream like as well. The first verse describes an 'American Dream Girl' who loves horses, her boyfriend and Jesus. Later in the song petty sings of vampires living in the San Fernando Valley, and gliding and falling into the sky. There are many layers of backing vocals, chanting and adding texture, all of which leads me to the conclusion that the whole song is about the American Dream, and how it's all kind of a dream in Los Angeles.
Monday, May 28, 2012
Sunday, May 27, 2012
"Et moi et moi et moi"
Jacques Dutronc - "Et moit et moit et moi" (1966)
Jacques Dutronc wrote music for a number of Ye-Ye singers in the early 60s including Françoise Hardy before finding his own voice in the mid sixties. In a interesting twist, Hardy and Dutronc married in the early 80s and have a son who is a French Jazz guitarist.
The lyrics are more like a poem than a song. There is no chorus per se, there are 9 verses each following a pattern. the last two lines of each could be considered a chorus because they are the same, but they are really sung like they are part of the verse, so I don't really consider them a chorus. Each verse or stanza starts by mentioning how many there are of a specific group of people: three hundred million Soviets, nine hundred million hungry people, five hundred million Martians, etc. Then 'Et moit et moit et moi' which is basically 'and me and me and me'. Then two lines that are about the singer that are only tangentially related to the specific group of people. The last two lines of the verse are the ones that are repeated. 'I am thinking about it, and then I forget it/That's life, that's life' (Lanzman/Dutronc). Musically the song is flat out an electric folk kind of song, reminiscent of Bob Dylan. Even the wry vocal style makes him sound like a folky Dylan. Jangly guitars and almost no bass guitar, heavy on the bass drum and just chugging along like a little train. British rock band Mungo Jerry had a hit with "Alright, Alright, Alright" in 1973 which is sort of an English language adaptation, but instead of wry humor and self deprecating humor about folk music, it's just a straight ahead tune with a pretty good guitar solo.
Jacques Dutronc wrote music for a number of Ye-Ye singers in the early 60s including Françoise Hardy before finding his own voice in the mid sixties. In a interesting twist, Hardy and Dutronc married in the early 80s and have a son who is a French Jazz guitarist.
The lyrics are more like a poem than a song. There is no chorus per se, there are 9 verses each following a pattern. the last two lines of each could be considered a chorus because they are the same, but they are really sung like they are part of the verse, so I don't really consider them a chorus. Each verse or stanza starts by mentioning how many there are of a specific group of people: three hundred million Soviets, nine hundred million hungry people, five hundred million Martians, etc. Then 'Et moit et moit et moi' which is basically 'and me and me and me'. Then two lines that are about the singer that are only tangentially related to the specific group of people. The last two lines of the verse are the ones that are repeated. 'I am thinking about it, and then I forget it/That's life, that's life' (Lanzman/Dutronc). Musically the song is flat out an electric folk kind of song, reminiscent of Bob Dylan. Even the wry vocal style makes him sound like a folky Dylan. Jangly guitars and almost no bass guitar, heavy on the bass drum and just chugging along like a little train. British rock band Mungo Jerry had a hit with "Alright, Alright, Alright" in 1973 which is sort of an English language adaptation, but instead of wry humor and self deprecating humor about folk music, it's just a straight ahead tune with a pretty good guitar solo.
Saturday, May 26, 2012
"Kings of the Wild Frontier"
Adam & The Ants - "Kings of the Wild Frontier" (1980)
Adam Ant was born Stuart Leslie Goddard. Not as big a mouthful as Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner, but I think we can forgive him for wanting a stage name.
Interesting song, You've got African style drums, masquerading as Native American drums. You've got guitars that are twangy, so they evoke the country sound and more specifically, the western movie genre sound. then you've got war whoops and lyrics about family, nobility, war cries and 'redskins'. Not exactly politically correct, but for a British band from the 80s gosh darn it they were trying to bring attention to something. They actually used two drummers on this album, one of whom, Chris Hughes, produced the record. The whole guitar sound, crashing down loudly over the drums makes this track much louder and impressive than I expected going into a track from the band before Adam Ant went solo.
So a little history on that. Adam & The Ants were founded in 1977 and had some minor success live, while never achieving much success on record sales. In January of 1980 the band's manager Malcolm McLaren (who had managed the Sex Pistols) convinced the whole band, minus vocalist Adam Ant, to quit and be the basis for a new band, Bow Wow Wow, to be fronted by a 14 year old girl that his friend had seen in a dry cleaner. Adam put together a new band, recorded a new album, and released Kings of the Wild Frontier, a big hit. Just two years later he went solo as Adam Ant, but continued to work with guitarist Marco Pirroni as a co-songwriter.
Adam Ant was born Stuart Leslie Goddard. Not as big a mouthful as Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner, but I think we can forgive him for wanting a stage name.
Interesting song, You've got African style drums, masquerading as Native American drums. You've got guitars that are twangy, so they evoke the country sound and more specifically, the western movie genre sound. then you've got war whoops and lyrics about family, nobility, war cries and 'redskins'. Not exactly politically correct, but for a British band from the 80s gosh darn it they were trying to bring attention to something. They actually used two drummers on this album, one of whom, Chris Hughes, produced the record. The whole guitar sound, crashing down loudly over the drums makes this track much louder and impressive than I expected going into a track from the band before Adam Ant went solo.
So a little history on that. Adam & The Ants were founded in 1977 and had some minor success live, while never achieving much success on record sales. In January of 1980 the band's manager Malcolm McLaren (who had managed the Sex Pistols) convinced the whole band, minus vocalist Adam Ant, to quit and be the basis for a new band, Bow Wow Wow, to be fronted by a 14 year old girl that his friend had seen in a dry cleaner. Adam put together a new band, recorded a new album, and released Kings of the Wild Frontier, a big hit. Just two years later he went solo as Adam Ant, but continued to work with guitarist Marco Pirroni as a co-songwriter.
Friday, May 25, 2012
"Don't Want to Know If You Are Lonely"
Hüsker Dü - "Don't Want to Know If You Are Lonely" (1986)
Bassist Greg Norton had a great mustache.
The band that started as punks and then evolved into a genre that was hard to describe. They broke up in 1988 as one of the most well respected performers of 'college rock' a genre that is cited as a jumping off point for the 'alternative' scene that dominated music in the 90s and 00s. Hüsker Dü was named after a board game, but with umlauts. Actually the story goes that they couldn't remember the lyrics to "Psycho Killer" and so just started saying random phrases in foreign languages and one of them said Hūsker Dū, which was a kids game mildly popular in the 60s and 70s. They fired their keyboardist during their first show and remained a trio from that moment on. Guitarist Mould and Drummer Hart shared production duties and each individually wrote and sang songs for every album. This song is Hart's.
The lead single for their major label debut, the song had a lot of pressure on it at the time, but over 25 years later, we can just listen and hear the music. It's definitely rooted in punk, the fast tempo, the screeching guitar, and the rolling drum breaks. But the guitar also has some great layered moments in the solo. There's more than a few overdubs going on, and the final squeal sounds like something a metal band would end a solo with instead of a punk outfit. Lyrically the song is classic tortured male. He's broken up with someone and doesn't want to know if she's lonely, but wants to know if she's alright. He doesn't want to hear from her friends, but wants them to leave a message. For my money the best line comes right at the end of the opening verse "/It reassures me just to know that you're okay/But I don't want you to go on needing me this way" (Hart). He needs reassuring that she's OK, but she's the one that needs him? It's a classic way of dealing with the pain of a breakup, and I think we've all been there. That 's what makes the song a good one, we can relate.
Bassist Greg Norton had a great mustache.
The band that started as punks and then evolved into a genre that was hard to describe. They broke up in 1988 as one of the most well respected performers of 'college rock' a genre that is cited as a jumping off point for the 'alternative' scene that dominated music in the 90s and 00s. Hüsker Dü was named after a board game, but with umlauts. Actually the story goes that they couldn't remember the lyrics to "Psycho Killer" and so just started saying random phrases in foreign languages and one of them said Hūsker Dū, which was a kids game mildly popular in the 60s and 70s. They fired their keyboardist during their first show and remained a trio from that moment on. Guitarist Mould and Drummer Hart shared production duties and each individually wrote and sang songs for every album. This song is Hart's.
The lead single for their major label debut, the song had a lot of pressure on it at the time, but over 25 years later, we can just listen and hear the music. It's definitely rooted in punk, the fast tempo, the screeching guitar, and the rolling drum breaks. But the guitar also has some great layered moments in the solo. There's more than a few overdubs going on, and the final squeal sounds like something a metal band would end a solo with instead of a punk outfit. Lyrically the song is classic tortured male. He's broken up with someone and doesn't want to know if she's lonely, but wants to know if she's alright. He doesn't want to hear from her friends, but wants them to leave a message. For my money the best line comes right at the end of the opening verse "/It reassures me just to know that you're okay/But I don't want you to go on needing me this way" (Hart). He needs reassuring that she's OK, but she's the one that needs him? It's a classic way of dealing with the pain of a breakup, and I think we've all been there. That 's what makes the song a good one, we can relate.
Thursday, May 24, 2012
"Doll Parts"
Hole - "Doll Parts" (1994)
We all needed this song.
Released about six months after the death of her husband, and Nirvana front man Kurt Cobain, this was the catharsis song that Courtney Love, and many American teenagers needed. Of course, it turns out that Love wrote the song starting back in 1991, before anyone outside of Seattle had ever heard of Nirvana, Hole, or Cobain. Hole recorded the song in October of 1993 along with the rest of the songs for their second album Live Through This. The first single off of the album "Miss World" was released in late March of 1993, and the album was released a few days later, but just as it climbed the charts, Kurt Cobain killed himself and the story changed. There was a lot of blame floating in the air, and a lot of anger. Fans wanted to grieve with Love, and yet wanted to blame someone for his unhappiness. Months later, soon after the video for "Doll Parts" was filmed, hole bassist Kristen Pfaff died of a drug overdose, so the release of the video and single was pushed back. When it finally was released, and we all heard Courtney Love crying and screaming about aching and loss it didn't matter that the song had been recorded a year before it was released, and more than six months after Cobain died; she was singing about him to us, and it was what we needed to hear.
We all needed this song.
Released about six months after the death of her husband, and Nirvana front man Kurt Cobain, this was the catharsis song that Courtney Love, and many American teenagers needed. Of course, it turns out that Love wrote the song starting back in 1991, before anyone outside of Seattle had ever heard of Nirvana, Hole, or Cobain. Hole recorded the song in October of 1993 along with the rest of the songs for their second album Live Through This. The first single off of the album "Miss World" was released in late March of 1993, and the album was released a few days later, but just as it climbed the charts, Kurt Cobain killed himself and the story changed. There was a lot of blame floating in the air, and a lot of anger. Fans wanted to grieve with Love, and yet wanted to blame someone for his unhappiness. Months later, soon after the video for "Doll Parts" was filmed, hole bassist Kristen Pfaff died of a drug overdose, so the release of the video and single was pushed back. When it finally was released, and we all heard Courtney Love crying and screaming about aching and loss it didn't matter that the song had been recorded a year before it was released, and more than six months after Cobain died; she was singing about him to us, and it was what we needed to hear.
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
"My People"
The Presets - "My People" (2007)
Oh joy, electro dance synth pop! It's like I won the musical lottery! Except of course the opposite.
As many popular Australian songs turn out to be, it is a message song dressed up as a pop song so that it is more palatable to the radio censors and becomes more of a ear worm for people so they think of it all the time. This song is about the Australian phenomenon of Boat People. Thousands of people leave lives of poverty and oppression every year in South East Asia by small boat, and travel to Australia looking for a better life. Most are caught and put into mandatory detention centers. The song brings to lights their plight.
The Presets is just about the best name I have ever heard for this type of group. So perfectly on the nose. The Presets is two guys, one on vocals and keyboards, and the other on drums and keyboards. It is all electronically produced noise, and a drum set, though many of the drums sounds are electronic as well. I find the obviously electronic sounds annoying and oddly out of time. Much of the high pitched sounds could have been made by a keyboard in an 80s British synthpop band. The worst offender is the sound that segues from the chorus into the verse. It's so dated I'm pretty sure I had a toy as a child that could make that sound. The lower pitched sounds that are replicating the sound of a heavily feedback looped guitar is less annoying. It's still not great, but it does give the song an angry edge that lets people know that the song might be for more than just dancing. The lyrics are good, evocative and really putting you in the feeling of the people that he is singing about; but the vocals are so processed and monotonous that aside from the repeated chorus I had to pull up a lyrics sheet just to get an idea of what he was saying. This is far from the worst dance influenced synthesizer driven song I've heard, it does some creative things with some of the sounds, and the message is clear if more that a little covered up; but it's just so not my genre, I don't know how I'm supposed to feel about it. And if that wasn't enough, Will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas has stated that their 2009 album The E.N.D., which gave us the musically null "Boom Boom Pow" and the truly horrible and musically stupefying track (yes, I'm implying that just by listening to the song you become musically dumber - that's why I'm not linking you to it) "I Gotta Feeling"; sounded the way it did because he spent three months in Australia while "My People" was big on the radio.
Oh joy, electro dance synth pop! It's like I won the musical lottery! Except of course the opposite.
As many popular Australian songs turn out to be, it is a message song dressed up as a pop song so that it is more palatable to the radio censors and becomes more of a ear worm for people so they think of it all the time. This song is about the Australian phenomenon of Boat People. Thousands of people leave lives of poverty and oppression every year in South East Asia by small boat, and travel to Australia looking for a better life. Most are caught and put into mandatory detention centers. The song brings to lights their plight.
The Presets is just about the best name I have ever heard for this type of group. So perfectly on the nose. The Presets is two guys, one on vocals and keyboards, and the other on drums and keyboards. It is all electronically produced noise, and a drum set, though many of the drums sounds are electronic as well. I find the obviously electronic sounds annoying and oddly out of time. Much of the high pitched sounds could have been made by a keyboard in an 80s British synthpop band. The worst offender is the sound that segues from the chorus into the verse. It's so dated I'm pretty sure I had a toy as a child that could make that sound. The lower pitched sounds that are replicating the sound of a heavily feedback looped guitar is less annoying. It's still not great, but it does give the song an angry edge that lets people know that the song might be for more than just dancing. The lyrics are good, evocative and really putting you in the feeling of the people that he is singing about; but the vocals are so processed and monotonous that aside from the repeated chorus I had to pull up a lyrics sheet just to get an idea of what he was saying. This is far from the worst dance influenced synthesizer driven song I've heard, it does some creative things with some of the sounds, and the message is clear if more that a little covered up; but it's just so not my genre, I don't know how I'm supposed to feel about it. And if that wasn't enough, Will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas has stated that their 2009 album The E.N.D., which gave us the musically null "Boom Boom Pow" and the truly horrible and musically stupefying track (yes, I'm implying that just by listening to the song you become musically dumber - that's why I'm not linking you to it) "I Gotta Feeling"; sounded the way it did because he spent three months in Australia while "My People" was big on the radio.
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
"Gloria"
Patti Smith - "Gloria" (1975)
Produced by former The Velvet Underground member and all around award winning record producer John Cale.
It was about eight months ago that I saw Patti Smith live in concert. She was and is a legend, and really knows how to work a crowd, but I think I can honestly say she was not my favorite part of the show. Her voice was harsh and her self righteous attitude seemed almost like a put on it felt so forced. This on the other hand sounds real. Based on the Them song of the same name, penned by lead singer and songwriter Van Morrison; Patti Smith ads a bitter introduction. Simple chord progression and snarled lyrics are part of what makes this song, and the whole album Horses seen as a jumping off point for the NYC punk movement. But I can hear country/folk influences in the guitar and the storytelling. Them sang about a young woman who was coming over and then obviously spent time with the singer. Smith takes the same basic tale and gives it more depth, setting us up the city and the neighborhood, and then really letting us know that when she's sings:
"/Here she comes/Crawlin’ up my stair
Here she comes/Waltzin’ through the hall
In a pretty red dress/And oh, she looks so good, oh, she looks so fine
And I got this crazy feeling that I’m gonna ah-ah make her mine" (Van Morrison/Smith)
she intends to make this the most memorable night that either of the woman has ever had. The song seems to be wrapping up around five minutes in, quoting Smith's opening lyrics, but then the drum rolls, and the ecstatic guitar solo at the end performed by Lenny Kaye is the perfect announcement to the world that Patti Smith is coming, lock up your sons and your daughters.
Produced by former The Velvet Underground member and all around award winning record producer John Cale.
It was about eight months ago that I saw Patti Smith live in concert. She was and is a legend, and really knows how to work a crowd, but I think I can honestly say she was not my favorite part of the show. Her voice was harsh and her self righteous attitude seemed almost like a put on it felt so forced. This on the other hand sounds real. Based on the Them song of the same name, penned by lead singer and songwriter Van Morrison; Patti Smith ads a bitter introduction. Simple chord progression and snarled lyrics are part of what makes this song, and the whole album Horses seen as a jumping off point for the NYC punk movement. But I can hear country/folk influences in the guitar and the storytelling. Them sang about a young woman who was coming over and then obviously spent time with the singer. Smith takes the same basic tale and gives it more depth, setting us up the city and the neighborhood, and then really letting us know that when she's sings:
"/Here she comes/Crawlin’ up my stair
Here she comes/Waltzin’ through the hall
In a pretty red dress/And oh, she looks so good, oh, she looks so fine
And I got this crazy feeling that I’m gonna ah-ah make her mine" (Van Morrison/Smith)
she intends to make this the most memorable night that either of the woman has ever had. The song seems to be wrapping up around five minutes in, quoting Smith's opening lyrics, but then the drum rolls, and the ecstatic guitar solo at the end performed by Lenny Kaye is the perfect announcement to the world that Patti Smith is coming, lock up your sons and your daughters.
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