Baby I've Been Thinking

Annie Lennox, SING Public Service Announcement

2009-12-01T05:10:00.003-05:00

Annie Lennox's efforts in the fight against AIDS are longstanding and commendable. It's a privilege to share the work she and her nonprofit SING are engaged in: to get people in South Africa tested and treated for HIV, and to eradicate the stigma against those who are positive. Indeed, Annie is herself not HIV+, but her point with the shirts she's made fashion of is, So what if I were?

Thank you, Ms. Lennox, for fighting the good fight in often sorrowful times.

The Pointer Sisters, "The Pinball Song"

2009-11-10T13:12:00.003-05:00

Happy 40th birthday, Sesame Street. You were my favorite block to hang out on through most of the '70s.

And happy 11/10/09 to the rest of you. Here's a fitting Sesame Street tune for the date. Betcha didn't know this was the Pointer Sisters singing these pinball songs, huh? Molto grazie to the fan who linked them all together as one long clip.

Grass Roots, "Midnight Confessions"

2009-11-02T00:43:00.004-05:00

The Grass Roots, prefab though they were in ways, were underrated insofar as the product they produced. Some of my very favorite songs of the 1966-1972 pop goldmine era came from them, from "Where Were You When I Needed You" to "Two Divided By Love." With their double-barreled vocal pair and the highly unorthodox (to my eyes) drumming of Sean Penn dead ringer Rick Coonce (seriously, he plays the drums as if he's twirling a Chinese yo-yo), they came up with a lengthy string of trash-single (and I use that term lovingly) pop gems.

Of them, "I'd Wait a Million Years" is my favorite (and a topic for another day), but the most interesting is "Midnight Confessions," an admission of desire for an unattainable other, a feeling we've all had at one time or another. I've worn that T-shirt more than once or twice myself. My friend Mike called my attention to Meatloaf video vixen Karla DeVito's version, but I'm afraid I have little use for it: she turns a genuinely painful situation into camp, in an unfunny way (she's crushing on a guy who beat up "Weird Al" Yankovic for his mustache and glasses? Really?). Like Toni Basil without the gleeful overlighting, Jane Wiedlin without a mission, Cyndi Lauper without a tool to pleasure herself: Just somehow missing the point.

And that's more than enough parentheticals for one day.

Friday Funtime: San Franciscan Nights

2009-10-30T14:18:00.004-04:00

I spent much of the past two weeks in San Francisco, my former home and eventual home again someday. Said goodbye to one dear friend (R.I.P. Angela Welch) and hello to numerous others - some former co-workers and happy-hour revelers, some fellow music fanatics. Saw many of my favorite former haunts - neighborhoods, restaurants, bars, shops - and a few new ones too. Made my usual pilgrimage to Amoeba Music, the world's greatest record store, where I am incapable of spending under $50 once I get going. And attended the annual Bridge School Benefit concert, Neil Young's annual undertaking to raise funds for the Bridge School, which aids children with speech and physical impairments to learn and express themselves.

Here are some highlights from the Bridge show, plus a few of the things I bought at Amoeba.

1. Adam Sandler (!) and Neil Young, "Powderfinger"
2. Chris Martin, "Viva La Vida"
3. No Doubt, "Simple Kind of Life"
4. Wolfmother, "Woman"
5. Gavin Rossdale, "Comedown"
6. Monsters of Folk, "Man Named Truth"
7. Matthew Sweet & Susanna Hoffs, "Baby Blue"
8. XTC, "King for a Day"
9. Pet Shop Boys, "Bet She's Not Your Girlfriend"
10. Neil Young, "Comes a Time"

Beach Boys, "Be True to Your School"

2009-10-29T16:27:00.003-04:00

Damn if this isn't the most fucking fascist pop song ever:

Beach Boys, "Be True to Your School"

Of course, this comes from someone who's never been capable of being true to any school - a perpetual free agent, as it were.

Recap of recent San Francisco trip to come in tomorrow's Friday Funtime. Please don't mind my periods of silence here - I haven't had as many new thoughts of late.

Pop Argot

Jefferson, "I Love You This Much"

2009-10-05T03:36:00.003-04:00

Origins of the power ballad? Not really, and not just because "I Love You This Much" wasn't a hit. Jefferson (not to be confused with my beloved interstellar flying contraption), the nom de disque of former Rockin' Berries vocalist Geoff Turton, seems to have been rather influenced by Nilsson's "Without You," a more likely candidate as progenitor of the species. It's lightweight, but don't take "I Love You This Much" lightly: there's a thoughtful and poetic sweetness to Jefferson's longings, and the melody is pretty enough that you can easily overlook the lack of a refrain.

And that album artwork is simply perfect for the song: the serenity of domestic bliss as so many of us idealize it. May each of us have someone who loves us this much. White picket fence optional.

The Mamas & the Papas, "I Saw Her Again Last Night"

2009-09-24T14:19:00.004-04:00

That lyric really takes on an ugly sheen now, dunnit?

But ignoring John and Mackenzie Phillips' family affair, I've long wanted to repurpose "I Saw Her Again Last Night" to be about a closeted guy with a beard-girlfriend. And watching Mad Men a few weeks ago, when Sal daintily and diligently performed the entire "Bye Bye Birdie" choreograph for his silently horrified wife, I thought to myself: "To string her along's just not right ..."

Justin Hayward, "Forever Autumn"

2009-09-22T14:16:00.003-04:00

So begins another fall, and this message of unresolved and unsatisfied longing feels appropriate for a summer that never truly became summer, in a year when few dreams came true: "Forever Autumn," Justin Hayward's best work outside the Moodies.

Friday Funtime: (Rerun) Talk Like a Pirate Day

2009-09-18T19:04:00.002-04:00

Sorry, didn't have time to come up with anything new, so here's a rerun. Tomorrow is International Talk Like a Pirate Day; check out last year's observation of the day for some arrrrrr-tistic inspiration. Avast ye!

Pet Shop Boys, "Go West"

2009-09-17T11:23:00.004-04:00

It's September 17 again, the anniversary of my 1996 move to San Francisco, a huge event in my personal development. I've told that story on this blog before, so today I'll just offer a note of tribute to the West Coast. While I've been in NYC for 6+ years and figure to be here quite a while longer, it was in SF I felt most fully at home and most fully able to live and breathe as myself. So for those feeling dislocated today, I offer this simple bit of advice, rendered originally by the Village People but more effectively by the Pet Shop Boys: "Go West."

PS: There's lots of hammer-and-sickle imagery in that PSB video. Glenn Beck, you can go fuck yourself.

First Class, "Beach Baby"

2009-09-16T03:49:00.003-04:00

I wanted to get this beautifully executed Beach Boys homage in before the summer's over. As genre imitations go, First Class's "Beach Baby", a Top 5 hit from the late summer of '74, was a spot-on surf harmonizer - with the assistance of a bright and blasting horn chart - and there's something about the way Tony Burrows sings "the suntanned crewcut all-American male" that to me is downright sexy in its evocations.

Ah, for a weekend in Rehoboth Beach. From July to the end of September, everyone deserves to take away at least one memory of a beautiful body lying on the sand.

Jim Carroll, "People Who Died"

2009-09-15T14:12:00.003-04:00

Well, it was either this or "She's Like the Wind," and I'm not up to the challenge of reconciling Patrick Swayze's titular phrase with his observation, "she's out of my leeee-eague." I suppose the wind is out of my league too, given that we're different states of matter.

So yeah. Swayze and Jim Carroll - those are people who died, died.

The Beatles, "Revolution #9"

2009-09-09T13:53:00.004-04:00

Number 9 ... Number 9 ... Number 9 ...

Paul Anka, "Hold Me 'Til the Mornin' Comes"

2009-09-08T13:38:00.002-04:00

Last weekend I had the displeasure of hearing, in a Casey Kasem '70s AT40 countdown, Paul Anka's noxious "I Believe There's Nothing Stronger Than Our Love," one of his mid-'70s hit duets with the otherwise unknown Odia Coates. His swarthy warbling has always rubbed me the wrong way - I believe there's nothing flatter than his voice.

But Anka got a small reprieve this past weekend, when in a rebroadcast of one of Casey's '80s shows, I was reminded of his last chart gasp. "Hold Me 'Til the Mornin' Comes", his first Top 40 charter in almost five years, peaked for two weeks in the chart's anchor position this month in 1983 - and it actually deserved better. Anka wisely hangs out in the background, turning the show over to the Splenda-sweetened voice of Peter Cetera for the soaring refrain. "Hold Me" is really no different from the ballad formula Cetera was working with David Foster and Chicago at the time - you're the inspiration and a hard habit to break, so it's hard for me to say I'm sorry - and it's worth noting how closely Chicago stuck to the formula after Cetera's 1985 departure, "Will You Still Love Me" sounding uncannily like this one.

But "Hold Me 'Til the Mornin' Comes" had two other things working against it: the lyric, an attempt at having one's cake and eating it too, is barely believable; and it's very difficult for two men to sing a love-song duet without appearing to be singing to each other. (It's the Air Supply curse.) I for one would rather not picture Cetera holding Anka 'til the mornin' comes. But I'm glad I was reminded of this song's existence.

George Michael, "Killer / Papa Was a Rollin' Stone"

2009-09-03T11:05:00.003-04:00

Last year I used today's date as the peg to play one of the Temptations' very best efforts - not to mention Norman Whitfield's finest hour. This year, it's George Michael's turn to tell us what happened on the third of September.

Michael's merging in 1993 of "Rollin' Stone" with Seal's "Killer" was a winning combination, and sadly, one of the last times he exhibited any particular musical adventure and ambition. He's spent the 2000s in a drug-induced lethargy, seemingly only minimally interested in music anymore. A shame for someone who was once one of pop's most elite triple threats.

Neil Diamond, "September Morn"

2009-09-01T12:36:00.004-04:00

Although summer doesn't officially end for another three weeks or so, September 1 marks for me, and I'm sure others, the psychological end of the season. (Labor Day's never been a lively vacation weekend for me.) I'll cite another summer song or two before the seasons change, but for now, a way to ease into the coming autumn: Neil Diamond's "September Morn."

How fortunate a man Neil is: By this point, not only did he get to wear glittery outfits that a figure skater would scratch your eyes out for, he increasingly got away with writing material like this that demands only a speak-sing from a less-than-an-octave range. I wonder what kind of rivalry he and the more vocally gifted if less lyrically introspective Barry Manilow had going around 1980.

The Legendary K.O., "George Bush Doesn't Care About Black People"

2009-08-31T12:44:00.004-04:00

This weekend saw the fourth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, an ugly storm that revealed an ugly side of America. Our nation's slothful indifference to the needs of the people trapped in the region was nothing short of shocking, and Kanye West was right to call it as he saw it.

But the Legendary K.O. made one error in transferring Kanye's loaded soundbite to the song "George Bush Doesn't Care About Black People": they rendered the refrain as "George Bush don't like black people. That's not the case. I'm sure there was no personal animus from W toward African Americans. What Kanye meant - and what I agree to be the case - was that black people in the Deep South, being on the whole poor and uninfluential, were simply off George's radar; dull man that he was, he just couldn't conceptualize that there were actual people down there in actual suffering. Their economic and social status defined their humanity in his and his administration's eyes. Like most Republicans in 2000s America, the only people George Bush was able to recognize as people were people who were a lot like him.

Alas for George and his GOP cronies, it's a different world: Your neighbor may well not be at all like you anymore. Your sister-in-law may well not be at all like you. Your boss may well not be at all like you. And, yes, your president may well not be at all like you. For those reactionaries and John Birch-inspired fearmongers, I have but one word in response: Deal.

And the comic tragedy, of course, is that "not at all like you" is a fallacy anyway. Not that you could tell a modern-day right-winger that.

Friday Funtime: Philly Soul!

2009-08-28T10:47:00.002-04:00

While on a much-needed vacation, I stopped at a record store (yes! physical record stores still exist!) with the tasteful name of the Electric Fetus. (Well, at least there was no risk that the URL was already taken.) There, I got a marvy deal on a marvy box set: Love Train: The Sound of Philadelphia. Highly recommended for anyone who wants 4 discs of some of the '70s' very best orchestrations, melodies, and harmonies. For today's Friday Funtime, a sampling of some highlights:

1. The Delfonics, "Ready or Not, Here I Come"
2. Jerry Butler, "Only the Strong Survive"
3. Joe Simon, "Drowning in the Sea of Love"
4. MFSB, "Family Affair"
5. Billy Paul, "Thanks for Saving My Life"
6. The Trammps, "Where Do We Go From Here"
7. Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, "Wake Up Everybody"
8. The O'Jays, "I Love Music" (the L-O-N-G version!)
9. The Manhattans, "Kiss and Say Goodbye"
10. Dee Dee Sharp, "I'm Not in Love"

Steely Dan, "Pretzel Logic"

2009-08-19T13:46:00.004-04:00

Yours truly is going off the grid for several days, so no updates until this time next week. Until then, here's one dedicated to Brother Argot, who celebrates a birthday today: his favorite song, Steely Dan's "Pretzel Logic." "They say the times are changing, but I just don't know."

Diana Ross, "Last Time I Saw Him"

2009-08-17T13:10:00.003-04:00

My friend Mike has long suggested that the song was tailor-made for Helen Reddy - and Dottie West offered this minute-long tantalizing taste of what it would have sounded like in her honky-tonk hands - but the quaintly vaudevillian "Last Time I Saw Him" belongs to Diana Ross.

Well, her and the Electric Mayhem.

Friday Funtime: Woodstock at 40

2009-08-14T01:04:00.003-04:00

What does Woodstock mean to me, as someone who was not yet alive when it happened and who has never attended a music festival of remotely similar scope? Simple: Proof that such a gathering can be done. When we find ourselves isolated from our neighbors, our families, our cow orkers, we can remind ourselves that occasionally there are moments when more than a few - say, a hundred-thousand-plus - find themselves not isolated, not alone at all, for three days of peace and music.

It can happen.

PS: My gratitude to the kind people who made these clips available for us.

1. Richie Havens, "Freedom / Motherless Child"
2. Arlo Guthrie, "Coming Into Los Angeles"
3. Santana, "Soul Sacrifice"
4. Jimi Hendrix, "Purple Haze"
5. Joe Cocker, "With a Little Help From My Friends"
6. Sly & the Family Stone, "I Want to Take You Higher"
7. Jefferson Airplane, "Won't You Try / Saturday Afternoon"
8. Crosby, Stills & Nash, "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes"
9. John Sebastian, "Darling Be Home Soon"
10. Country Joe and the Fish, "Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-to-Die Rag"

Toby Keith, "American Ride"

2009-08-13T14:02:00.004-04:00

Where the idiotic guy who advocated lynchings a few years ago (and I still haven't fully forgiven Willie Nelson for his involvement with that, though I guess going Top 40 with "Beer for My Horses" paid his bills for the decade well enough) returns with coded language about a "tidal wave come across the Mexican border" (oh noes! the immigrants are invading!) and cautions "don't get busted singing Christmas carols" (oh noes! the ACLU atheists are invading!) to play on some of Christofascist America's deepest fears. I suppose for racist Middle Americans, disbelief in diversity would indeed be cause for sarcastic appreciation of "this American ride." At least Toby left the President and other African-Americans out of this one.

Richard Marx, "Right Here Waiting"

2009-08-12T12:34:00.003-04:00

Twenty years ago this week, I was on my way home from a summer "young scholars" science internship at the University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg. The six-week session represented my first extended period of time on my own - and I quite enjoyed the liberating feeling.

My summer soundtrack consisted of my Monkees cassettes with only a smattering of Top 40 tunes (1989 being one of pop's least vital years): Prince's "Batdance," Simply Red's "If You Don't Know Me by Now," Neneh Cherry's sublime "Buffalo Stance." But the #1 song in the nation that August was the ambitiously coiffed Richard Marx's "Right Here Waiting."

Song's a little corny, to be sure. But a young friend of mine recently told me it was one of the very first songs he remembers from his childhood, one of the first he learned on piano, and that got me thinking: How strange it now seems, in an era when what passes for ballads have refrains like "birthday sex, birthday sex" and "you tha fuckin' shit, you tha fuckin' shit," to have a #1 song that's as appropriate for kids to sing as for adults. Today, music is only so innocent when it's marketed to Radio Disney, and that's a pity for all of us.

Beach Boys, "Never Learn Not to Love"

2009-08-10T19:21:00.004-04:00

This weekend marked the 40th anniversary of one of the more unfortunate episodes in the annals of pop culture: the Tate-LaBianca murders, committed at the behest of Charles Manson by his family of followers. Manson was for a time an L.A. outsider, a fringe musician who befriended the Beach Boys' Dennis Wilson and thereby persuaded the band to record his song "Cease to Exist." Retitled "Never Learn Not to Love", the song proved passable at best, salvaged only by the hypnotic monotone hum of Bruce Johnston and Al Jardine's backing vox and the saintly corrupted visage of Dennis himself on the stoned lead.

The murder of Sharon Tate and her friends and the LaBiancas tells us little about Manson himself but much about his Family, whose murderous members took years to develop genuine remorse for their actions. It is well to realize how readily some people will obey, whether the leader is Barack Obama, Sarah Palin, Charlie Manson or your figurehead of choice. We're largely a nation of followers, merely in search of someone to lead us on. May we learn to not be so easily led down paths that conflict with our own codes of conduct. It may be too late for Atkins, Van Houten and Krenwinkel to absorb this lesson, but not for the rest of us. Never learn not to trust your internal moral compass.

Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson, "The Man"

2009-08-06T03:00:00.002-04:00

Oh, wow. Someone on the ILM board brought up a duet between Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson that not only had I never heard, I'd never heard of it. "The least famous of their three co-writes/duets," the gent argued, "is IMO the best of them all."

And damn if he isn't right. "The Girl Is Mine" and "Say, Say, Say" have gotten a bad rap over the years, and I think it's unfair - particularly in the case of the latter, whose defense I'll save for another day. They're good songs.

But allow me to extoll above them the virtues of "The Man," a tune on Macca's 1983 Pipes of Peace album. (The reason I'd never heard it: McCartney solo has never been an album guy for me. Give me the singles, and that's pretty much all I need.) The songwriting's credited to Paul and Michael both, but I suspect, given the vocal range it calls for, it was almost entirely MJ at work concocting this oblique observation of - a god? A golden child? A man who's found self-awareness and wisdom within?

Or perhaps, more specifically, the one who has the courage to venture out into unknown territory, and come back with experience and tales for those who cannot themselves leave. The heroic journey described by everyone from Joseph Campbell to Sandra Cisneros. Can you be the one to go where others cannot? Can I? Who can? This is the man.

PS: How this was not a single, I'll never understand.