Any Major Dude With Half A Heart

Last time on our musical road trip through the USA we visited Philadelphia. It’s time now to hitch a helicopter ride to Gotham City. I am among the many who are profoundly fascinated by New York. Without ever having been there, or to America at all, I feel an affinity with the place (at this point I might invite the multi-millionaires among my loyal readers to come forward with offers for an all-expenses trip to NYC for me and my family). Obviously I’m not alone.

Before turning on our notional journey towards NYC, I thought that this leg of the trip ought to be marked with a mix of songs about the city. In fact, I thought I’d even make it two mixes. Then I began shortlisting. The list grew longer and longer. Then I culled, ruthlessly. Sorry, Lou, just two songs for you. Ditto Paul Simon (though his songs have been widely covered, thereby qualifying for inclusion in the interpretation of others). Upshot: I have about a hundred songs about New York which I want to share. I promise you two mixes; if you want more after those, let me know.

NYC – Any Major Mix Vol. 1

1. Billie Holiday – Autumn In New York (1954)
NYC hook: When Harry repeatedly met Sally, his creepiness was relieved by the beauty of NYC’s fallen, brown leaves. I’m not sure that match-making via Harry Connick is what Billie had in mind. It’s beautiful nonetheless. No wonder the creep eventually managed to hook the rather attractive Sally, playing lovely music like this for, to and at her.

2. Ray Charles – New York’s My Home (1961)
NYC hook: Well, it’s his favourite city, not just a visiting place. It’s, as the title shrewdly implies, his home.

3. Bobby Darin – Sunday In New York (1964)
NYC hook: Ah, those innocent days when shops would be closed on Sundays, and there’d be nothing better to do than window shopping — and sing infectiously upbeat songs about it.

4. Ad Libs – Boy From NY City (1964)
NYC hook: Well, there’s a boy, and he’s from New York City, and a girl named Kitty, for reason of rhyme, is urged to tell us about him. We learn that he is no clown, which is a relief.

5. Harpers Bizarre – 59th Street Bridge Song (Feeling Groovy) (1967)
NYC hook: Slowly following the S&G city map, Harpers Bizarre are finding cause to feel pretty good — or groovy, in the era’s vernacular. As the title might have told you. What else can make you feel groovy?

6. Gerard Kenny – New York, New York (1978)
NYC hook: It’s safe to say that Gerard Kenny likes New York. In his enthusiasm, he claims inaccurately that on account of how good the city is, it was named twice, like the father of English footballing brothers Gary and Phil Neville. Of course we know that his Sesame Street level assertion does not correspond with reality, yet we would feel guilty disabusing him of his error. It would crush him, no doubt.

7. Russ Ballard – New York Groove (1975)
NYC hook: A little under a decade after people were feeling gently groovy, Russ thumped us with the NY GROOOVE, symbolising the transition from weed to coke. Ex-Argent member Ballard wrote the song, but didn’t release it. Instead, Hello in 1975 and Ace Fehley of Kiss in 1978 had hits with it.

8. Nicole Atkins – Brooklyn’s On Fire (2007)
NYC hook: It’s Independence Day and, Nicole counsels us, Brooklyn is on fire. Not literally, even though the chorus fdoes sound deceptively alarming. It’s the fireworks, and romance is in the air. Fantastic song.

9. Ramones – Rockaway Beach (1977)
NYC hook: Joey and his “brothers” go to the Beach. The Surfin’ USA for New Yorkers.

10. Bruce Springsteen – Sherry Darling (1980)
NYC hook: New York traffic is a bastard, and more so when you have to ferry around your nagging future mother-in-law. Broooce likes Sherry, but one more word out of Mom, and she walks.

11. Ryan Adams – New York New York (2001)
NYC hook: Ryan loves New York a lot, and this is his declaration of love. The video for this song was filmed four days before 9/11, and apparently the song played on loop for days after the attack. Apologies to New Yorkers in whom this track evokes horrible memories.

12. Elliot Smith – Amity (1998)
NYC hook: This mix is like a soap opera. Remember Kitty who told us about the by from New York City? Well, it seems the Boy from New York City has returned to New York City, with Kitty. “Hello, hello Kitty, happy in New York City.”

13. Bright Eyes – Old Soul Song (For The New World Order) (2005)
NYC hook: The only song in this mix not to mention New York, its geography or landmarks. But it is set in New York, describing the big February 2003 demonstration against George W Bush’s illicit, indefensible declaration of war against a state that posed no threat to his country’s security. As we knew then, if we were ready to refuse to believe the brazen lies peddled by Dick, Don and Dubya, and their gurning poodle in Britain.

14. Rosie Thomas – Much Farther To Go (2007)
NYC hook: A broken heart in New York City, with the Statue of Liberty as a prop. Without wishing to engage in undue hyperbole, this is one of the most beautiful songs ever written.

15. Rufus Wainwright – Chelsea Hotel No 2 (2006)
NYC hook: Casual celebrity oral sex; it’s the New York way. The cover is even better than Laughing Len’s original.

16. Everything But The Girl – The Only Living Boy In New York (1997)
NYC hook: One person leaves New York, the other stays behind. The second Simon & Garfunkel cover in the mix, and I have two of their songs lined up…

17. Mondo Kané feat. Georgie Fame – New York Afternoon (1986)
NYC hook: We’ve had Billie Holiday in autumn and Rosie Thomas in winter; here Mondo Kané and Georgie Fame (produced by soon-to-be-evil-but-still-excellent Stock Aitken Waterman) enjoy a nice summer afternoon in various New York landmarks.

18. Prefab Sprout – Hey Manhattan! (1988)
NYC hook: And coming in on the flight after Mondo Kané’s are wide-eyed tourists Prefab Sprout, admitting to being entirely star-struck. Brooklyn Bridge, 5th Avenue (where Sinatra walked), JFK hang-out The Carlyle… But look out for the denouement as our tourist friends become aware of New York’s class division.

19. Neil Diamond – Brooklyn Roads (1968)
NYC hook: Neil grew up in Brooklyn. No dazzled observations about famous landmarks and celebrities here. Reminiscing on his childhood, Neil is smelling cooking in the hallways of his block; I get the scent of Mrs Diamond’s boiled cabbage. Wistfully, he imagines a new generation of children living in his old room, perhaps dreaming, as he did, of busting loose.

20. Gil Scott-Heron – New York City (1976)
NYC hook: You’d think angry Gil would hate New York. But he doesn’t. He loves it. Not quite sure why. Nothing much wrong with it, he says. And that’s Just as well, seeing as the city reminds Gil of himself.

21. Steely Dan – Brooklyn (1972)
NYC hook: The charmer under me is…the guy who lived below Fagen and Becker in Brooklyn. All there is to it.

22. Lou Reed – Dirty Blvd. (1989)
NYC hook: Face it, Lou Reed could sing ice cream commercials on a gondola or pack a surf board on a beach surrounded by gaggle of busty blondes, and whatever he was singing would still be about the grime of New York City’s underbelly. The Venetian gondolier would be a pimp, the surfer a pusher and the busty blondes junkie hookers. It’s what our man Lou does.

23. Bob Dylan – Hard Times In New York Town (1961)
NYC hook: Young Bobby Zimmerman escaped from cold Minnesota to Greenwich Village and joined the folk circuit. Recorded before he released his (not terribly good) debut album, we can sympathise here with the complications he is facing in his adopted home.

24. Bob James – Angela (Theme from Taxi) (1978)
NYC hook: What would a series of songs about New York be without reference to the yellow cabs. Taxi was, of course, the show about, well, taxis which brought together Danny DeVito, Tony Danza, Jeff Conaway, Carol Kane, Randall Carver, Judd Hirsch, Marilu Henner, Christopher Lloyd and Andy Kaufman.

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NYC – Any Major Mix Vol. 2
NYC – Any Major Mix Vol. 3 – New York in Black & White

I don’t really care much for Mothers’ Day or Fathers’ Day, mostly because I’ve had neither mother nor father since I was 18. Still, as a father I damn well expect to get breakfast in bed today. High hopes… Fathers’ Day, of course, does bring to mind my late father, who died suddenly when I was 11. It has occurred to me that I am now at the same age he was when I was born, the fifth of his six children. He doubtless was far more mature than I am now. He probably wouldn’t have written blogs about moustaches in pop and the twattery of Michael Fucking Bolton. But then, I didn’t fight in World War 2, my brother did not die in war, my father was not persecuted by the Nazis, and I’ve never been widowed. Of course he was more mature than I will ever be.

My father was not quite an absentee father, but he was away a lot. The little time he had free, he needed to share between relaxation and a little socialising, wife, and, lastly, children. When he spent time with us, he was very loving, but there never wasn’t enough of him. I’ve learned from my father to make career sacrifices so that I could be a constant presence in my son’s life.

For a few years after my father died, I had occasional dreams that it was all a hoax; that he faked his death and was now coming to fetch us. About a decade after he died, I dreamt about him. He was hugging me, and I could smell him, a scent I had long forgotten (and never thought of). That was the last of my hoax dreams. In fact, twenty years or so on, I don’t think he has ever appeared in my dreams again.

Here then a few song about fatherhood, inspired by a recent series on the subject on the fine Star Maker Machine blog.

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Everything But The Girl – The Night I Heard Caruso Sing.mp3Not so much a song about parental relations than one of despair and hope. Released on 1988′s Idlewild album, the singer notes that just where his father lives in Scotland, the military has set up a missile system. That persuades him that he does not want to be responsible for bringing a child into this ugly world. But then he comes across something of great beauty — a recording of early 20th century opera singer Enrico Caruso — and it changes his notion of fatherhood, about his unborn child and about being the child of a father. It is a very beautiful song from a desperately under-appreciated album.

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Cardigans – Don’t Blame Your Daughter (Diamonds).mp3
This quite brilliant 2005 track is an indictment of a really shitty father who seems to have abandoned his family. The song drips with bitterness and anger and sarcasm and a healthy shot of self-pity. “Your autograph’s worthless so don’t send me letters, and don’t mail me cash ’cause your money is no good. What’s left in your mattress is holes that lack of love left, some hair from a horse and none of it is yours, man.” Somebody has Daddy Issues…

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Loudon Wainwright III – A Father And A Son.mp3
Loudon’s children, Rufus and Martha, evidently are not great fans of his parenting style, as we’ll see in the next song. Here, Loudon addresses his teenage son, recalling his own difficult relationship with his father, suggesting that volatile filial interactions are hereditary. He’d rather not fight with his son: “I don’t know what all of this fighting is for; but we’re having us a teenage/middle-age war.” Presumably father and son don’t hold back when screaming at each other. And yet: “This thing between a father and a son — maybe it’s power and push and shove; maybe it’s hate…but probably it’s love.”

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Martha Wainwright – Bloody Mother Fucking Asshole.mp3
Perhaps Loudon can persuade his son, but daughter is disenchanted. He has clearly caused Martha (and, it seems, her mother) so much pain that the breakdown in their relationship is complete: “I will not pretend, I will not put on a smile, I will not say I’m all right for you…” And then the repeated outburst: “You bloody mother fucking asshole. Oh you bloody mother fucking asshole.” No breakfast in bed for Loudon on Fathers’ Day then?

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Gladys Knight & The Pips – Daddy Could Swear, I Declare.mp3
Ah, a father after my own heart. A man of my height (what do you mean “only” 5’7, Gladys) who knows how to swear and a short fuse. But he loved his children. This song, from 1973’s Neither One Of Us album, should resonate with adult children remembering their father through the medium of anecdote: “Ooh, my brothers and sisters still talk about how Daddy lost his temper that day. You see, he built a picket fence from the garage to the house. Well, Sam, tell me what I say, the same day the garbage man backed into the fence and the whole darn thing gave way. You should have been there…”

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Johnny Cash – Daddy Sang Bass.mp3
The family that sings together, stays together. Until somebody dies. Johnny Cash didn’t have a particularly happy family; his father blamed Johnny for the accidental death of his older brother. In this song, written by Carl Perkins, the family enjoys harmony, despite poverty. “Daddy sang bass, mama sang tenor. Me and little brother would join right in there.” Now, however, they’re all dead. Cash remembers the closeness and has the religious convictions to presume meeting them again in the afterlife: “Singing seems to help a troubled soul. One of these days, and it won’t be long, I’ll rejoin them in a song.” Cash died 34 years after recording the song at San Quentin jail.

Here’s the trouble with Valentine’s Day, apart from the crass commercialisation and pressure to spend a month’s salary on a dozen frozen roses shipped in from Argentinia or wherever. Valentine’s Day is just for the select few, the lucky ones who are experiencing love in a good way. It excludes those who yearn for love, those who have had their heart shredded to ribbons, those who love somebody they cannot have. No, it doesn’t just exclude hem; it mocks them. The forced inclusiveness — red and white dresscodes, the Valentine’s cards and, worse, Valentine’s e-mails to people — creates an illusion that love causes no pain, that love is like it is in the movies (and how many rom coms open at your multiplex on February 14?). Worse, Valentine’s Day makes people in a relationship say or do things they may not really mean, even if they don’t really know what they are doing. So for most people, the most appropriate Valentine’s Day song is the one I posted a few days ago: Gram Parsons & Emmylou Harris – Love Hurts.mp3

For most people, Valentine’s Day is a banal fraud, and so are many of the songs that extol the glory of love. In lyrics, romantic love, of whatever brand, is usually a musical McGuffin, the plot device that drives the song. The Beatles sang exclusively about romantic love until Rubber Soul, their sixth album, “Nowhere Man” breaking the mould. Some of the emotions portrayed in some of these songs ring true, of course. Sometimes the lyrics are eloquent even. But do they convey the feeling of love accurately? Does, say, Kylie Minogue communicate it today? The challenge today, as it was on the mix-tape I posted on Saturday, is to find songs that can convey being in love believably, in lyrics, sound and performance (songs marked with an asterisk have been recycled from older posts).

Art Garfunkel – All I Know.mp3
“I bruise you, you bruise me. We both bruise too easily, too easily to let it show.” Art Garfunkel breaks our hearts in his beautiful 1973 version of the Jimmy Webb song. Being in love is a fragile reality. You are vulnerable. Your future is determined by the one your with: “All my plans have fallen through, all my plans depend on you; depend on you to help them grow.” Hurt may be just around the corner. Is Art neurotic or realistic when he sings: “But the ending always comes at last; endings always come too fast”? All these questions have no answer. There is only one answer: “I love you, and that’s all I know.”

Sarah Bettens – Grey.mp3
Sarah Bettens, of the folk-rock duo K’s Choice, takes the vulnerable route too. Here, love isn’t red, nor black or white. It’s somewhere in between: grey. Love can die, and Sarah says it might do so from her side even as she pleads to be loved. “You can’t be my everything and I am not half you. But you can make it all worthwhile, and that’s why I love you.”

The Weepies – Cherry Trees (live).mp3
Yeah, posted again. This is a gorgeous love song based on Pablo Neruda’s poem. “I wanna do with you what spring does with the cherry trees”, the idea nicked from Neruda, means that love must renew itself and grow. “Sometimes our love is like a mountain: solid and steep, grounded in heat. And sometimes we rage like a river, cold and fast, then quiet and deep. We ride the storm, ’cause when it’s through we have changed and love is new.” This is the key love surviving summarised in two lines.

Everything But The Girl – Love Is Where I Live.mp3*
Some of the songs here are love-giddy, others communicate the fear of being in love. Of the latter, this is the darkest. Tracy Thorn seems certain that this love won’t last. It’s here now, but may not always be. So she repeats these three words like a mantra: “It won’t last”. She’s been burned in love before, clearly. Love is here, but it cannot survive when one partner thinks it is already doomed. What Tracy needs is a shot of Donny Hathaway’s brand of love.

Donny Hathaway – A Song For You.mp3
In this definitive version of Leon Russell’s stunning declaration of love, Donny Hathaway puts us through the wringer. He has treated the woman he professes to love poorly, but now he is going to articulate just how much he loves her back: “and if my words don’t come together, listen to the melody, ’cause my love is in there hiding”. He’s not lying: the melody is enveloped in pure love. It communicates tenderness and vulnerability. But the words do come together: “I love you in a place where there’s no space or time. I love you for in my life you are a friend of mine. And when my life is over, remember when we were together: we were alone and I was singing this song to you.” Would you not melt? Would that not reassure Tracy Thorn?

Herb Alpert – This Guy’s In Love With You.mp3
It may be a little premature to include this Bacharach composition here. It might belong in yesterday’s post. Our dude has only just picked up that the girl he desires seems to like him back. From here on, Herb gets into it. The deal, as far as he knows, is done. Back out of the deal, he tells her melodramatically in the best bit of the song, and he might not survive it: “My hands are shakin’, don’t let my heart keep breaking ’cause I need your love, I want your love. Say you’re in love and you’ll be my girl…if not…I’ll just…die.” To great effect, when it seems that the song has ended on that note, it resumes with Herb’s trumpet, indicating that probably the girl has not given him cause to die. Yay!

Blue October – Calling You.mp3
We’ve not dealt with the insecurity in love that produces quasi-stalker behaviour, have we? This is where alt.rockers Blue October come in to help us out. This seems to be quite a sweet song: guy finds girl (probably out of his league), life has become easier and better…except he feels the need to phone her all the time to see if she is thinking or dreaming of him (yup, way to keep the girl, dude, waking her up all the time). The thing is, love makes people act stupidly. We may laugh at our dude here, but who in love has not ever had the same impulses?

The Crimea – Lottery Winners On Acid.mp3
Let’s get giddy, kicking off with John Peel-championed Indie-rockers The Crimea (with the original EP version, not the inferior re-recording with which they scored a 2006 UK hit). The song has a ’60s-like exuberance about it, and not just because of the acid reference. Our boy is so deep-fucked in love, he even loses his grasp on basic grammar: “If she get a black eye, I want a black eye. If she get a splinter, I want a splinter too.” And later: “If she get a disease, I want a disease. If she go tripping, I go falling over.” And his Mom might rightly enquire: “If she jumps of a bridge, would you jump as well?” Of course our boy would. ” Everything she say, I was thinking anyway.” Isn’t that just the way love is, initially?

Style Council – You’re The Best Thing (extended).mp3
Presumably Paul Weller wrote this for Dee C. Lee, a former Wham! backing singer who joined the Style Council in 1984 when she and Weller hooked up. So when he sings stuff like: “I could be discontent and chase the rainbows’ end, I might win much more but lose all that is mine” (meaning Dee C.’s love), you sort of wonder what their chances are. All good intentions in vain, Weller and Lee ended up getting divorced.

Sarah McLachlan – Ice Cream (Live).mp3
Sarah McLachlan takes the more conventional route to explain love: it’s like ice cream or chocolate. A jubilatory song that conveys the euphoria that comes with being in love, and being loved back. A note of caution: ice cream and chocolate melt in heat; will the romance retain its shape in the heat of passion?

Minnie Riperton – Lovin’ You.mp3
A song just dripping with love. The birds are singing, so is Minnie, hitting orgasmically high notes. The song was written with her husband, and in the end Minnie sings, in multi-syllable mode, the name of their daughter, Maya (SNL comedian Maya Rudolph). Which is lovely, I think. The lyrics are simple, yet communicate all that needs to be said. The line, “Stay with me while we grow old, and we will live each day in springtime” is a great one for wedding proposals (though these are best not uttered on February 14). In the context of this song it is poignant: Minnie died of cancer in 1979, five years after “Lovin’ You” was a hit.

Earth, Wind & Fire – Love’s Holiday.mp3
Love finds expression in sex. So, to round this thing off, a couple of songs saturated with love and sex. On “Love’s Holiday”, Maurice White rocks his sonorous voice in the most seductive manner. Forget about Barry White or Isaac Hayes, Maurice’s is the voice of a sex god. “Would you mind if I looked in your eyes till I’m hypnotised, and I lose my pride?” Playa got game. But, ooops, what’s this: “Would you mind if I make love to you till I’m satisfied, once again.” Till you are satisfied, Mo? What sort of seductive proposition is that? Promise her satisfaction twice over before you think of yourself, you selfish goon!

Foo Fighters – Everlong (acoustic version.mp3)*
Maurice’s women may be better off with Mr Grohl, who may not look particularly hot, take much care of his hair (if the Grammys performance is a reliable guide) or have a particularly sexy voice, but he has a way with words: “Slow how you wanted it to be… Breath out, so I can breathe you in, hold you in.” And here is the beauty of Grohl’s seduction technique: he doesn’t make grandiose promises of being a bureau-of-standards-approved lovemachine; he doesn’t flatter about bodies being wonderlands. He just outlines how he plans to make an emotional connection while in the act of making love. Which makes this is one of the best song about sex ever.