A Love for All My Life to Have and to Hold

“A Sunday Kind Of Love,” Etta James

On January 20^th we lost one of the best friends a song ever had.  Etta James had an unmistakable capacity for expression that made the songs she sang her own.  Although “A Sunday Kind Of Love” is considered a standard, the 1961 James recording represents the pinnacle of its possibility.

The opening line of this song is bewitching.  The way James’ voice draws you in is captivating—you can’t not listen to the rest of the story.  The sweeping string accompaniment provides a romantic setting that James matches with enthralling conviction.  James’ instrument has a richness that is befitting such a beautiful piece of music—the composition itself gives her a lot to work with, but she really makes everything come together.  There is something that is just so warm and comforting about her voice; it’s like an intimate embrace.

There are so many tired or trite ways to approach the subject of love, but calling it “a Sunday kind of love” is such an effective metaphor to communicate the elation of a settled match.  The song speaks of longing, but the tone is optimistic: “I’m hoping to discover | A certain kind of lover | Who will show me the way!”  This song is about all of your life finally coming together around that one person—that Sunday kind of love.

Question: This song has been recorded by many different artists.  What other standards are your favourites?

Every Way Love’s a Little Stronger

“Everyday,” Buddy Holly

This week marks the anniversary of The Day the Music Died.  On 03 February 1959, the plane carrying Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper crashed into the cold Iowa night.  With this one twist of fate, half a generation’s musical promise was lost, and it seems futile to fathom what might’ve been, and even more difficult, still, to assess the extent to which we’ve suffered because these talents were barred from continuing to advance.  However, we are fortunate to have the recordings these greats left behind.

In so many ways, Holly defies categorization.  We know he belongs somewhere under the rock umbrella, but his experimental nature makes him hard to pin down.  His songs are humble and often lyrically simple.  But, that sound!  It changes you.  Tracks like “Rave On” and “Peggy Sue” continue to shape our expectations of what the best rock and roll can achieve.  

It is stunning how much impact “Everyday” achieves with such simple devices.  Everything is pared down: the lyrics are of a plaintive love ballad, and Holly’s singular vocal line is primarily accompanied by subdued hand slaps and a tinkling celesta.  This doesn’t really sound like a rock and roll song, but it doesn’t really sound like anything else, either.  The overall effect is almost like a music box playing, quiet and sweet—slow, but sure.  It’s remarkable how with a minimum of sound, it doesn’t feel like something is lacking.

“Everyday” was released as the B-side to 1957’s “Peggy Sue,” but it possesses a sound that is timeless.  This stripped down recording feels like it could have just as easily been recorded today as sixty years ago.  Holly sings about a tender love to last, and the barn-burner fireworks of many of his other tunes would have been an overstatement of such a gentle sentiment.  The track stands the test of time because it doesn’t feel as though it belongs to a time.  Even Holly’s signature glottal flourishes don’t date this song, because the best music just does not fade away.

Question:  Despite having such a brief career, Buddy Holly’s remarkable influence is enduring.  What other musicians do you think we were fortunate to have for a good time, if not a long time?

I'll Make You Cry Those Tears of Joy

“Two Kinds Of Teardrops,” Del Shannon

Two of the most persistent themes in classic rock are cars and love.  Del Shannon incorporates both of these touchstones into his identity because he is rumoured to have chosen his stage name after his favourite car, Cadillac’s Coupe de Ville, and he most always sang about romance.  Released in 1963, “Two Kinds Of Teardrops” wasn’t much of a hit outside of the UK.  However, this song is so much fun to listen to that it deserves a place alongside Shannon’s signature tune, “Runaway.”

Shannon sings lead, and a few sing-songy, child-like girls provide back-up vocals.  Instead of being overly cloying, though, the harmonic dissonance they provide is just jarring enough to complement Shannon’s rough-around-the-edges growl.  The light-heartedness of this counterpoint keeps the song moving and the sound fresh.  Shannon's phrasing transitions quickly between lines and makes the song really move.

The “two kinds of teardrops” represent relationships of the past and future.  Failed relationships produce “lonely tears,” but going steady with Shannon means things are going to change.  This song could be one-note, but the vocal stylings tone down the sugar and add dimension that wouldn’t be there with a lesser voice.  When Shannon sings, “I’m going to make you cry | Those happy teardrops,” he is at once playful, yet in control.  This hopeful promise is one Shannon makes you believe he’ll keep.

Question: Regardless of subject matter, what other songs do you think are “fun” listens?

It’s Been So Lonely Without You Here

“Nothing Compares 2 U,” Prince feat. Rosie Gaines

Although Prince wrote this track, it is most closely associated with Sinéad O’Connor because of her famous release of the single, “Nothing Compares 2 U.”  Three years after that cover version topped the charts, Prince’s 1993 compilation, The Hits 1, included this live performance of his song.  The O’Connor recording of this lament is well known, and it should be; the flight of her lilting vocals is chilly elegance.  However, it is a delight to discover how well the song translates as a duet, with Prince and Rosie Gaines trading verses and bringing the heat.

The beginning of this performance features soothing keyboards and an understated guitar riffing on the familiar “Nothing Compares 2 U” hook.  This quiet scene betrays none of the chaotic despair to come when the singers take their turn.  Prince displays his impressive vocal range, with extensive improvisational ornamentation that sustains interest with its delicacy, side-stepping the trap of becoming tiresome.  However, it is Gaines’ soulful blasts that are the real reason to come to this show; she is a woman on the verge of collapse, and one is left rattled by the sound of her heart breaking.

This tune is absolute catharsis.  Presented as an ambling, blues-y lament, every word becomes poignant; each syllable breaks with the emotional destruction of love lost.  This particular rendition is so powerful because conceiving of it as a duet transforms its character.  The two voices are in the same song, but they are somehow not speaking to each other, they are speaking about each other.  The lack of communication is frustrating, but it deepens the emotional release necessary when confronting a profound loss.  Each line reveals a new dimension of sorrow, effecting devastation.

Question: Performing this song as a duet adds impact to its already weighty subject matter.  What are some songs that you think are better for being duets rather than solos?

Merry Christmas Baby!

Song and Why is on holiday for the rest of the season.  Please check back January 10, 2012 for another song and why it's great.  Happy Holidays!!

We’re Sweating in the Winter

“Date With The Night,” The Yeah Yeah Yeahs

There are a lot of songs about dates: dates with that special someone, dates to remember, dates to forget, dates gone good, dates gone bad, dates even ending in death.  Going on a date with “the night” defies all the usual norms; one of the partners is metaphysical.  Now anything can happen.  From the first time Karen O announces, “I got a date with the night!”, the track explodes with possibility.  It’s that feeling one has when getting ready for a wild night out with anticipatory thrill—the night could bring anything, and it is absolute frisson.  “Date With The Night” is on the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ 2003 release, Fever To Tell, an album that jumps you from behind and won’t let go.

Lyrics are almost cursory to the combination of O’s voice, Nick Zinner’s guitar, and Brian Chase’s drums.  Spinning an incoherent tale of walking on water, fixing fights, and most enticingly, “dropping brides at the altar,” this chaotic narrative serves as an unbounded allusion to a night that could be.  The cut opens with blares of Zinner’s scratchy axe, with a hook that is as catchy as it is startling.  Chase’s percussion keeps “the date” on a tear through the night, landing only briefly before flying through each chorus.  O’s gale-force howl is matched by Zinner’s equally shrieky shredding.  The perfect storm that ensues is as overwhelming as it is seductive.

Everything is on edge, electric—almost unbearable.  The track tests the limits of shrillness, but never pushes it so far as to be reckless and unlistenable.  It is no small feat that even when O screams, she sings.  Backed by wailing sirens from Zinner’s guitar, O is the party police, screeching orders that will be obeyed.  Much of the time it’s difficult to decipher her aggressive commands, but Officer O won’t let up, her voice a piercing siren itself. You know it’s a good party when the cops get there before you.

Question: In “Date With The Night,” not just anything happens, everything happens.  What songs fill you with the anticipation of nothing but possibility?

Everybody's Shaking

“Too Young,” Phoenix

Featured on Phoenix’s 2000 album, United, “Too Young” reveals the group’s Parisian roots through vocalist Thomas Mars’ occasional, charmingly Francophonic inflections.  Although these errors in pronunciation seem unintentional, they may well be affect, for they shrewdly contribute to the atmosphere of unstudied disquiet to which the song alludes.  The chorus is an elegant frenzy of Mars beseeching “Can’t you hear it calling | Everybody’s dancing | Tonight everything is over | I feel too young.”  The close of this lyric summons a sadness in recalling a moment lost to being overwhelmed.  Failure is implicit here, but not in a judgmentally removed way; the song is understanding and engaged in its reflections.  Even the title, “Too Young,” is a softened rather than impatient stance.

The power of this song is greater than the sum of its parts.  Its true impact is found in its capacity to conjure the tangibility of fleeting angst.  The message is a tangle of ephemera, but the mode is strikingly simple.  Like last week’s Stone Roses track, “This Is The One,” “Too Young” is almost all chorus.  This repetition has an hypnotic effect, opening the emotional potency of the repeated words to wash over the listener.  The chorus’ lyrical hook could almost be cloying, were it not tempered by the accompanying mid-tempo instrumentals.  The complex sentiment is uncomplicated by a stark guitar motif that serves as a kind of respite from the song’s emotional weight each time it is featured. 

This song is so evocative of that uncomfortable time in one’s life when everything seems to be in limbo—even socializing is unsettled.  The track is transportive and tenderly takes one back to those bright, young, bewildering days.  Through the metaphor of being unready for the complications of a specific romantic relationship, the narrative expands this device to encompass the larger uncertainty and confusion of approaching adulthood.  The dizzying beginnings of coming into one’s own are the focal point, and the poignant recollections of that time manifest a fond wistfulness—yearning, even—to once again be on that chrysalid brink of maturity.

Question: The real strength of “Too Young” is its success at inciting an emotional response.  What other songs make you feel before you think?