I'm pretty sure I didn't hear this song on US radio when it was released in May 1973. Yet I'm guessing it has played on enough movie and TV soundtracks since then that it seems totally familiar to me now. And when it came up on Spotify a couple weeks ago, my immediate response was -- "Oh, this song -- I love this song!" And it hasn't left my head since.
In 1973, if I knew anything about the band Faces, it was that Rod Stewart was their lead singer. At first I'd loved his 1971 solo hit "Maggie May," but I quickly got tired of him as a solo artist. So why would I be interested in Faces?
But here's the thing: Rod Stewart has nothing to do with this track. It was written by the two Ronnies -- Lane and Wood (yes, that Ron Wood, now of the Rolling Stones) -- and although Ronnie Lane usually did lead vocals when His Rodness couldn't be bothered, in this case good ol' Woody took the mike, a rare occasion.
This may be the album's title track, but it lands as the last track of Side B, and it's anything but a statement song: It's as loose-limbed and carefree as could be. To me, it could just as easily be The Band; it's all acoustic twang, clogging shuffle, and drawl, and Ron Wood's vocals have an unaffected Rick Danko quality that's totally endearing. It's got an offbeat jerky tempo and a rambling melodic line and, well, you just have to collapse into it.
The song's premise is simple -- a grandfather telling a youngster "I wish that I knew what I know now / When I was younger." Lane and Wood were still in their twenties when they wrote this, so hardly grizzled oldsters dispensing advice. But it's not portentous (not like Bob Dylan's "My Back Pages" or Cat Steven's "Father and Son"); the old guy's basically giving the kid tips on how to avoid floozies, and the kid doesn't listen, and now he's woefully sorry. And life goes on...
Aha! My research now tells me where I first learned to love this song: It's played over the end credits of Wes Anderson's Rushmore. (Which honestly is one of the best soundtrack albums ever. I adore Wes Anderson.*) It all makes sense now.
Well, hell, take a listen. Put your feet up. Enjoy.
*Go see his new film The French Dispatch -- it's a wondrous delight!!
Now we're getting into music that really resonates with me. It was an era in which charts and lists still mattered -- I remember staying up until midnight every New Year's Eve with my neighbor and close pal Kay Wolf, waiting to find out what was the number one song of the year. Wonder if any of these songs was in the year-end Top Ten...
1963: Bobby Vinton, "Blue Velvet"
Another one of the Bobbys! Schmaltz and strings again, angel-choir backing vocals, and one of the most memorable vocal swoops in all pop -- "She wore blue-oooo VEL-vet." I very distinctly remember this drippy song on the radio, and being riveted for reasons I still can't explain.
1964: Roy Orbison, "Pretty Woman"
Legit rock & roll, at last. I saw Roy Orbison perform this song on the weekly music TV show Shindig,with his black pompadour and dark glasses, coolly standing center stage, no dancing or gyrating -- and oh, that knock-out voice. This song (Orbison's biggest hit ever) was clearly about a man on the prowl (he even purr-growls at one point) -- hardly the stuff this little 11-year-old wanted to hear at the time. But I couldn't turn away from it. Mercy!
1965: The McCoys, "Hang On Sloopy"
Granted, this was a blip on the charts -- the next day the new #1 was the Beatles' "Yesterday," which I yearned to write about instead, as the first of these #1s that I actually went out and bought as a 45. However, I cannot deny the McCoys their fleeting moment in the sun (especially since they, like me, were from Indiana). I'll admit, I always conflated this song with Snoopy, the dog from the Peanuts cartoons, and with the Beach Boys' goofy single "Sloop John B," which would hit the charts a few months later. Neither a boat nor a dog, however, Sloopy was a girl from "the wrong side of town," that all-American story line. At the time, I didn't know the song's backstory -- how the Strangeloves recorded it, but, not wanting to cannibalize their still-active hit "I Want Candy" (yes, that song), hired an unknown teen band to release it under their name, flying the lead singer into New York to overdub the vocals. As luck would have it, it leaped to the top of the charts, outselling "I Want Candy" by far. Who knew? And by the way, who was that 17-year-old lead singer of the McCoys? None other than Rick Derringer, who'd later under his own name have a hit with "Rock and Roll Hoochie Koo," and who also played guitar on Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse of the Heart." More than you wanted to know, I bet.
1966: The Association, "Cherish"
Did I own this single? You bet I did. Although it was nowhere near as great as the Association's previous hit, "Along Comes Mary," this song was probably a better showcase for their plush vocal harmonizing (the Association's raison d'etre, I realize in retrospect). "Cherish," however, was tailor-made for a 13-year-old's hopeless crushes, with lyrics like "Well I'm beginning to think / That man has never found / The words that could make you love me / That have the right amount of letters / Just the right sound / That could make you feel / Make you see / That you are driving me out of my mind..." Well, obviously, even though I cannot remember the name of my current dentist, the date of my recent brain surgery, or what pills I need to take in the morning -- even though I still have not remembered to sign up for Medicare -- I still remember every word of "Cherish." Just sayin'.
1967: The Box Tops, "The Letter"
Oh, sweet Jesus, here it is. My Number One Favorite Pop Song of All Time. Just confirming my belief that 1967 was probably the greatest year in music ever.At fourteen, I was just on the cusp of appreciating the raw urgency and heat of Alex Chilton's lead vocal. How was I to know he was barely older than I was?
1968: The Beatles, "Hey Jude"
Iconic. ICONIC. How much has been written about this song (although, oddly, it seems I never did a post on it before)? It was Paul's song to comfort John's son Julian on his parents' break-up; John was convinced it was Paul's blessing on his relationship with Yoko; Paul himself may have been writing about the beginning of his great true love with Linda. The fact that it is all these songs at once testifies to its greatness. I've been a Paul girl from Day One, but honestly, you don't need to be a Paul girl to know this is a genius track. Even though it was more than 7 minutes long -- unheard-of in Top Ten radio -- it held the #1 spot for nine weeks in the US, the Beatles' longest #1 streak ever. We didn't know at the time that this was the first step in the Beatles' long goodbye. (There's a whole book in that.) But hey, on my 15th birthday, how could I know that my Beatles universe was about to fall apart? All I knew was that I had better start memorizing all the nah-ne-nah-nahs, to make sure I'd get them right when this came on the radio in a carful of us true believers.
(Hang in there on this video clip, by the way -- it charmingly messes around a bit before the song takes off.)
1969: The Archies, "Sugar, Sugar"
Oh, Lord. Was this single the beginning of the end? A made-up band for a cartoon series based on a comic book -- and yet it hit #1? It's an earworm, yes -- but honestly, WHO BOUGHT THIS RECORD? But here it is, a milestone in bubblegum pop, proving that the music biz was still all over the map.
1970: Diana Ross & the Supremes, "Ain't No Mountain High Enough"
Was Diana Ross still a Supreme at this point, or not? It almost doesn't matter. Her diva status was already certified, and this overblown hit -- a remake of a 1966 Marvin Gaye/Tammi Terrell written by Nickolas Ashford and Valerie Simpson -- claimed #1 as if it was Diana's due. Man, I loved the Supremes back when they were just the best of the girl groups, but the minute Diana went diva (enabled by a smitten Berry Gordy), Motown lost whatever credibility it still had with me. I'd follow Stevie Wonder to the ends of the earth, but Diana Ross? Count me out.
1971: Rod Stewart, "Maggie May"
Freshman year of college, and I didn't buy singles any more; I bought LPs. And I bought this one. That raspy voice, that mandolin, those whomping drumbeats -- it was loose and sexy and boozy and everything that 60s pop was not. I listened to college radio stations now, which played entirely different music; I was beginning to leave chart-based radio behind. (Though there was still a station in Springfield, MA, with a pre-programmed playlist and no DJs, that kept me listening to "Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone," "One Toke Over the Line," Cat Stevens' "Wild World," and all the Carpenters and Three Dog Night I could handle....)
1972: Mac Davis, "Baby Don't Get Hooked on Me"
Are you kidding me? This cheesy country-crossover hit -- another of those "men got to be free, women just want to tie you down" songs -- was definitely not on my radar; or rather, I knew it was out there and it made my baby feminist flesh creep. Wikipedia duly tells me that Mac Davis wrote both "In the Ghetto" and "A Little Less Conversation" for Elvis Presley, and that raises Mac Davis multiple notches in my estimation. But in 1972, I wanted nothing to do with it.
1973: Cher, "Half Breed"
Okay, now I'm really getting annoyed. It was the 1970s, rock music was going in a million fascinating directions, and the chart-toppers were zigging and zagging. Good stuff from Carly Simon and Roberta Flack and Stevie Wonder, but we also had Dawn's "Tie a Yellow Ribbon" and Jim Croce's "Bad Bad Leroy Brown." Look, I'd dug Sonny and Cher when they first landed on Shindig singing "I Got You Babe,"but Cher's march into diva status left me totally cold. (Am I the only person who hated the fact that she was in Mamma Mia 2?)
But let's be honest -- I was 21 and no longer the pop charts' target audience. (How swiftly do we reach obsolescence....). From here on in, it would be the songs I DID care about that would make all the difference.
Stay tuned.
Sunday, February 16, 2014
52 GIRLS
"Maggie May" / Rod Stewart
Nowadays, we'd call her a "cougar," I guess.
We had no idea -- how could we? -- what a MOR slacker Rod Stewart would eventually turn out to be, how quickly he'd turn into a parody of himself, with his succession of hot blond wives, his perma-tan and artfully streaked shag, the tight trousers and silk shirt unbuttoned to the waist. But in 1971, that gritty voice still sounded authentic and vital. "Maggie May" practically jumped out of the radio speakers at me. Yes, I went out and bought Every Picture Tells A Story; not just bought it, but listened to it A LOT.
Forget all those folky guitar twiddlings in the intro; this song really begins with two whomping drum beats. (Sitting on my dorm bed, I'd slam the bedposts to those drum whacks.) Then comes Rod's desperate croak, "Wake up Maggie, I think I've got something to say to you." For once, the hoarseness of Rod's voice made dramatic sense -- he's just woken up from a rough night of shagging.
For me, the grabber was that next line: "It's late September and I really should be back at school." It made me, a new college student myself, somehow identify with this scenario of a randy slacker entwined in the wiles of an older woman. I'd never been in anything even remotely like that situation, but that didn't stop me. Maybe even then I liked the idea that an older woman could be sexier than the girls his own age.
His attachment to Maggie is intriguing and complicated -- he knows she's used him, she's "made a first-class fool out of me," she's "kicked me in the head." He even sees that she did it for purely selfish reasons -- "just to save [herself] from being alone." The raspiness of Rod's vocals enhances our image of a kid being run ragged by this voracious older woman. ("Older" meaning, what, thirty? Horrors!) In the first chorus, he says she stole his heart, but the next time around, she's stolen his soul, "and that's what really hurts."
The instrumental arrangement, too, teeters between sexual tension -- Ronnie Wood's driving guitar riffs and lunging bass, Mickey Waller's crashing drums, Ian McLagen's thrumming organ -- and tenderness, in the form of that memorable mandolin solo (played by Lindisfarne's Roy Jackson.) Our hero is both realistic and romantic, watching her sleep. I love this snapshot image: "The morning sun when it's in your face really shows your age." But he shrugs that off: "But that don't worry me none, in my eyes you're ev'rything." He's willingly done his part -- "I laughed at all of your jokes / My love you didn't need to coax." Even now, he's not exactly angry with her; he's still muddled up and half in love.
In the bridge, he recalls their history, how he drifted into this affair innocently, or at least unsuspectingly. "All I needed was a friend to lend a guiding hand / But you turned into a lover, and mother, what a lover! / You wore me out." That's a damn sexy line, IMHO; you just about HAVE to picture them in bed.
Somewhere in England the original Maggie May must smile whenever she hears this song. Yes, the master Singer of Other People's Songs actually did write this one himself, and he claims it's autobiographical. He never went to university -- too busy trying out to be a footballer -- but that's a minor point. At the end of the song, he retreats from the idea of school, and begins to idly thumb through alternative careers. Should he be a pool hustler like his dad? (Who was actually a footballer, but never mind.)
And then here's the final grabber: Or maybe, I don't know, "find myself a rock and roll band / That needs a helping hand." And as we all know, the rest was history.
33 DOWN, 19 TO GO
Thursday, February 18, 2010
The 100 Best Singles In My Head Nos. 81-85
These five songs aren't quite guilty pleasures -- though they're all by artists that some rock snobs spurn. I'll defend them to the death, though, and not just because of nostalgia for the time in my life when I first heard them.
[Click on the highlighted links to read my earlier posts on those songs]
81. "Don't Let the Sun Catch You Crying" / Gerry & the Pacemakers (1964) In 1964 we were all waiting to figure out who the next Beatles would be (turns out it was more of the Beatles). Even then, though, I'm pretty sure I knew it wouldn't be Gerry & the Pacemakers, despite the fact that they were also managed by Brian Epstein. Still, Gerry Marsden had a soulful pop voice, well suited to ballads, which soon replaced perky numbers like "How Do You Do It" in their repertoire. As a coda to the whole Merseybeat phenomenon, 1965's "Ferry Cross the Mersey" was poignant, even for us who'd never been to Liverpool. But my vote goes to "Don't Let The Sun Catch You Crying," which came out a year earlier. It was the Pacemaker's first U.S. hit, and amid the tsunami of other British Beat bands frantically trying to cash in on the Beatles' US success, the tenderness of this song really stood out. I'll admit, that arrangement was totally movie-music schmaltz -- those quivering strings, that oboe counterpoint -- but still it comes off as totally sincere. I've read that Marsden wrote it after breaking up with his girlfriend; after she heard the song, apparently, they got back together and eventually married. I don't know if that story's true or not, but I desperately hope so. I remember watching Gerry sing this on Shindig, adoring his Liverpudlian vowels, taken in by his huge puppydog eyes. Ultimately, I just couldn't work up a crush on Gerry Marsden -- not with Paul McCartney around -- but this song still brings a lump to my throat.
82. "Rikki Don't Lose That Number" / Steely Dan (1974) You either get Steely Dan or you don't. Plenty of other cheesy jazz-rockers came along later to muck up the waters, but these guys invented the sound -- the dense aural environment, underlaid with a slapping, commanding groove. I loved Donald Fagan's nimble and intelligent keyboards, but what really spoke to me was Walter Becker's snarky lyrics. It's toss-up between this number and "Reeling in the Years" ("those weekends at the college never turned out like you planned / The things that pass for knowledge I don't understand"), but in the end I vote for this on the Spookiness Quotient -- that ominous ticking bass line, the faintly scolding lyrics, the lapidary call-and-response of the chorus. The singer's pleading with a girlfriend -- not even that, a girl he's briefly dated; with a whiff of desperation, he reminds her of "our little wild time" and going "out driving on Slow Hand Row" (that's some evocative name for a lover's lane). "Rikki don't lose that number," he entreats her -- I picture something scrawled on a matchbook or a cocktail napkin -- adding, "Send it off in a letter to yourself" (mnemonic tips from Dr. Becker!). Chords falter and diminish as he speculates, "You might use it if you feel better / When you get home . . . " He knows she won't, but a guy can hope, can't he? ("And you might have a change of heart . . . " the line wanders upward, followed by a twiddle of piano). I've always thought that it was his phone number he wanted her to keep, but just today it occurred to me that it could be something else -- an abortion doctor, maybe? Whatever. It's like being thrown into a Raymond Carver short story, and scrambling to figure out what's going on. One thing I knew for sure: if I was Rikki, I'd keep that number.
83. "Smooth Operator" / Sade (1985) Jazz again -- really smooth jazz, in fact, sizzling over a Latin beat. When this song came out, mind you, we were in the throes of MTV's glory days of video; the sound is inextricable from the exotic vision of gorgeous Sade, with her skimmed-back hair and luscious red lips, poured into a cocktail dress. She was so poised, so reserved, so elegant -- more Audrey Hepburn than Debbie Harry -- I instinctively identified with her. The wary, wounded quality of her voice fit perfectly with this allusive story about a jet-set wheeler-dealer ("diamond life, lover boy"). Not that we get many details, though -- he could be a pimp, a drug lord, or James Bond for all we know. She doesn't trust him, and I'm guessing it's from bitter firsthand experience, as she croons: "A license to love, insurance to hold / Melts all your memories and change into gold / His eyes are like angels but his heart is cold." (Dig that icy quarter-note pause before "cold.") Sade's voice is like satin, like honey, her diction crisp, her phrasing sensuous yet delicate. Congas thump, maracas sussurate, a sax moans in the night. "Coast to coast, LA to Chicago, western male / Across the north and south to Key Largo, love for sale" -- it's so Eighties. But delicious.
[And by the way -- how cool is it that Sade's brand-new album just zoomed to number 1? The lady takes a decade off from performing, and her audience is right there waiting for her to return. No crazy promotional blitz (take note, Madonna and Lady Gaga), just a solidly crafted set of songs with her long-time loyal band. It proves that when the older audience respects and cares about an artist, they'll buy records in droves. So how come the record companies waste so much time and money only wooing the fickle youth market?]
Well, I said there'd be guilty pleasures, didn't I?
And in 1971, who knew what a MOR slacker Rod Stewart would eventually turn out to be? That gritty voice still sounded authentic and vital, and I hadn't yet discovered that most of Rod Stewart's songs were actually better when sung by the original artists. (I'll never get over my Beatles-inspired conviction that a real artist writes his own material.) Later on I'd get hep to the fact that Rod Stewart wasn't much of a songwriter, but he did write "Maggie May" himself -- let's give him a pass. And give "Reason to Believe" a pass, too, just because it was written by neglected genius Tim Hardin. ("If I Were a Carpenter" was a fine song, dammit!)
I was still a radio listener in 1971, and "Maggie May" practically jumped out of the speakers at me, earning my devotion with that one line: "It's late September and I really should be back at school." As a newly-minted college student myself, somehow I identified with this scenario of a randy young guy entwined in the wiles of an older woman. I'd never been in anything even remotely like that situation, but that didn't stop me. Maybe even then I liked the idea that an older woman could be sexually preferable to the girls his own age. Nowadays we'd call her a "cougar," I guess, and make a convenient joke out of it. But he's no gigolo, that's for sure; the power in this relationship is all with her.
Forget all those folky guitar twiddlings in the intro; this song really begins with two whomping drum beats, then Rod's desperate croak, "Wake up Maggie, I think I've got something to say to you." His attachment to Maggie is intriguing and complicated -- he knows she's used him, she's "made a first-class fool out of me." The hoarseness of Rod's voice enhances our image of a kid who's being run ragged by this voracious older woman. ("Older" meaning, what, thirty? Horrors!) But come on, there's genuine tenderness in his voice as he sings "the morning sun when it's in your face really shows your age / But that don't worry me none, in my eyes you're ev'rything." I'm not surprised that Stewart claims it was written from his own experience (he never went to university -- too busy trying out to be a footballer -- but that's a minor point). He may have turned into a cynical slagger later, but this early in his career he still wore his heart on his sleeve, and it got to me.
"Maggie May" was originally the B-side of this single, but thanks to that May-December romantic plot, it snowballed in popularity until it became the hit everyone remembers. Let's not write off "Reason to Believe," though. The emotional landscape here is just as rocky: "If I listened long enough to you / I’d find a way to believe that it’s all true / Knowing that you lied straight-faced while I cried / Still I look to find a reason to believe." There's a jolt of psychological wisdom here -- haven't we all dabbled in this sort of relationship? Someone who gets you so twisted up that you can't walk away?
And Rod sings it with gut-wrenching regret -- "Someone like you / Makes it hard to live without / Somebody else." The convoluted grammar tells you everything about his messed-up state of mind. I love the part of the record where he strips away all the busy guitars and the pleading mandolin and just sings it a capella, doggedly repeating the refrain, aspirating the H on "hard" with a deep and weary sigh. His phrasing on this is magnificent, fearlessly digging into the emotions of it. Good on you, Rod.
Years later, I discovered that Rod Stewart was a schoolmate of Ray Davies -- I think they even played football together -- though I'm not sure that's a reason to believe in Rod Stewart. He quickly turned into a parody of himself, with his succession of hot blond wives, his perma-tan and artfully streaked shag, the tight trousers and silk shirt unbuttoned to the waist. Frankly, I blocked the fact that I once owned Every Picture Tells A Story; not just owned it, but listened to it A LOT. I'd sit on my dorm bed slamming the bedposts to those drum whacks on "Maggie May"; I'd sing along to "Reason to Believe," urging my voice into its own raw edges. Working up this 100 Best Singles List, those songs came back to haunt me. I can't deny them now.
