Arts and Entertainment
‘Bulo’s Fave Tunes: July 2019
I’ve discovered so many great tunes this year that I don’t know how I can shoehorn the best into a mere Top 50 at year’s end. Top 100, maybe? Talk me down. But only after you’ve listened to this month’s trove of musical treasures:
Song of the Day 7/30: Five Americans, “Western Union”
Technological progress has rendered some old songs obsolete — “Please Mr. Postman” and “The Letter,” for example, are set in an era when people still used snail mail to communicate with each other. Or consider telephone songs, especially ones in which the singer talks to an operator, like “Memphis, Tennessee” — most people haven’t spoken […]
Song of the Day 7/29: 10cc, “Oh Effendi”
This was written in the wake of the first Arab oil embargo, but it’s remarkable how little the geopolitics of the Middle East have changed in decades since. The only big difference is that we no longer have to use gun-runners to sell weapons to sheiks and mullahs — we do it right out in […]
Song of the Day 7/26: Rod Stewart, “True Blue”
The lead-off track to “Never a Dull Moment,” the 1972 follow-up album to Stewart’s mega-hit “Every Picture Tells a Story,” finds Rod the Mod struggling with his new-found success. Like many of Stewart’s solo records from the period, it’s hard to hear any difference from his work with the Faces, and no wonder — it’s […]
Song of the Day 7/25: Sly and the Family Stone, “Hot Fun in the Summertime”
Though it’s a quintessential summer song, the single, recorded for an album but rushed into release shortly after the band’s triumphant set at Woodstock, didn’t reach its No. 2 chart position until October of 1969. As a summertime anthem, this might be Sly’s most-covered composition. An early-’80s funk band from Dayton, Ohio, called Dayton, gave […]
Song of the Day 7/24: Toots and the Maytals, “Monkey Man”
Jane Goodall met Prince Harry yesterday and they enacted a “chimpanzee greeting.” As you can see at the link, it’s not much different from a human greeting, because we are basically near-hairless, smarter, weaker chimps. Toots and the Maytals released the song in 1969, inspired by Toots losing a woman to a guy who, he […]
Song of the Day 7/23: The National, “Secret Meeting”
I once heard The National described as “REM for the 21st century,” and the comparison makes some sense. Both groups are guitar-driven alternative bands that feature inward-looking, literate, cryptic lyrics and vocals by their brooding front men. Both write songs that, as the rock-crit adage has it, reward repeated listens. This song, which led off […]
Song of the Day 7/22: Dave Mason, “We Just Disagree”
A message for people who know who they are. Dave Mason is one of those rockers who, like Mick Ronson, was famous as a sideman but never became a front-rank star himself. He’s best known as a founding member of Traffic, a group he subsequently left and rejoined several times. He also did a good […]
Song of the Day 7/20: Aaron Neville and Jim Henson (as Ernie), “I Don’t Want to Live on the Moon”
It’s been 50 years since we got there and there’s still nobody living on the moon. Heck, we don’t even visit any more. But that’s not really what this Sesame Street classic is about. Composed by Jeff Moss, one of the show’s staff writers, it first appeared on TV in 1978, sung by Jim Henson […]
Song of the Day 7/19: Jonathan King, “Everyone’s Gone to the Moon”
The 50th anniversary of the first moon landing has triggered a wave of nostalgia for the space race of the ’60s. This song was written and recorded in 1965 by British hitmaker Jonathan King, who was still a student at Cambridge at the time. He said later that the lyrics were his attempt to satirize […]
Song of the Day 7/18: Johnny Clegg, “Scatterlings of Africa”
South African musician and anthropologist Johnny Clegg, who died Tuesday at age 66, had a brief window of exposure in the U.S. back in the ’80s, when apartheid came under increased pressure from most other industrialized countries. Clegg’s bands Juluka and Savuka, each formed by Clegg and a native African, broke the country’s laws simply […]
Song of the Day 7/17: The Gourds, “Gin and Juice”
Snoop Dogg wrote and Dr. Dre produced this hip-hop classic in 1994, and the Gourds covered it less than two years later. An alt-country band from Austin, The Gourds recorded 10 albums before going on hiatus six years ago, but this cover of Snoop Dogg’s hit, sped up and changed to a major key, was […]
Song of the Day 7/16: Roomie ft. Christine O’Donnell, “I’m Not a Witch”
Hey kidz, ‘memba the innocent days of nine years ago? Mike Castle was running for Senate and when he was challenged by Christine O’Donnell we all had a good laugh. When she released her still-infamous campaign ad, the Gregory Brothers were there to Songify it. It was just one of a string of hilarious but […]
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