Arts and Entertainment
Song of the Day 10/20: Tom Jones and the Cardigans, “Burning Down the House”
I thought Jan. 6, 2021, made clear what the MAGA Republicans wanted to do to Congress, so the current House fire is no great surprise. I blame voters for handing them the matches. The Talking Heads’ funkiest tune, inspired by a Parliament/Funkadelic concert, became their highest-charting U.S. single, No. 9 in 1983. But the song […]
Song of the Day 10/19: Vince Taylor, “Brand New Cadillac”
Americans might be forgiven for thinking British rock and roll began with the Beatles. The Merseybeat sound they represented seemed to grow from meager roots – skiffle, the craze that dominated the late ’50s and early ’60s in England, sounded like jug-band music to Americans. The British reaction to Elvis Presley and the rest of […]
Song of the Day 11/18: The Grateful Dead, “Touch of Grey”
The media hasn’t had time to remind you lately, what with a couple of wars and a couple of Trump trials and Republicans In Disarray Chapter XII, but Joe Biden is older today than he was last week, which is the last time they checked in on that emerging story. Robert Hunter was not yet […]
Song of the Day 10/17: Sly and the Family Stone, “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)”
Sly Stone, much to my surprise, is still alive. Now 80, he’s released a memoir, titled after his No. 1 hit “Thank You ((Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin),” something I learned when this CBS Sunday Morning piece turned up in my YouTube feed. The book is the product of hundreds of interview sessions with Ben […]
Song of the Day 10/16: Mickey Dolenz, “Shiny Happy People”
Rock is deep into its post-modern phase. How else to explain 78-year-old Mickey Dolenz, the last surviving Monkee, releasing an EP of R.E.M. covers? Well, maybe as time being a flat circle – R.E.M. was one of the first bands to cite the Monkees as an influence. “Shiny Happy People” might be the song that […]
Song of the Day 10/15: Madness, “Michael Caine”
Iconic British actor Michael Caine announced yesterday on BBC Radio that, at 90 years old, he’s retiring. “I keep saying I’m going to retire. Well, I am now. I’ve figured, I’ve had a picture where I’ve played the lead and it’s got incredible reviews. The only parts I’m likely to get now are old men.” […]
Song of the Day 10/14: Joni Mitchell, “Banquet”
For Paul and El Som, by request. The original arrangement on “For the Roses” features Joni on piano, but this full band concert performance from her film 1983 film “Refuge of the Roads” brings the song to greater life. The music starts at 1:46, but the old film footage preceding and punctuating it puts the […]
Song of the Day 10/13: Cyndi Lauper, “Money Changes Everything”
What makes so many politicians succumb to the lure of lucre? I think Cyndi Lauper summed it up. Actually, a guy named Tom Gray, who led an Atlanta new wave band in the late ’70s, summed it up first on an indie label in 1978, and did it so well that it got the Brains […]
Song of the Day 10/11: Talking Heads, “Life During Wartime”
The Talking Heads concert film “Stop Making Sense” is getting as much critical acclaim in its recent rerelease as it did when it opened in theaters back in 1984, maybe because the band’s sense of apocalyptic absurdity fits our present reality so well. Enjoy it while you can. As this New Yorker piece makes clear, […]
Song of the Day 10/10: U2, “Pride (In the Name of Love)”
Did Hamas deliberately single out the Tribe of Nova trance music festival, where they massacred at least 260 people and took an unknown number hostage? It wouldn’t be the first time terrorists have struck a music audience – the attack on an Eagles of Death Metal concert in Paris’ Bataclan killed 90 people and wounded […]
Song of the Day 10/7: Fred Neil, “Dolphins”
Guest post by Nathan Arizona Fred Neil wrote a sad, beautiful and enduring song called “The Dolphins” as a Greenwich Village folk singer in the mid-1960s. “I’ve been searching for the dolphins in the sea,” he sang plaintively. He doesn’t find them. Neil, who suffered from stage fright, soon dropped out of the music business […]
Song of the Day 10/6: The Sex Pistols, “Pretty Vacant”
They would never admit it, even to themselves, but the Freedom Caucus apparently is in favor of anarchy in the U.S. House, which makes the Sex Pistols the perfect soundtrack for their exercise in nihilism. According to original bassist Glen Matlock, who wrote the song, “‘Pretty Vacant’ is a primal scream kind of thing: We […]
Song of the Day 10/5: The Kinks, “Situation Vacant”
With a tip o’ the sombrero to El Som. Yoohoo, anybody home? House Republicans are demonstrating that maybe men do too think about the Roman Empire too much, and no that good comes of it. One online reviewer called this tune “a classic Ray Davies character piece in which ambition leads to misery.” That sounds […]
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