Posts tagged with song of the day
Van Morrison- “Listen to the Lion”
Harry Belafonte- “On Top of Old Smokey”
Meeting is a pleasure,
but parting is grief,
An Unconstant Lover
is worse than a Thief
A Thief he can but Rob me,
and take what I have,
But an Unconstant Lover
will bring me to the Grave.
The text above is from the earliest transcription of the ballad that would eventually become “On Top of Old Smokey.” It was known more commonly at this time (around 1683) as “Meeting’s a pleasure” or “The Young-Man’s Lamentation.”
In 1962, Harry Belafonte recorded his own version of this tune for The Midnight Special, one of his best-known albums of jazzed-up traditional music. The album is probably best remembered for the appearance of a 20-year-old harmonica player named Bob Dylan on its title track- apparently a big diva in the recording booth. He walked out after only one (blues-drenched) take. Come on, Rob, don’t you know studio harmonica players are a dime-a-dozen?
Years later, Dylan’s attitude improved significantly.
Belafonte’s “On Top of Old Smokey” is the kind of achievement that makes you understand why pop musicians become compelled to mine traditional songs for new possibilities (so forgive the String Cheese Incident “Pretty Polly”!) The success of this song is as much due to the dynamic and tense arrangement as the commanding vocal performance. Harry interpolates some of the best lyrics in any century’s version of the ballad: “If I ever see that Eastman/I’ll shoot him with my gun/I’ll cut him with my long Jones/And dare that pimp to run.” I’d like to see that written in calligraphy!!!
Those lyrics, coupled with the trumpet blasts, eerie string swells and gunshot bombs on the drum kit…music doesn’t get much better.
Sonny Sharrock- “As We Used to Sing”
More amazing things from Sonny Sharrock (with Elvin Jones and Pharaoh Sanders).
Erma Franklin- “Piece of my Heart”
Oh, here’s the song. Why isn’t this the one we listen to?
Bobby Darin- “Artificial Flowers”
Figure 1 for possible B.D. research paper: here we have Bobby Darin, in full-on cheese mode, ecstatically delivering lyrics that read like the text to an Edward Gorey picture book. Sometimes I think Bobby just memorized all his words by sounding out the syllables; this would explain his steadfast commitment to delivering all of them with the same basic timbre and intensity. In the case of “Artificial Flowers,” the Darin anti-interpretation (sturdily reinforced by the band’s arrangement) results in a memorable and truly bizarre performance. Imagine if he actually tried to emote these schmaltzy lyrics! We wouldn’t be here talking about it. Here, he is neither parodying the song or enacting it- he is just delivering it, as only he can. His odd facial contortions are not meant to correspond with the travails of Annie, but are just things he believes he has to do in order to produce certain types of sounds. His phrasing choices are based upon some hermetic internal logic about which I cannot speculate. His refusal to open his eyes fully at any point during the performance makes us feel that he is mentally and spiritually far away from us. And what can one say about that little grapevine at the end? I almost feel like I am intruding when I watch this, as if the true drama here is going on entirely inside Bobby’s head and we are not meant to know anything about it.
El-P- “Tougher Colder Killer” (feat. Killer Mike and Despot)
It gets going at 1:20.
“Train of Life”- Merle Haggard and the Strangers
Hag breathes all sorts of life into this unassuming Roger Miller song.
Ed. Note- At some point R.O. will stop almost exclusively featuring links to George Jones and Merle Haggard ballads, but I’m no hurry.
George Crumb- Star-Child
I saw the American Symphony perform this and two other massive Crumb orchestral pieces last night. The “Music of the Spheres” ostinato in the strings put me into some sort of insane trance, especially in the last section. This is scary stuff- also, remarkable. Track #6 of this album is the start of Star-Child.
(Source: Spotify)
(Source: Spotify)
