Archives for July 2015

Certain Songs #267: Danny & Dusty – “The Word is Out”

July 31, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: The Lost Weekend
Year: 1985

“Danny” was Dan Stuart of Green on Red, and “Dusty” was Steve Wynn of The Dream Syndicate, and in early 1985, they convened in a studio in Los Angeles with a bunch of their friends and spend 36 beer-and-whiskey fueled hours recording one of my all-time favorite one-off records, The Lost Weekend.

Populating the album with an endless series of boozers, dreamers and losers, Danny & Dusty — along with ringers Sid Griffin, Stephen McCarthy & Tom Stevens from The Long Ryders, Dennis Duck of The Dream Syndicate & MVP Chris Cavacas of Green on Red — cobbled together an album that sounded like The Replacements decided to follow Let it Be with a boozy, fucked-up version of Let it Bleed.

Certain Songs #266: Dan Bern – “God Said No”

July 30, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: New American Language
Year: 2001

In a weird way, “God Said No” just might be the ultimate Dan Bern song. For a guy who (tongue-in-cheek) sang “I am The Messiah” on the first song on he debut album, writing a whole song about a conversation where he basically asks God to let him alter history isn’t out of the pale.

That said, “God Said No” shows unusual pathos about human weaknesses and God’s understanding as such. The result is a lyric that resonates regardless of your personal belief system. After all, he could be making the exact same requests of The Doctor.

Certain Songs #265: Dan Bern – “Simple”

July 29, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: Smartie Mine
Year: 1999

Dan Bern’s most ambitious move to date was 1999’s two-CD Smartie Mine, a rock-solid collection of folk-punk tunes that also allowed him to stretch out with remakes and covers and craft great songs on subjects like Pete Rose, Marilyn Manson, Vincent Van Gogh, Tiger Woods and his own feelings about being a “New Dylan.”

Two discs meant that he also could stretch the song lengths, with songs establishing a riff and riding it for several minutes, like the two songs that end the first-disc, the piano-driven “Ballerina” and slide-guitar-filled “Simple.”

Certain Songs #264: Dan Bern – “Marilyn”

July 28, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: Dan Bern
Year: 1997

They don’t really make “New Dylans” any more, do they? That was a big thing for a very long time: the singer-songwriter who was going to somehow takeover the mythical place in the cosmos previously occupied by Bob Dylan.

However, after a half-century of getting their asses kicked by the old Dylan, that concept has pretty much fallen by the wayside.

There were a lot of singer-songwriters who got the “New Dylan” hype were pretty awesome. For example, Bruce Springsteen, who you might have heard of. Or Dan Bern, who had the temerity to actually sound like Dylan.

Certain Songs #263: Curtis Mayfield – “Superfly”

July 27, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: Super Fly
Year: 1972.

Back in the mid-70s, whenever this song came on KYNO 1300 AM, it always kinda weirded me out.

While the Super Fly soundtrack was a huge enough cultural phenomenon to land two hard funk songs into the pop top ten, the first of those singles, “Freddie’s Dead,” at least felt like other R&B hit singles I’d heard by folks like Marvin Gaye & Isaac Hayes.

But “Superfly” made no damn sense to me at all.

Certain Songs #262: The Cure – “Just Like Heaven”

July 26, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me
Year: 1987

If The Cure’s reputation was based in part upon the massive gothic movement spearheaded by Joy Division (which is a totally reductive thing to say), then some of my favorite Cure songs were based upon the dancey guitar music created by New Order.

Which is also pretty reductive thing to say, but the fact is that two of my all-time favorite Cure songs are what I call The Cure’s New Order songs: “In Between Days” (which I didn’t write about because I really didn’t have much to say beyond this New Order thing) and of course, “Just Like Heaven.” One time is an experiment, but two times is a concept.

Certain Songs #261: The Cure – “Push”

July 25, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: The Head on The Door
Year: 1985

Even at my mid-20s gloomiest, I never fully bought into Robert Smith’s persona. And while I could tell that he was a pretty great — and eclectic as hell — maker of radio-friendly pop songs, I never really got past enjoying them on the radio.

So I was neither surprised, offended or cheered when The Cure became gigantic international superstars on the back of Smith’s outsized goth persona and right-sized songwriting acumen. Even in the 80s, the audience was already fragmenting, I could respect the hell out of what he did without ever fully loving it except for a song here and a song there.

Certain Songs #260: Culture – “Calling Rasta For I”

July 24, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: Two Sevens Clash
Year: 1977.

One of the great pleasures of doing “Certain Songs” — especially right now, when I have an insane amount of time to devote to each post — is listening to and doing research on albums that I’ve always loved but I haven’t heard in full for a very long time.

I always get reminded what attracted me to these records in the first place as well as being reminded of their place in history.

Certain Songs #259: Crosby, Stills & Nash: “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes (Live at Woodstock)”

July 23, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: Woodstock – Music From The Original Soundtrack
Year: 1969

We never really described it as such, but during the late 70s and early 80s Tim & I were on a quest to see every rock n roll performance that had ever been captured on film. It was secondary to our quests to see every concert and buy every record, but it was still definitely a thing.

In practical sense, this usually meant going to the midnite movies at the Tower Theater, where we’d saw everything from Jimi Plays Berkeley to D.O.A., but it also meant seeing a double bill of Rust Never Sleeps and Rock ‘n’ Roll High School at the Moon-glo Drive-in and renting a VHS of Blow-Up just to fast-forward to the part where Jimmy Page & Jeff Beck were playing together.

Certain Songs #258: Creedence Clearwater Revival – “Ramble Tamble”

July 22, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: Cosmo’s Factory
Year: 1970

It goes without saying that Creedence Clearwater Revival were American originals, and still one of the greatest singles bands ever.

And in fact, those singles were so dominant on the radio of my youth and in the albums that I own, I’ve only ever loved one of their albums start-to-finish: 1970’s titanic Cosmo’s Factory

Of course, that just might be because Cosmo’s Factory starts with their greatest non-single — and quite possibly their greatest song — the onomatopoetically-named “Ramble Tamble,” which was once named by The A.V. Club as “The Most Rockin’ Song of All-Time.”