Country Manners

This was a huge crossover hit. Back then, that meant parents were listening to the same songs their kids were.

I've remarked elsewhere that vernacular music has a distinctly regional accent when it's performed by people of another country, and this is no exception. It seems that, in Canada, even their country music is polite.

Here's Anne Murray with her first U.S hit, "Snowbird".

What the Song Is Really About

You know those songs that remind you of relationships so intensely passionate you think you'll never recover?

Together Alone, the album from Crowded House, is full of those songs for me. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that "Fingers Of Love", from that album, is about -- ta da!!! -- masturbation. So, this one's probably about having a fender-bender in rush-hour traffic because you're driving into the setting sun. Ugh!

Crowded House, live, with a song from Together Alone, called "Distant Sun".

Emo Americana Summer Playlist

Lemony cologne. Picnic blankets. Potato salad. No-bake cookies. Open windows. Ice by the bucketful. Fireworks. Bug bites. Sea and Ski "Suntan Lotion". Those dreams where you feel like you're being tossed by ocean waves whenever you turn over in your sleep. And these songs.

Memories of summer.

Gotta Travel On; Bill Monroe: Some people never shake that itchy, spring-into-summer feeling. Bill Monroe gives himself away, redeeming a song from the Folk Scare in the process.

Twelve Thirty (Young Girls Are Coming To The Canyon); The Mamas and The Papas: I see two sides to this one -- the terrible fates that befell so many of the girls, and a repressed narrator experiencing a summer of the spirit, if you will.

The Poacher; Ronnie Lane and Slim Chance: Gorgeous orchestration; the notes skip like sunlight on the water. Is this the harsh reality of an otherwise gentle, English summer?

City Folks Call Us Poor; Larry Sparks, feat. Cheryl and Sharon White: Ex-Clinch Mountain Boy, Larry Sparks, describes, in loving detail, the kind of summer not everyone can appreciate. Everyone should get off their high horse.

Rocky Mountain High; John Denver: Like The Beach Boys, John Denver could make musical instruments sound like summer; how could you place those orchestral guitars anywhere else in time? Add to that the sheer poetry of nature, and you have the quintessential summer song.

Roseville Fair; Nanci Griffith: Raise your hand if you ever took in the fair with the love of your life. 🙋 Nanci Griffith and an all-star cast help give this track that old-time country feel.

For Your Love; Humble Pie: As hot as the season itself, and just as unconscious of the temporary nature of passion.

Because; The Beatles: Puts a period at the end of the sentence that was 1960s psychedelia. Unabashedly influenced by those shamans of summer, The Beach Boys.

The Warmth Of The Sun; The Beach Boys: Seriously, you didn't expect a summer playlist without these guys, did you? "I'm sad, but I'm at peace with it"? Saddest song on this list, but it hints at what a rock Brian Wilson really is.

Blue; The Jayhawks: Summer's end. If The Beach Boys had been country, they'd have sounded like this.

Ten Favorite Post-Millennial Records

I apologize to all the artists who'll be mortified to learn that a boomer who is not their parents likes their music.

It all started with a song you'll expect to find on my list. The song, Coldplay's "Clocks", isn't on it, but has a place of honor in the story of how I finally came to terms with the fact that I was an adult.

The year was 2003. We were sitting in the theater, watching the trailer for the live-action adaptation of Peter Pan, scored with "Clocks". Imagine the sense of peace that came over me when I found myself sympathizing with Mr. and Mrs. Darling, over their missing kids. "I. Am. An. Adult," I thought. "And I'm good with that."

Yes, I'm an adult, and a boomer besides. And now, here we are with this list.

Artists I was predisposed to listen to (e.g. Mogwai, Jose González, Magnetic Fields, Neko Case, The New Pornographers) don't count. Ditto obvious song choices like Coldplay's "Clocks", "It's Been Awhile" from Staind, and "Pumped Up Kicks" by Foster The People.

Millennials, prepare to be mortified.

Happy; Pharrell Williams: Because who doesn't want more old-school Motown sound? The universality is as infectious as the groove, and Williams' cool jazz style contrasts beautifully with the unfettered joy of the lyrics.

Rumour Has It; Adele: It's got a good beat, and you can dance to it (boomers shall understand), but the beat is supplied by war drums, as befits a song about gossip in the Information Age.

Take A Bow; Rihanna: And, in an age when everybody crafts their personal dramas to be reality-show-ready, Rihanna delivers the ultimate insult: "You look so dumb right now".

Somewhere Only We Know; Keane: A striking moment in millennial culture, this realization that privacy just might save you, and your relationship, too.

Bust Your Windows; Jazmine Sullivan: It was supposed to work -- it was. Jazmine Sullivan, hoping against hope that her target is thinking the same thing.

Mas; Kinky: Polyrythmic grooves for those who missed music in the vein of Santana's early work. I first heard this track in Episode 6 of Kingpin -- the drug family soap opera miniseries, not the Farrelly Brothers flick.

The Man Who Can't Be Moved; The Script: Remarkably sweet-natured for a song that's borderline stalker-ish. Aside from that, Daniel O'Donoghue has one of the lushest voices on this list, and the group harmonies are something I'll never tire of.

99 Problems; Danger Mouse: This version comes from Mouse's The Grey Album, which featured mashups of songs from Jay-Z's The Black Album and The Beatles' self-titled record, popularly known as The White Album. I expect this choice can be viewed as misogynistic, and I reckon it is, coming out of some mouths. That said, the titular line has become a catchphrase used by people on all points of the gender spectrum, which feels like nothing so much as empowerment.

The Infanta; The Decemberists: The Decemberists are the sort of band about which you think, "They sound insufferable" when you first read about them. Then, somebody spins their debut album, and you realize that Picaresque will forever be the album that every music/drama/art/dance geek needed in high school, and needs still.

Ten Records That Made Me Pull Over

Let's be real: Every music nerd worth the name has had way more than 10 of these. This is just the list I remember today.

"Records" because I hate it when people refer to excerpts from classical works as "songs", which they're generally not unless you're talking Schubert. Or Copland.

Can you dig it? I knew that you could. Here we go.

Guinnevere; Crosby, Stills and Nash: Seems to proceed out of Vince Guaraldi's "Cast Your Fate To The Wind", which I knew and loved. There's a little bit of Daphne DuMaurier's Rebecca, and her hapless replacement -- also known and loved -- here too. 

A song that has lost none of its power to haunt this listener, and inspire hope for the rescue of a woman trapped forever in the wooden memories of an inanimate object madder even than Guinnevere herself.

(What A) Wonderful World; Art Garfunkel, feat. Paul Simon and James Taylor: The arrangement was too elevator-friendly by half, but, oh, those voices! Nobody but Crosby, Stills and Nash was singing like this at that time, and that union was always touch and go.

Love Is Like Oxygen; Sweet: Could just as easily have been "Addicted To Love", which provoked the same reaction when I first heard it. And then, I saw that video .... So, Sweet takes it. There's just something about riff rock (Green River, Long Cool Woman, Dwight Twilley's I'm On Fire) that puts your whole day right.

Bonus: Slightly-delusional lyrics. Also, two great riffs in one -- that synthesized, French Horn opener, and the crunchy guitar. 

No apologies.

Stories We Could Tell; Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers: I had seen this tour, and was still marveling that some New Wave cat (that'd be Bobby Valentino of The Fabulous Poodles) had sounded every bit as country on the fiddle as Roy Acuff. Then, they released a live version with Valentino as the B side of ... something, and I was done.

Stop Draggin' My Heart Around; Stevie Nicks, feat. Tom Petty: This was smart, it was lean, it was tough, and it boasted a frontwoman.  It's impossible to state how different it was from anything that had come before.

The Köln Concert; Keith Jarrett: A lot of water under the bridge, and a lot of soulless, brunchy imitators can't rob this record of its beauty or its power. A magnificent achievement that captivates from the first few notes. Like being lost in the storm-tossed ocean without ever drowning.

Bury My Lovely; The October Project: Kate Bush without all the silly, rich-girl trappings. Completely, utterly, and appropriately serious, yet just as utterly without pretense.

The Water Music Suite No. 1 in F major, HWV 348: VII. Bourree, Georg Friderich Händel; Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Gerard Schwartz, cond.: Improv, baroque style, courtesy of virtuoso oboist, Alan Vogel. 

I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry; The Holly Cole Trio: A musical banquet of country, jazz, gospel, and old-style hymn singing. The lonesome streak that runs a mile wide through all those genres makes it work in a way some cheap, exploitative "crossover" hit never could.

Tennessee Blues: J.D. Crowe and The New South: From the first, halting notes of the banjo, this George Jones cover announces an unshakable soul sickness of the kind you can only catch when you're forced to act all homey in a place  that makes you feel homeless.