This is a song that should have been a bigger hit. Mick Jagger and Paul McCartney were fans of this song. Dave Davies remembered Paul jokingly telling him “You bastards! How dare you! I should have made that record!”
This song is about the loss of Ray’s sister, who lived for a time in Ontario, Canada. Upon her return to England she developed a sickness and died while dancing at a night club. Just before she died she gave Ray his first guitar for his 13th birthday.
He wrote the song while traveling in India years later when he heard about the significance of the Ganges river in the Indian death ritual. Two years later he again used the metaphor of crossing a river in his beautiful song Waterloo Sunset.
The song peaked at #10 on the UK Charts in 1965.
Ray Davies:“A bit more care should have been taken with it. I think (producer) Shel Talmy went too far in trying to keep in the rough edges. Some of the double tracking on that is appalling. It had better songs on it than the first album, but it wasn’t executed in the right way. It was just far too rushed.”
Ray Davies:“It’s more about you’ve lost the female love of your life, therefore you only have your friends left. That little interchange – ‘She is gone’ – is the sound of someone who is completely distraught. It’s more about camaraderie than homosexuality. But then it borders on that. You go out for a pint with the blokes and then it gets to that moment… (whispery laughter) and they’re singing to one another pissed, and they hug one another.”
See My Friends
See my friends,
See my friends,
Layin’ ‘cross the river,
See my friends,
See my friends,
Layin’ ‘cross the river,
She is gone,
She is gone and now there’s no one left
‘cept my friends,
Layin’ ‘cross the river,
She just went,
She just went,
Went across the river.
Now she’s gone,
Now she’s gone,
Wish that I’d gone with her.
She is gone,
She is gone and now there’s no one left
‘cept my friends,
Layin’ ‘cross the river,
She is gone and now there’s no one else to take her place
She is gone and now there’s no one else to love
‘cept my friends,
Layin’ ‘cross the river,
See my friends,
See my friends,
Layin’ ‘cross the river,
See my friends,
See my friends,
Layin’ ‘cross the river,
If you tried to giverock ‘n’ roll another name, you might call it Chuck Berry…John Lennon
Chuck Berry is the father of rock and roll. His guitar paved the way but most importantly his poetry with his writing. He used rhyme and more reason to weave his songs into the fabric of society. If you were a teenager in the 1950s you understood No Particular Place To Go and his other songs. He used cars as a symbol of freedom much like Bruce Springsteen would do years later.
Berry’s assistant, Francine Gillium, told Berry about the High School that she worked at and helped him get in the right mindset to write these songs about teenagers. He mostly stayed away from politics and topical references in his songs…which is why many are relatable today.
Sweet Little Sixteen, the second-biggest pop hit of his career next to the terrible My Ding-a-Ling. Chuck wrote this song when he was on a package tour, and came across a teenage autograph-seeker who was insistent upon getting the autograph of each headliner on the tour.
The most important collaborator that Chuck had was Johnnie Johnson. He was a piano player who collaborated with Berry on many songs, including “Maybellene,” “Roll Over Beethoven” and “Sweet Little Sixteen.” Johnson often wrote songs on the piano, and then Berry converted them to guitar and wrote lyrics. Berry joined Johnson’s group, The Sir John Trio, in 1953, and quickly became the lead singer and centerpiece of the band.
There is a controversy that Johnson came up with a lot of the riffs that Chuck used and Berry would transpose them from piano to guitar. In 2000, Johnson sued Chuck Berry, alleging he deserved co-composer credits (and royalties) for dozens of songs, including No Particular Place to Go, Sweet Little Sixteen, and Roll Over Beethoven, which credit Berry alone. The case was eventually dismissed because too many years had passed since the songs in dispute were written. Keith Richards has talked about this also… he is a huge fan of Chuck but also a huge fan of Johnnie Johnson.
Sweet Little Sixteen
They’re really rockin’ Boston
In Pittsburgh, PA
Deep in the heart of Texas
And ’round the ‘Frisco Bay
All over St. Louis
And down in New Orleans
All the cats wanna dance with
Sweet Little Sixteen
Sweet Little Sixteen
She’s just got to have
About half a million
Famed autographs
Her wallet filled with pictures
She gets ’em one by one
Becomes so excited
Watch her, look at her run, boy
Oh, mommy, mommy
Please, may I go?
It’s such a sight to see
Somebody steal the show
Oh, daddy, daddy
I beg of you
Whisper to mommy
It’s all right with you
‘Cause they’ll be rockin’ on Bandstand
In Philadelphia, PA
Deep in the heart of Texas
And ’round the ‘Frisco Bay
All over St. Louis
Way down in New Orleans
All the cats wanna dance with
Sweet Little Sixteen
‘Cause they’ll be rockin’ on Bandstand
Philadelphia, PA
Deep in the heart of Texas
And ’round the ‘Frisco Bay
All over St. Louis
Way down in New Orleans
All the cats wanna dance with, ooh
Sweet Little Sixteen
Sweet Little Sixteen
She’s got the grown up blues
Tight dresses and lipstick
She’s sportin’ high heel shoes
Oh, but tomorrow morning
She’ll have to change her trend
And be sweet sixteen
And back in class again
But they’ll be rockin’ in Boston
Pittsburgh, PA
Deep in the heart of Texas
And ’round the ‘Frisco Bay
Way out in St. Louis
Way down in New Orleans
All the cats wanna dance with
Sweet Little Sixteen
This was the Journey I really liked…before a member left (Gregg Rolie) and one was added (Jonathan Cain)…and they became more radio-friendly with Escape. It comes down to my personal tastes. Gregg Rolie played a B4 organ and sounded great and Cain played an 80’s Casio (just kidding but…) synth…it changed the music completely…but it did make them more accessible to the masses…so yea I’m in the minority.
This song was on the album Infinity. Personally…my favorite Journey album is Departure. The three I listen to are Infinity, Evolution, and Departure. The albums before were prog albums and the ones after…more 80’s radio pop. With those three albums, they were more of a rock band.
The origin of this song is interesting. It started off as a poem by Diane Valory, the wife of Journey bassist Ross Valory. The band’s first vocalist, Robert Fleischman, wrote new lyrics, and guitarist Neal Schon wrote the melody on acoustic guitar in the back seat of a station wagon while the band was driving between shows.
This song was the first single to chart for the band. Before this album, they were more of a progressive band. With this single and the next two albums, they started building themselves up in the charts to lay the groundwork for superstardom in the eighties.
The song peaked at #57 on the Billboard 100 and #45 in Canada in 1978.
Wheel In The Sky
Winter is here again, oh Lord
Haven’t been home in a year or more
I hope she holds on a little longer
Sent a letter on a long summer day
Made of silver, not of clay
Ooh, I’ve been runnin’ down this dusty road
Ooh, the wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’
I don’t know where I’ll be tomorrow
Wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’
I’ve been trying to make it home
Got to make it before too long
Ooh, I can’t take this very much longer, no
I’m stranded in the sleet and rain
Don’t think I’m ever gonna make it home again
The morning sun is risin’
It’s kissin’ the day
Ooh, the wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’
I don’t’ know where I’ll be tomorrow
Wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’, whoa, whoa, whoa
My, my, my, my, my
For tomorrow
Oh, the wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’
Ooh, I don’t know where I’ll be tomorrow
Wheel in the sky keeps me yearnin’
Ooh, I don’t know, I don’t know where
Oh, the wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’
Ooh, I don’t know where I’ll be tomorrow
Wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’
Ooh, I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know
Wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’
Don’t know where I’ll be tomorrow
Ooh, the wheel in the sky keeps turnin’
Wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’
It’s a rare event that I post a top ten song of the eighties but this song was a cover and I didn’t know that for the longest. In the 80s my favorite female singers of that time were Maria McKee from Lone Justice and Patty Smyth of Scandal. As far as mainstream artists…I did like Cyndi Lauper and Pat Benatar at the time. My then-girlfriend played Lauper constantly so I gradually started to like her music like Money Changes Everything.
This song was her breakout song and never did I think it was a cover. She released an album in 1981 as a member of the group Blue Angel, but “Girls Just Want To Have Fun” made her famous. She turned the song into a 1980s anthem. The song was on the album She’s So Unusual released in 1983.
Singer/songwriter named Robert Hazard, who had a band called Robert Hazard and the Heroes, wrote it and released it in 1979. It was much more rock guitar based than Lauper’s version.
Lauper had trouble recording the song. They tried it in different ways but nothing worked. Lauper listened to Come On Eileen and was inspired by that…they did it in that tempo and it worked.
The song peaked at #2 on the Billboard 100, #1 in Canada, #1 in New Zealand, and #2 in the UK in 1983. She would have two number 1’s in Billboard with Time After Time and True Colors.
The album She’s So Unusual peaked at #4 on the Billboard Album Charts, #1 in Canada, #3 in New Zealand, and #16 in the UK. She had 5 charting singles off of that album…four top 5 songs including a number 1 and one top 30 song.
The video made for the song features the wrestler Captain Lou Albano as Lauper’s father, and also Lauper’s real-life mother, who had no acting experience. It won the first ever award for Best Female Video at the 1984 MTV Video Music Awards. Albano was also in her next video, “Time After Time.”
What’s an eighties song without a parody from Weird Al?… “Girls Just Wanna Have Lunch.” He said he didn’t want to make fun of women so he kept it at lunch. Lauper said: “I like Weird Al. I LOVED ‘Like a Surgeon.’ I thought he was going to make MORE fun of Girls just wanna have lunch. But it wasn’t hard. Because everybody thought I was an alien, I spoke funny and I dressed funny… Not hard to make fun of.”
Cyndi Lauper:“I wanted ‘Girls Just Want To Have Fun’ to be an anthem for women around the world – and I mean all women – and a sustaining message that we are powerful human beings. I made sure that when a woman saw the video, she would see herself represented, whether she was thin or heavy, glamorous or not, and whatever race she was.”
Girls Just Want To Have Fun
I come home in the morning light
My mother says, “When you gonna live your life right?”
Oh, mother dear, we’re not the fortunate ones
And girls they wanna have fun
Oh, girls just wanna have fun
The phone rings in the middle of the night
My father yells, “What you gonna do with your life?”
Oh, daddy dear, you know you’re still number one
But girls they wanna have fun
Oh, girls just wanna have
That’s all they really want
Some fun
When the working day is done
Oh, girls, they wanna have fun
Oh, girls just wanna have fun
(Girls they want, wanna have fun)
(Girls wanna have)
Some boys take a beautiful girl
And hide her away from the rest of the world
I wanna be the one to walk in the sun
Oh, girls they wanna have fun
Oh, girls just wanna have
That’s all they really want
Is some fun
When the working day is done
Oh, girls, they wanna have fun
Oh, girls just wanna have fun
(Girls they want, wanna have fun)
(Girls wanna have)
They just wanna, they just wanna (girls)
They just wanna, they just wanna (girls just wanna have fun)
Oh, girls, girls just wanna have fun
(They just wanna, they just wanna)
They just wanna, they just wanna (girls)
They just wanna, they just wanna (girls just wanna have fun)
Oh, girls, girls just wanna have fun
When the workin’
When the workin’ day is done
Oh, when the workin’ day is done
Oh, girls, girls just wanna have fun
Everybody, ha, ha
They just wanna, they just wanna (girls)
They just wanna, they just wanna (girls just wanna have fun)
Oh, girls, yeah, girls just wanna have fun
(They just wanna, they just wanna)
When the workin’
When the workin’ day is done, oh (they just wanna, they just wanna)
When the workin’ day is done (girls)
(Girls just wanna have fun)
Oh, girl, girls just wanna have fun
(They just wanna, they just wanna) Everybody now
Yeah, yeah, yeah
(They just wanna, they just wanna) Yeah, yeah
Girls
In the late seventies, my friend had the Fly Like An Eagle album. I loved it at that time and this song is the one young Max zoned in on. It’s one Steve Miller song that is NOT worn out! It’s not a great song by any means but there is something charming about this country-type song. It’s one you can imagine someone singing on a back porch.
I like when artists do something different out of the norm. At this time he was changing from blues to pop…and this song went in a different direction.
The Steve Miller Band started off as a blues psychedelia band. They got signed for $50,000 dollars in 1967…quite a lot at that time… after the band had an impressive performance at the legendary Monterey Pop Festival They continued to release one album a year but they never rose up the charts too much. At that time the band included drummer Gary Mallaber and LonnieTurner on bass, but the albums also featured contributions by harmonica player James Cotton, session guitarist Led Dudek, and the Doobie Brothers’ John McFee…and Boz Scaggs was a member for a while.
One song in the earlier period I’ll touch on in a few weeks is “My Darkest Hour” and he recorded it with Paul McCartney in one of his most darest hours…right after Paul refused to sign with Allen Klein.
After The Joker was released as a single in 1973, Miller started to move toward pop melodies and struck gold with Fly Like An Eagle. The album bounces everywhere in style. He does a Sam Cooke cover, Send Me to sitars on “Wild Mountain Honey…along with this Bluegrass – Country song Dance, Dance, Dance. Then there are the hits. The title track Fly Like An Eagle, Take The Money and Run, and Rockin’ Me. This album is one of the building blocks of classic rock radio.
The album was released in 1976 and it peaked at #3 in the Billboard Album Charts, #4 in Canada, and #11 in the UK.
Dance, Dance, Dance
My grandpa, he’s 95
And he keeps on dancin’
He’s still alive
My grandma, she’s 92
She loves to dance
And sing some, too
I don’t know
But I’ve been told
If you keep on dancing
You’ll never grow old
Come on darling
Put a pretty dress on
We’re gonna go out tonight
Dance, dance, dance
Dance, dance, dance
Dance, dance, dance
All night long
I’m a hard working man
I’m a son of a gun
I’ve been working all week in the noon day sun
The wood’s in the kitchen
And the cow’s in the barn
I’m all cleaned up and my chores are all done
Take my hand, come along
Let’s go out and have some fun
Come on darling put a pretty dress on
We’re gonna go out tonight
Dance, dance, dance
Dance, dance, dance
Dance, dance, dance
All night long
Pick on
Dance, dance, dance
Dance, dance, dance
Dance, dance, dance
All night long
Come on darling, don’t look that way
Don’t you know when you smile
I’ve got to say you’re my honey pumpkin lover
You’re my heart’s delight
Don’t you want to go out tonight
You’re such a pretty lady
You’re such a sweet girl
When you dance it brightens up my world
Come on darling put a pretty dress on
We’re gonna go out tonight
And dance, dance, dance
Dance, dance, dance
Dance, dance, dance
All night long
A true rock and roll pioneer. I don’t have to be coaxed to listen to Gene Vincent but I watched the 1969 bio of him doing a UK tour in 1969 (at the bottom of the post). He radiated star but you could tell he was in pain probably from all directions. I always liked him because of his attitude while singing but I noticed…very late…but I saw what a great unusual voice he had. He could go from ballad to rocker in a split second.
Vincent was injured in a car accident on April 16, 1960…with Eddie Cochran in a taxi which killed Cochran. Vincent whose leg was weak due to a wound incurred in a motorcycle accident in Virginia during the Korean War. He walked with a noticeable limp for the rest of his life. In 1962 he was in Hamburg and played on the same bill as the Beatles.
The 50s revival had started in the UK and Vincent did around 24 shows altogether on that tour. The bio is a fascinating look into the UK in 1969. The music is there of course but it gives a lesson on how touring is not always glamorous and 5-star hotels.
Vincent’s energetic performance and dynamic vocals make this song a standout track. It was written by Whitey Pullen and Jerry Merritt. The song was released in 1960 and it peaked at #22 in the UK charts. By this time the UK is where all of the 50’s rock stars went because America was too busy listening to Paul Anka, Fabion, and Pat Boone. It was a sad state of music at that time for rock and roll. The parents probably loved the no soul no trouble singers. Then thankfully…the British invasion and Motown were coming up.
The Beatles, Stones, Who, and other bands made America wake up to the blues and rock artists they had been ignoring.
Gene Vincent would die only two years after this tour in 1971 after recording an album called The Day the World Turned Blue at 36 years old. He was the first inductee into the Rockabilly Hall of Fame upon its formation in 1997. The following year he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He would die of a ruptured ulcer, internal hemorrhage and heart failure.
She She Little Sheila
Well, she, she, she little Sheila
Best lookin’ gal in town
Well now, she, she, she little Sheila
With your hair so long and brown
Well, you never-never know what my Sheila’s puttin’ down
Well now, Dick Clark said you’re the best lookin’ girl
On his big bandstand
I know it too and I love you true
And honey, I’m your man
Well, you never-never know what my Sheila’s puttin’ down
Yeah, she, she, she little Sheila
She, she, she little Sheila
She, she, she little Sheila
She, she, she little Sheila
Well, you never-never know what my Sheila’s gonna put down
Well, she, she, she little Sheila
Best lookin’ gal around
Well, she, she, she little Sheila
With your hair so long and brown
Well, you never-never know what my Sheila’s puttin’ down (aw)
Yeah, she, she, she little Sheila
She, she, she little Sheila
She, she, she little Sheila
She, she, she little Sheila
Well, you never-never know what my Sheila’s puttin’ down
I’ve heard of this band but CB (Cincinnati Babyhead) turned me on to them…and when that happens great music comes out of it. I listened to their first real album Birth, School, Work, Death and it was fantastic. I then skipped around and listened to some songs throughout their career. Super band… they have a tough, rought Katie bar the door… no-holds-barred sound. I hear some Who, Kinks, Small Faces, Sloan, and other bands in them.
The main reason I like them…the hooks. They know how to develop and use great hooks in the right places. While you have the hooks and melodies you also have the super-aggressive anger riding on top of everything. They mix it perfectly. In short… abrasive in-your-face rock.
Think of this post as a sample platter…I included some history but the main thing is…listen to these songs.
Peter and Chris Coyne started the band in 1982 calling it the Side Presley Experience. By 1985 they had removed some members and brought in some more. They also made a name change to The Godfathers. They wanted to record so they found a producer in Vic Maile who had worked with The Kinks, Who, and Motorhead. They released some singles in the UK and finally after seeing import sales they put together an album made up of singles and B sides plus they did a cover of John Lennon’s Cold Turkey and called it Hit By Hit (#3 in the UK).
Then came the call every band wants…Epic Records signed them to a contract. They released the single Birth, School, Work, Death in 1987. The following year they released an album with the same name. Birth, School, Work, Death peaked at #38 in the US Modern Rock Charts.
They broke up in 2000 but reformed in 2008 with the original members. Chris is not with the band but Peter still is. They released an album last year named Alpha Beta Gamma Delta.
Also on the album was this song…Love Is Dead peaked at #3 in the UK indie chart in 1987.
Now, let’s skip around a little too different album songs. She Gives Me More peaked at #8 in 1989 on the US Modern Rock Chart.
Now to one of the coolest titles ever… Just Because You’re Not Paranoid Doesn’t Mean To Say They’re Not Going To Get You!
Together they had 10 studio albums with the last released in 2022.
Hit by Hit (comp, 1986)
Birth, School, Work, Death (1988)
More Songs About Love & Hate (1989)
Unreal World (1991)
Unreal World (1991)
The Godfathers (1993)
Afterlife (1995, Intercord)
Jukebox Fury (2013)
A Big Bad Beautiful Noise (2017)
Alpha Beta Gamma Delta (2022)
Peter Coyne: I would like The Godfathers to be remembered as a great British rock & roll band who made some fantastic singles & classic albums – right from the start to the very end. I would also like us to be remembered as a brilliant, kick ass live band who brought a lot of pleasure to punters all round the world. On my gravestone you can chisel “He came, he saw, he’s gone – awopbopalubopalopbamboom!”
Peter Coyne: I would have liked to have been in The Beatles circa ’61 during their Hamburg period. All that black leather gear they wore, quiffs, speed, girls with peroxide blonde hair, seedy clubs, high energy rock & roll & exotic, neon night life would have suited me fine!! Beatlemania & their psychedelic era was ace too. Fab4 FOREVER! X
Now one for the road…Unreal World was their highest charting song in North America. It peaked at #6 in the US Modern Rock Chart.
Unreal World
I heard women crying everywhere
Babies born and no one cares
People sleeping on the ground
See the rain come falling down
There’s decisions to be made
There has to be some give and take
For this the road we walk along
Is no the road we started on
Have you heard the full time score
We’re living under Murphy’s Law
I’ve been walking ‘cross vast empty spaces I feel
I’ve been looking for one face I know that is real
I’ve been walking ‘cross vast empty spaces
Let’s talk about the way I feel
The whole wide world’s become unreal
Time’s like money it’s soon spent
Let’s talk about the government
They’re selling England by the gram
We’re stranded in the strangest land
There’s not enough to go around
No one knows what’s going down
Nothing ventured nothing gained
Why should we feel so ashamed
‘Cause every dog must have it’s day
And I refuse to be your slave
I’ve been walking ‘cross vast empty spaces I feel
I’ve been looking for one face I know that is real
I’ve been walking ‘cross vast empty spaces
Let’s talk about the way I feel
The whole wide world’s become unreal
Let’s talk about the way I feel
The whole wide world’s become unreal
London’s mourning skies turned black
They’ve gone too far we can’t turn back
Free the ravens from the tower
We’ve yet to have our finest hour
Don’t believe the news at ten
That happy days are here again
Where’s the Union Jack and Jill
‘Cause we should not be standing still
Listen to me understand
A hungry man’s an angry man
Let’s talk about the way I feel
The whole wide world’s become unreal
Let’s talk about the way I feel
The whole wide worl’ds become unreal
I first heard the Turtles with the single that I got from a cousin. The single was Eleanor… I fell for them at that moment. After I got to know them better…I found out they didn’t take themselves seriously and had some good pop songs.
This was written and originally recorded by Bob Dylan, who released the song on his 1964 album Another Side Of Bob Dylan. Smart performers started to pick up that this Bob guy could write accessible songs for the public. Add a Rickenbacker or a jangly guitar and whala you have folk rock.
The band was formed by Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan. They were saxophone players who did whatever was trendy in order to make a living as musicians. They were also in the choir together in high school.
They were in an instrumental band but with the Beatles and the British invasion, they soon switched to a rock and roll band with Howard Kaylan as lead singer.
This was their debut single and what a single it was for them. It peaked at #8 on the Billboard 100 and #3 in Canada in 1965. It was on their debut album with the same name. The album didn’t do as well…it peaked at #98 on the Billboard Album Charts.
The Turtles were more of a singles band but did release some interesting ones at the end of their career. One of them was called The Turtles Present The Battle of the Bands. It was a concept album where they pretended to be different bands for each song. I’ve always liked that idea.
After they broke up Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan became Flo and Eddie.
Howard Kaylan: “When the Turtles first signed our original recording agreements with the tiny label that would become White Whale, we were all under the legal age of 18. Needless to say, the contracts required our parents’ approval. This was all done before a judge in the county of Los Angeles who reviewed the paperwork about to be executed and told our parents that, “If you let your sons sign these papers, the court won’t be responsible for the outcome. These are the worst contracts that I have ever seen.” We didn’t care. We wanted to make records and damn the consequences. So we signed. And our parents co-signed. And the judge had been right. It took many years and many thousands of dollars to win back our money and our self-respect. But, in the meantime, we had a record deal.
We had originally intended to break up our band, the Crossfires, on one particular evening in 1965, while playing our usual Friday night gig at the a teen club in Redondo Beach, California called the Revelaire. On my way upstairs with our resignation, two shady-looking entrepreneurs stopped me and asked if we were interested in making a record. They loved the way we sounded doing a cover of the new Byrds single (our guitarist had gone out and bought a 12-string guitar earlier that week) and thought that doing folk-rock was the key to our future.
It fell upon me to find the tunes to record. The Crossfires had been a surf band in high school, but together with a friend of ours, Betty McCarty, we had also done some folk singing as The Crosswind Singers. In fact, we opened a concert at Westchester High that starred the folk duo Joe and Eddie (a foreshadowing of things to come, many years before the names Flo and Eddie were to become our nom de plumes). I found Dylan’s ‘It Ain’t Me Babe’ on an album and, being blissfully unaware that anyone else had ever recorded it, thought that it would make a great rock song. So I literally ‘lifted’ the Zombies’ approach to pop – a soft Colin Blunstone-like minor verse bursting into a four-four major chorus a-la ‘She’s Not There.’
It Ain’t Me Babe
Go away from my window
Leave at your own chosen speed
I’m not the one you want, babe
I’m not the one you need
You say you’re lookin’ for someone
Who’s never weak but always strong
To protect you and defend you
Whether you are right or wrong
Someone to open each and every door
But it ain’t me, babe
A-no, no, no it ain’t me, babe
Well, it ain’t me you’re lookin’ for, babe
Go lightly from the ledge, babe
Go lightly on the ground
I’m not the one you want, babe
I’ll only lead you down
You say you’re lookin’ for someone
Who’ll promise never to part
Someone to close his eyes to you
Someone to close his heart
Someone who will die for you and more
But it ain’t me, babe
A-no, no, no it ain’t me, babe
Well, it ain’t me you’re lookin’ for, babe
No it ain’t me you’re lookin’ for, babe
I said a-no, no, no, it ain’t me, babe
I said a-no, no, no, it ain’t me, babe
I said a-no, no, no, it ain’t me, babe
I said a-no, no, no, it ain’t me, babe
I won this single at the county fair. From the title, I didn’t know what it was until I played it. It was a hit single at the time. It’s a well-constructed song that never gets old to me. The song peaked at #11 in the Billboard 100, #8 in Canada, and #21 in New Zealand in 1979-80. It came off the great Jackrabbit Slim album.
I liked that album and also Alive on Arrival released a year before this one. Sometimes I hear songs and think…man I wish I could have wrote that song. This is one of them. It’s a pop song but a pop song that fits together perfectly. It has great hooks and the verses flow perfectly.
Steve has had a nice career but I really thought he would have been more known. He was one of the many who got stuck with the “New Bob Dylan” tag. I met him one afternoon. He is a nice guy…he sat behind me at a Rolling Stones concert in Vanderbilt Stadium on the Bridges to Babylon tour on Oct. 26, 1997. He was almost 20 years older but still had that boyish face. It surprised me because I was thinking…wait…he is Steve Forbert…why doesn’t he have better seats?
According to the Jackrabbit Slim album sleeve, the song was dedicated to the memory of the late Supreme, Florence Ballard, who died in 1976. Forbert actually wrote the song about a girl from his hometown of Meridian, Mississippi, rather than the Supremes singer.
John Simon produced this song/album. His credits include The Band’s Music from Big Pink and Janis Joplin’s Cheap Thrills. The song and album were recorded in Quadraphonic Sound studios, Nashville, Tennessee.
One tidbit I picked up that I would have never guessed. Steve was in Cyndi Lauper’s video “Girls Just Want To Have Fun.” I only halfway believed it but sure enough he plays Cyndi’s boyfriend in a tuxedo at the end.
Steve Forbert on Ballard: “that seemed like such bad news to me and such sad news. She wasn’t really taken care of by the music business, which is not a new story.”
Steve Forbert on being compared with Dylan: “You can’t pay any attention to that. It was just a cliché back then, and it’s nothing I take seriously. I’m off the hook – I don’t have to be smarter than everybody else and know all the answers like Bob Dylan.”
Romeo’s Tune
Meet me in the middle of the day
Let me hear you say everything’s okay
Bring me southern kisses from your room
Meet me in the middle of the night
Let me hear you say everything’s alright
Let me smell the moon in your perfume
Oh, Gods and years will rise and fall
And there’s always something more
It’s lost in talk, I waste my time
And it’s all been said before
While further down behind the masquerade the tears are there
I don’t ask for all that much I just want someone to care
That’s right now
Meet me in the middle of the day
Let me hear you say everything’s okay
Come on out beneath the shining sun
Meet me in the middle of the night
Let me hear you say everything’s alright
Sneak on out beneath the stars and run
Oh yeah, oh yeah yeah, oh yeah
It’s king and queen and we must go down now beyond the chandelier
Where I won’t have to speak my mind and you won’t have to hear
Shreds of news and afterthoughts and complicated scenes
We’ll huddle down behind the light and fade like magazines
Meet me in the middle of the day
Let me hear you say everything’s okay
Bring me southern kisses from your room
Hey hey, meet me in the middle of the night
Let me hear you say everything’s alright
Let me smell the moon in your perfume
Oh now, meet me in the middle of the day
Let me hear you say everything’s okay
Let me see you smiling back at me
Hey, meet me in the middle of the night
Let me hear you say everything’s alright
Hold me tight and love and loving’s free
The reason I’m posting this at night? I want to make sure it works…and I didn’t want to be scrambling with it on my way to work.
I am putting together my new music computer and I haven’t recorded anything in a few years… and what a project it has been! I was wondering if you all would be receptive if I posted any of my songs once in a while? I’m only talking every once in a while…not many. The only thing I request of you…is if you can… listen to it… if possible wear headphones. The reason is I am NOT a good mixer and I mixed them down in headphones which you should never do.
On most, I played all the instruments myself unless I note it otherwise. When I was playing more (before covid) with the guys in my garage…I would make demos to show them…hey this is how it goes.
The songs you will be hearing are basically demos… I made them a few years ago for our band to learn so we could record them properly. Well life happens and that never happened. Some of you have heard some of the songs I’ve emailed to you… and I’ve somehow got positive feedback. I did most of the instruments my self…guitar, bass, vocals, keyboards, and programming real drums sounds which I’m not good at. These were never meant for public consumption but what the hell…I’m not 20 anymore trying to make something.
The reason I haven’t posted them before? My terrible voice and I was waiting for my cousin Mark…who is a proper singer to take over but that will take a while…so you would be hearing the rough demos.
So what do you think? Are you game for this? I’ve included an example of a song…this one has no vocals…just something a friend I have and I put together in 10 minutes (really just 10 minutes) a few years ago to work on later. It’s just guitar (him), bass (me), and some drums that I programmed from real drum kits. We called it “Whats In That Brown Paper Bag?”…more as a joke. This is not one of the songs I want feedback on…the feedback on this is how it sounds over your system. It is harder than the usual songs I write. Chris, my friend who plays guitar on this, came up with this riff. It gave me an excuse to have fun playing bass…Also….does it even play?
It’s very repetitive because like I said…it was for the fun of it and so we wouldn’t forget it. Today we are using it as a test. IF it goes well and I don’t get too many “no’s” then I will post one within a week or two with singing and a real song.
I’ve always liked Linda Rondstadt and the songs she covers. I know I’m in the minority with this song but I prefer the original version. Not because Linda did a bad job…on the contrary…she did great and made it popular. I’m just a huge Warren Zevon fan and she left out a verse that I fell in love with because it was so out there.
The lyrics would not really fit her so I understand but Zevon’s version is my go-to version. Ronstadt’s cover is a cleaned-up version with the gender-reversed. Her character still fails at suicide, but the S&M references (“I met her at the Rainbow Bar, she asked me if I’d beat her…”) are gone.
Zevon’s version came out in 1976 and Rondstadt’s was released in 1977. This song helped Zevon to get noticed. His Excitable Boy album came out a few months later and Werewolves of London was his first hit.
Linda Ronstadt was in the middle of a run of hits when she released this song on her eighth album, Simple Dreams. Her producer was Peter Asher, who also worked with James Taylor. Asher figured out that Ronstadt was more than just a singer, and he valued her input. When he started working with her a few years earlier, that’s when the hits started coming.
Peter Asher was one part of the Peter and Gordon pop duo that was part of the British invasion. Paul McCartney was going out with his sister Jane Asher and would give Peter songs to record with Gordon. After that was over he became part of Apple Records and then left to manage and produce James Taylor.
Ronstadt’s version peaked at #31 on the Billboard 100, #26 in Canada, and #46 on the Billboard Country charts in 1977. I was surprised actually…I thought it would have been higher in the charts.
Linda Rondstadt:“To me that song seemed like the purest expression of male vanity. Step on you, be insensitive, be unkind and give you a hard time, saying can’t ya take it, can’t ya take it. Then if you tease men in the slightest bit, they’ll just walk off with their feelings hurt, stomp off in a corner and pout. I mean that’s the way men are, I swear. I thought the verse turned around to a female point of view was just perfect. The gender change works perfectly.”
Poor Poor Pitiful Me
Well, I lay my head on the railroad track Waiting on the double E But the train don’t run by here no more Poor, poor pitiful me
Poor, poor pitiful me Poor, poor pitiful me Oh, these boys won’t let me be Lord, have mercy on me Woe, woe is me
Well, I met a man out in Hollywood Now I ain’t naming names Well he really worked me over good Just like Jesse James
Yes, he really worked me over good He was a credit to his gender Put me through some changes, Lord Sort of like a waring blender
Poor, poor pitiful me Poor, poor pitiful me Oh, these boys won’t let me be Lord, have mercy on me Woe woe is me
Well, I met a boy in the Vieux Carres Down in Yokohama He picked me up and he threw me down He said, “Please don’t hurt me, mama”
Poor, poor pitiful me Poor, poor pitiful me Oh, these boys won’t let me be Lord, have mercy on me Woe woe is me
Poor, poor, poor me Poor, poor pitiful me Poor, poor, poor me Poor, poor pitiful me Poor, poor, poor me Poor, poor pitiful me
I just read a Joplin book and anyone who follows me knows what that means…a few Janis Joplin posts are coming.
She wasn’t here to be conventional or a cookie-cutter person. She was here to blaze a path and leave her mark…and she did just that.
I owned the album Pearl a long time ago and loved it. Through the years I also got her greatest hits and was wrapped up in those songs. I had forgotten about this funky song…and I use funky in the best way. It reaffirmed what a singer should be about to me…giving 100 percent of yourself every time out there.
On her last album, she was produced by Paul Rothchild who wanted Janis to use less of her brash voice to give more. He also worked on her dynamics which worked perfectly with this album and song. She was working with her 3rd band in two years…and this one was the best one no doubt. I liked Big Brother but she HAD to scream to get over those loud guitars. She was taking more of an R&B/soul/funk/blues/rock approach unlike her strictly rock/blues approach with Big Brother. She had more nuances on this album and her voice never sounded better.
Half Moon was written by John Hall and his first wife, the former Johanna Schier. It was picked as the B-side to Me and Bobby McGee. At the time, John was a struggling musician and Johanna was a writer for The Village Voice. Johanna was assigned an interview with Joplin, who suggested the couple write a song for her. Joplin wanted Johanna to write a song about how she was feeling about a man she met in Rio Janeiro and was planning to marry in the future after he finished what he was doing.
It was the first song they wrote together, and a huge break for the couple, who were able to buy a house and a sailboat with the royalties. John Hall got a lot of credibility in the rock realm from co-writing it, and his career took off. A few years later, he formed the group Orleans, which had hits with two songs he wrote: “Still The One” and “Dance With Me.”
I never realized what it meant when I heard people say…”the artist always gives everything of themselves” until I saw clips of Joplin, Springsteen, and Hendrix. They go out on a limb on stage and risk a train wreck to give you that raw excitement. In today’s world of pre-packaged high-priced Las Vegas style shows…you get a slick show with dancers (I never understood that) without a bit of soul. Sure…the live acts sound exactly like their records and that can be tedious after a while. Some love that…and more power to them but I like the emotional roller coaster journey you take with an artist like Joplin…and she gives you that feeling on studio albums also.
The amazing thing about Pearl is that all of the vocals were called “scratch” takes…meant to be redone later on. She was planning to replace all of her vocals…she went all out anyway so I don’t see how she could have improved on them. Funny thing about the album…the original producer was no other than Todd Rundgren…Janis got rid of him right off the bat because she could not relate to him. Paul Rothchild (Door’s producer) took over and just fell for Janis’s voice and Janis.
I included a live version she did a few months before her death on the Dick Cavett show. When she grabs that mic…there is no doubt who is in charge. There is no screaming in this…just pure soul/blues singing…I love the high notes and dynamics…and she just plain kicked ass on this song.
Pearl peaked at #1 on the Billboard Album Charts, #1 in Canada, and #20 in the UK in 1971.
John Hall:“It was numerological and astrological in nature. And it also had an alliterative repetition that was kind of captivating. It wasn’t rhyming, exactly, but it was an internal rhyme, perhaps you could say. It’s a device that poets use and that songwriters use to not just have the end of lines rhyme or the end of verses rhyme, but to have sort of a foreshadowing of that and words inside each line.”
Half Moon
Half moon, night time sky
Seven stars, heaven’s eyes
Seven songs on seven seas
Just to bring all your sweet love home to me
Hey, you fill me like the mountains
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
You fill me like the sea, Lord
Not coming past but still at last
Your love brings life to me
Your love brings life to me, hey
Rings of cloud and arms aflame
Wings rise up to call your name
Sun rolls high, Lord, it burns the ground
Just to tell about the first good man I found
Yeah, you fill me like the mountains
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
You fill me like the sea, Lord
Not coming past but still at last
Your love brings life to me
Your love brings life to me
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh yeah
Half moon on night time sky
Seven stars, heaven’s eyes
Seven songs on seven seas
Just to bring all your sweet love home to me
Hey baby, you fill me like the mountains
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
You fill me like the sea, Lord
Not coming past honey still at last
Lord, you fill me like the mountains
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
You fill me like the sea, Lord
Not coming past but still at last
Hey, you fill me like the mountains
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
You fill me like the sea, oh Lord
You’re not coming past, honey, still at last
Your love brings life to me
Your love brings life to me
Your love, la la la la la, la
Won’t you bring life to me
I said you’re gonna ride around
When I’m on a little home babe
Bring it on home, you bring it on home
Bring it on home, bring it on home
I said your love brings life to me, yeah
This was one of the great songs on Sticky Fingers…which has been called their greatest album alongside Exile on Main Street.
Mick Taylor wrote this track with Jagger, believing he’d receive his due acknowledgment, but it was ultimately credited to the Jagger/Richards duo. It was the type of slight that the guitarist took in his stride in the early days but, would grow into a larger issue in the coming years.
The Black Crowes were influenced by this song heavily on their track Sister Luck… they captured the same feel. I thought of this song because of a blogger friend (Jeremy James). He doesn’t blog much any more but has a cool youtube channel. He shows how to play this slide solo. He analyzes guitar effects, and equipment, and shows how to play different songs on guitar….check him out.
Sticky Fingers was the first album The Stones recorded on their own label and the first in which Mick Taylor played guitar on nearly all the tracks. The album peaked at #1 in the Billboard Album Charts, and #1 in Canada, and #1 in the UK in 1971. They had a lot of competition that year with The Who’s Who’s Next and Led Zeppelin IV.
On December 2, 1969, the band had begun work on what would be their first album of the 1970s, and the one upon which so much of their myth and mystique would be built.
At the Muscle Shoals Sound Studio in Sheffield, Alabama, they cut three tracks Brown Sugar, Wild Horses, and You Gotta Move in three days, all of which would subsequently appear on the band’s ninth LP, Sticky Fingers. They did this before they played at the disaster that was known as Altamont…where Meredith Hunter lost his life…on December 6, 1969.
Sway
Did you ever wake up to find A day that broke up your mind Destroyed your notion of circular time
It’s just that demon life has got you in its sway It’s just that demon life has got you in its sway
Ain’t flinging tears out on the dusty ground For all my friends out on the burial ground Can’t stand the feeling getting so brought down
It’s just that demon life has got me in its sway It’s just that demon life has got me in its sway
There must be ways to find out Love is the way they say is really strutting out
Hey, hey, hey now One day I woke up to find Right in the bed next to mine Someone that broke me up with a corner of her smile, yeah
It’s just that demon life has got me in its sway It’s just that demon life has got me in its sway
It’s just that demon life has got me in its sway It’s just that demon life has got me
I want to thank Lisa from Tao-Talk for publishing this post on March 19, 2023. Every March she does a Women Music March with a post on a female artist every day. Please go visit her site and see the artists she has featured this month.
On stage, I make love to 25,000 different people, then I go home alone… Janis Joplin
When I think of female artists…Janis Joplin is the first one that comes to my mind. My top two female singers are Aretha Franklin and Janis Joplin. Both are legends and both unique.
I cannot express how much I love this woman. She had the most powerful voice I have ever heard. She could sing with beauty, grit, and she could sing with a sound like Southern Comfort pouring through razor blades. There was soul, confidence, strength, and vulnerability in her voice that came through in every song. She was one of the authentic singers. You can hear the pain in Billie Holiday’s and Bessie Smith’s voice…you can hear pain in Janis, yes it was a different kind but pain all the same. It all started with a Janis Joplin greatest hits album I got when I was 11 and the love affair has never ended.
You really can’t compare her to her female contemporaries. She was not like Joni Mitchell, Linda Ronstadt, Mama Cass, or even Grace Slick. Janis hit you between the eyes and never looked back. Sweet ballads were not her style, but she could do them. She could hold her own against anyone…she had more in common with Robert Plant than the other female singers. She was also a kind thoughtful lady.
Bessie Smith died in 1937 but a headstone was never bought for her. In August 1970, just two months before Joplin’s own death, she and Juanita Green, who worked in Smith’s house when she was younger and went on to become the president of the North Philadelphia chapter of the NAACP, pitched money to buy a proper headstone for Smith. For the epitaph, they chose the following line: “The Greatest Blues Singer in the World Will Never Stop Singing.”
Her childhood was spent in Port Arthur, Texas. Janis’ mother was a businesswoman, and her father was an engineer, and as the oldest child, she was given all the care she needed but soon discovered that she was different. Being different in Texas at that time was not good.
In high school she was groped and bullied by many of the football team including Jimmy Johnson the football player, coach, and now analyst for Fox Sports. He and his teammates spread rumors that she’d slept with their friends because she “looked and acted weird.” He was a star linebacker on the football team. He said, “Janis looked and acted so weird that when we were around her, mostly in the hallways at school, we would give her a hard time…she ran with the beatnik crowd.” He continued to occasionally degrade her after she died.
She would go to college in Austin Texas, but Austin wasn’t “weird” yet at the time. Alpha Phi Omega sponsored its “Ugliest Man on Campus” contest as part of an effort to raise money for charities. Fraternities would nominate one of their members and dress them up in old clothes and they would be voted on. Someone nominated Janis and it hurt her bad. Joplin’s mother, Dorothy Joplin, admitted that her daughter wrote an “anguished letter laying out all the gory details of how the contest had affected her.”
She moved from Texas to San Francisco and became part of the San Francisco music scene with the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Moby Grape, and Quicksilver Messenger Service. Her influences were Billy Holiday, Bessie Smith. Big Mama Thornton, Odetta, and Leadbelly.
She played with Big Brother and the Holding Company who were as raw as you could get, and they played at the Monterrey Pop festival and broke through. She went solo with a couple of backing bands… The Kozmic Blues Band and the Full Tilt Boogie Band. She later played at Woodstock and traveled in a train to concerts all around Canada with the Grateful Dead and other artists that can be seen in the movie The Festival Express.
There are few artists who give everything they have all the time. Bruce Springsteen is one…Janis was one. On film it comes through…she gave everything she had and more. The last recording, she made was a fun birthday message to John Lennon.
Her nickname was Pearl and that was the name of her last album. Her last album is a classic. Janis with the help of the producer Paul Rothchild learned how to control her voice and not belt everything out. He wanted her to have a voice when she turned 30. It worked…it was her most successful album. It showed how great of a voice she had…she wasn’t just a screamer.
Janis would not make 30…she will be 27 for eternity. She died on October 4, 1970, from a heroin overdose after working on her album. She left $2,500 for her wake…. 200 guests were invited with invitations that read…” Drinks are on Pearl.” The guests showed up with the Grateful Dead (as she had requested in her will) as the house band. Her body was cremated, and the ashes scattered from an airplane near Stinson Beach.
I only wished she could have survived and been alive today. Much like Jimi Hendrix, I hate to think what we missed out on.
She was the ultimate take me as I am person.
Discography
Studio Albums solo and with Big Brother: 4
Live Albums: 7 (after her death)
Compilation Albums: 14
Singles solo and with Big Brother: 13
Filmography from Wiki
Monterey Pop (1968)
Petulia (1968)
Janis Joplin Live in Frankfurt (1969)
Janis (1974)
Janis: The Way She Was (1974)
Comin’ Home (1988)
Woodstock – The Lost Performances (1991)
Woodstock: 3 Days of Peace & Music (Director’s Cut) (1994)
Festival Express (2003)
Nine Hundred Nights (2004)
The Dick Cavett Show: Rock Icons (2005) Shout Factory
Rockin’ at the Red Dog: The Dawn of Psychedelic Rock (2005)
This is Tom Jones (2007) 1969 appearance on TV show
Woodstock: 3 Days of Peace & Music (Director’s Cut) 40th Anniversary Edition (2009)
Janis Joplin with Big Brother: Ball and Chain (DVD) Charly (2009)
Janis: Little Girl Blue (2015)
Things to Share
The quantity and more importantly the quality of her work was incredible in a short window of time. In 1995, Joplin was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 2005, she received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In November 2009, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum honored her as part of its annual American Music Masters Series. In 2014 there was also a commemorative Janis Joplin stamp issued by the US Postal Service.
I’ll close this with a couple of short stories. Janis did not suffer fools gladly. At a party Jim Morrison was getting drunk and became obnoxious, rude, and violent. Morrison saw that Joplin was there and started to hit on her. Joplin had admired Morrison but not on this night. By this point, she shot him down at every turn and eventually tried to leave with Paul Rothschild (her producer) and nearly got away before Jim, wobbling along, followed her to her car and reached in, grabbing Janis by her hair in an attempt to pull her out. BAD move Jim… Janis then took her bottle of Southern Comfort and cracked him over the head with it, immediately knocking the Lizard King out cold. Now normally, this would have been the end of things…but the next day at rehearsal, Jim was absolutely smitten with Janis, begging Paul Rothschild to give him her phone number…he didn’t get it.
Her road manager John Cooke was the son of Masterpiece Theater host Alistair Cooke and the great grand-nephew of poet Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Janis also punched Jerry Lee Lewis when Lewis told Laura Joplin (Janis’s sister) something offensive. She had to be pulled off him.
This is her on the Dick Cavett show and it says a lot about her. This was in 1969, before the Morrison party.
I was going to post this song a few weeks ago but I posted The Poacher instead by Ronnie Lane. Either way, we all win with those two songs. As with The Poacher…Ronnie Lane wrote and did the vocals for this song. It’s a gorgeous song and is one of the Faces best known songs.
This song was on the album that I would say ranks in the Hall Of Fame for names… A Nod Is As Good As a Wink… to a Blind Horse. It doesn’t get much better than that. The album was released in 1971. Debris is said to be about his East End working class roots. The album also contained their biggest hit…Stay With Me. The album peaked at #6 on the Billboard Album Charts, #5 in Canada, and #2 in the UK in 1971.
Lane didn’t seem the kind of person who wanted just fame…or for that matter money. He pretty much proved that when he left the Faces two years later to start a solo career that toured under a big top travelling around not meeting expenses most of the time.
Ronnie started his own folk-country band named “Slim Chance” and released a surprise hit single “Come On” in 1973 and it went to #11 in the UK. Ronnie had a unique idea of touring. His tour was called “The Passing Show” which toured the countryside with a circus tent and included a ringmaster and clowns.
Lane had been ripped off along along with the other Small Faces so he wasn’t drawing money from those old records. Pete Townshend tried to talk him out of quitting the Faces because as Pete told him…you are on the verge of making good royalties and money from the Face’s concerts will set you up for life. He ignored Pete and followed his heart. Lane had a lot of great music in him though and those albums with Slim Chance and Rough Mix with Pete Townshend are great.
Lane diagnosed with was Multiple Sclerosis around 1976.
In 1983 Ronnie called some of his musician friends to do some charity concerts for the Research for Multiple Sclerosis. They were known as the ARMS (Action into Research for Multiple Sclerosis) Charity Concerts. Musicians such as Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, Steve Winwood, Bill Wyman, Charlie Watts, and more came out to support Ronnie.
Ronnie Lane died of Pneumonia while in the final stages of Multiple Sclerosis in 1997
Debris
Two, three, four
I left you on the debris
At the Sunday morning market
You were sorting through the odds and ends
You was looking for a bargain
I heard your footsteps at the front door
And that old familiar love song
‘Cause you knew you’d find me waiting there
At the top of the stairs
I went there and back
Just to see how far it was
And you, you tried to tell me
But I had to learn for myself
There’s more trouble at the depot
With the general workers union
And you said, “They’ll never change a thing
Well, they won’t fight and they’re not working”
Oh, you was my hero
How you are my good friend
I’ve been there and back
And I know how far it is
But I left you on the debris
Now we both know you got no money
And I wonder what you would have done
Without me hanging around
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