I have this œ on my clipboard from when I wrote another post you haven't seen yet, so I didn't want to waste that.
And I decided this should be a Christmas post, because this beautiful bilingual version by two bilingual Canadians is perfect for this very holy night.
This song was originally intended for Roy Orbison. And he recorded it - first!!!!!!!! So, I guess this should be on Totally Covered?
I didn't put it there. I put it here. I did that for two reasons.
First, this version was released first, by several years. It was a big hit for Cyndi Lauper in 1989, and it was written by frequent songwriting partners Tom Kelly and Billy Steinberg.
Second, it's so lyrically brilliant that it warrants the higher visibilty that this blog brings. I know people are going to read this here. And, it's lyrically brilliant, if I wasn't clear. Because it illustrates the desperation of love - what someone in love might actually do. We've all been there.
A lot of people think that this song contains a bagpipe solo. It does not. A combination of two guitars - one played with an EBow - and its recording on a Synclavier generated that bagpipe-like sound.
Co-written by Steve Kilbey - yep, two days of him in a row - and Karin Jansson, the song gets its title not from a group of stars, but from an Amsterdam music club. It was well recevied at the time of its release, and remains their signature song today.
In the absence of the Synclavier, you can hear in this 2011 live recording that those bagpipes are really guitars.
Steve Kilbey - of The Church - and Donnette Thayer - of Game Theory and an absolutely lovely human being - were Hex, an atmopheric duo. This song, from their 1989 eponymous self-titled debut, is likely their best known.
The song, co-written by the duo and produced by Kilbey, featured a sparse keyboard and guitar arrangement with electronic percussion that didn't overpower Thayer's dreamy voice. It is a work of underappreciated art, and I hope my short description of it gives it just a little more attention.
Liz Phair's first single, in 1993, was this complete denial. If you believe the lore, this was the response to The Rolling Stones's song "Tumbling Dice", but really, it was a Girly-Sound rerecording. If you don't know what Girly-Sound was, go here and read all about it - but it was basically Liz Phair's pre-major label mixtapes). Originally titled "Clean", it was rewritten to be the fifth track on Exile In Guyville, a track number Phair considered to be the most important.
The song was about the rumors that travel throughout the music scene, but in a broader sense, it DOES make sense to be the female mirror for "Tumbling Dice", as it is a woman's take on not being accountable - by keeping her mouth shut.
“Never Said” was one of those times where I was showing I could be just as unaccountable. “Tumbling Dice” is really about, again, I’m picturing all the guys from Urge Overkill, hey man, you may get to go home with me tonight, you may not. I may show up at the bar and be available, and I might not. You gotta roll me and see how it’s going to roll. I was playing that same game. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, I never said nothing, you can’t pin that on me.” I was playing the female version.
The song itself is great. It's a fun romp about keeping your damn mouth shut that endures to this day.
Because I know you're interested, here's the Girly-Sound version.
For a while, Phair performed this song live in this manner with a key change in the middle of the second verse. I always loved this version - it kind of amped up the indignation and desperation that the lyrics were trying to capture.
The fans of the Liverpool Football Club contributed to this recording. That's them singing "You'll Never Walk Alone", an unofficial anthem of the club, in an on-field recording. It's the type of thing that could give you goosebumps. And does, for me, every single time.
The song itself is a great illustration of how innovative and ground-breaking the band actually was. Nick Mason's ecclectic drumming, Roger Waters's odd guitar tuning, Richard Wright's orchestral piano, and David Gilmour's quiet vocal, with practically Sisyphythian lyrics, all combine for a unique, compelling, and inspiring song.
Although only released as a B-side, "Fearless" has become a fan favorite song, and is my favorite Pink Floyd song. It is not, however, a song they performed live - save for some dates by Roger Waters in 2016, nearly 50 years after its release.
This is a song that was scheduled for Maple Leaf March and got bumped for a lesser known artist. I still wanted to share it with you, though, so I saved it. I didn't want it to wait until March. The song is good on its own, and doesn't need to be Canadian to be good.
By the time the fifth single from the album Jagged Little Pill, this song, was released, a lot of people thought they knew what to expect from Alanis Morrissette.
Boy, were people way off base.
The video itself is a closeup of Alanis's face, never changing focus no matter how much she moves. But, really, given how bankable she was at that point, her face was all MTV needed to make this a huge hit song, hitting #1 on the pop chart in the US and also becoming her first #1 adult contemporary song. It would also be one of the biggest hits of the year in her native Canada.
The song is considered to be one of the first pop culture uses of the term "friend with benefits". I don't know about that, but I do consider it to be a sweet - one of the sweetest ever written - soft song that still resonates a quarter century later.
