#56) "Sleep's Dark and Silent Gate" by Jackson Browne - When I was in high school, I was constantly on the hunt for musical heroes. While all in all I have fairly eclectic tastes, my 'heroes' list has never strayed too far from what I call white boy troubadours: John Lennon, Meat Loaf, Bruce Springsteen, Hank Williams Jr., Frank Sinatra, Tom Waits, among others, and principal among them (at least from age 18-22, when it mattered most): Bob Seger.
One night long ago, somewhere, I so frustrated a girlfriend (we'll call her Sammy) with a blowhard-ish sermon about what Seger's music is really saying (and that I was likely the only one understanding) that she blurted out, "You know what? I don't think you're Bob Seger at all...if you're like anyone, it's him!"
She pointed to the radio. 'Him' was Jackson Browne. The song playing at the time, Running on Empty.
"What the hell does that mean?" I said, flailing in the most sticky and viscous indignation my 18-year-old self could muster, as though she'd just questioned my manhood.
"I just don't think you're Bob Seger," she shrugged flatly. "You remind me of that guy."
I was appalled! Jackson Browne was obviously no Bob Seger, and she clearly wasn't listening! She wasn't understanding! She didn't GET me! ;-)
Now, twenty-five years later, I look back on her evaluation and think it was not only spot on, but, frankly, one of the nicest things anyone has ever said about me.
Those for whom music is more than mere background noise know what it means to search for heroes, artists from whose songs we can report the news of our existence, compile the soundtrack of my lives. Naturally those heroes change over time, because we grow, evolve and adapt to changing life circumstances and stages. But I think Sammy was right even back then. It took me a while to come to Jackson Browne, because I didn't understand. I wasn't listening. I didn't get him.
Without question, the 'essence' of me, that is, the stuff that hasn't changed over time - how I cope with other people, with myself, with my emotions, with heartache and jubilation alike, with all those drastic changes in circumstances and stages - can be found in the comfy old shoe melancholy of Sleep's Dark and Silent Gate. The highway, the looking back, the looking forward, the old friends slipping away, the mellow, just-this-side-of-sentimental reflection that seeps out of the sunlight...never overwrought, never hyper-sensitive or drama-fueled...yes, that's pretty much how I've always rolled, emotionally, ever since I've been rolling.
And I gotta say, it's made for a slow, steady pleasurable ride that I wouldn't trade for anything.
"Sitting down by the highway (looking down the road), waiting for a ride / I don't know where I've been (wishing I could fly away), don't know where I'm going (wishing I could hide)..."
#57) "Love's the Last to Know" - by Bob Seger - Oh Sammy, that poor girl, suffered at the hands of my ego too often! In another instance, it wasn't enough to tell her about Seger, to blather about my essence, about some rarefied plane I'd cooked up in my mind, I felt compelled to play the music for her.
'Just listen to this one song,' I told her, 'and you'll understand what I'm talking about! You'll understand me!'
She reluctantly agreed to give a listen, and as I fumbled to rewind the cassette tape to just the right spot, I caught her rolling her eyes.
'Does this song have a lot of piano in it?' she groaned.
An astute observation, I've always thought, for a couple of reasons, and the answer, of course: hell yes, a lot of piano.
Love's the Last to Know doesn't move me quite like it used to. But it illustrates as vividly as a photograph the type of person I was once, or thought I would be...er, at least tried to make myself. And it still makes me think of morning as the best time to skip town. To that end, I have no doubt 1/48/50 will be launched in Steinbeck's hour of the pearl.
"There's a distant sound, to the outward bound, on a cold and windy night / A restless sigh as it fades away, a longing at first light..."
#58) "Whiskey River" by Willie Nelson - I'm not sure where this particular live version was recorded (Austin City Limits...?), or what album it was first released on (Willie and Family Live...?) but it is a great example of musical innovation, vastly different from the 1972 original by the lesser-known Johnny Bush, who wrote it. A friend of mine could not believe Willie's sharp, funked-out interpretation, which throws the country music playbook (of the time, anyway) out the window, and more importantly, captures a moment in country music history when lines were more blurred. It was harder to figure out just how the likes of Nelson (et al.) identified - as a redneck, or a hippie. Lots of twang and fiddle and pickin' going on (Willie's a killer picker), but rednecks don't groove like this...do they? And what's with the braids and bandanna?
Today, mainstream country music lamentably is mired in stereotypes that don't leave a lot of room for variety. Or braids and bandannas.
As one who has sort of always identified as a little bit redneck and a little bit hippie, and being from Wisconsin, Whiskey River has on more than one occasion provided the perfect accompaniment to the spastic moves I would bust out after 8 or 9 Pabsts, back in my younger days, when Pabst Blue Ribbon wasn't the victim of ignorant hipster whimsy, but simply the beer we could afford.
"Feeling the amber current flowing from my mind...."
#59) "Love Like You" by Paper Tongues - Something about this power ballad stirs me like no other, literally makes my heart beat faster. It's a custom-made wedding song, but encompasses all things good, fresh, and exhilarating. Seriously, this song would have you believe getting out of bed in the morning can or should be a nitrous-fueled acceleration toward the sun as she throws back her long blonde hair.
And really, what in the world could possibly be wrong with that?
"Your heart is a like a castle in my sky..."
