You CAN go home again, but without a specific reason, you probably shouldn't

Every couple years, I try to take a trip home in the third week of June, because I'm addicted to the long, lingering days and short, short nights that crowd around the summer solstice in the northern latitudes where I grew up. 

Well, relatively northern: northern Wisconsin, where in summertime, June specifically, Lupine grow along roadsides in profuse propagations of purple and pink and the sun's westbound departure each night can only ever be described as reluctant. This phenomenon of late-lingering twilight tormented me as a little kid, having just been put to bed and expected to fall asleep when there was still a heapin' helpin' of useable (playable) daylight falling through my bedroom window at 9, 9:30, 10 o' clock and beyond. Enough light at 10, at least, to feel comfortable hanging out on the front porch a little, maybe daring to dart into the yard right to the edge of the porchlight's influence. Often, I heard my older brother and all the older neighbor kids doing just that while I was stuck in bed, trying to force myself to sleep, resenting every minute of it.

In adulthood, I've developed a certain devotion to the northern summer night's ultra-slow seduction. I'd love one day to journey way up north, past Canada to Alaska, or ideally Scandinavia, to witness a day that never ends, a true midnight sun. But for now, this third week in June spent in the town I grew up in, on the shores of Lake Superior, just a well-skipped rock across the water from Canada, will have to do. It's far enough north to provide a little savory taste. 

I still think of it as a homecoming when I visit, but truth is, my hometown is not "home" anymore. I moved away several years ago. I still live in the Midwest, but not the Northwoods, which anyone who grew up in, say, northern Minnesota, northern Wisconsin or the UP of Michigan will attest certainly reads Midwestern at first glance, but has its own distinctive look, feel and culture. It's never so flat or expansive here, less proud farmland, more sullen (sometimes sulky) woodland, a place where falling afternoon sunlight must search for the ground, picking its way through dense clusters of trees that obscure the view in every direction, grow right up to the shoulder of the road for miles-long stretches, and tend to be more coniferous than deciduous. 

Also, the slant of daylight is different where I grew up, a phenomenon related to the curvature of the Earth and its relationship to the sun providing the light from 93 million miles away. I never noticed this until I left and started coming back periodically. Yes, it's entirely possible I'm imagining it, and yes, with the click of a mouse or swipe of a finger, I could find out for myself. But I choose to keep believing I've spotted observable evidence that the daylight shifts hue - in ever subtle gradients - the further north I travel, the closer to "home" I get.

LUPINUS ARCTICUS - Trimming northern roadsides every June

I've enjoyed my periodic homecomings over the last decade, always an opportunity for reflection, a little sentimentality, which like so much else in life can be beneficial in moderation, and I know I'm not the only one. "Coming home" after a long absence has been written about in books, sung about in songs and captured in movies countless times over the years, usually in a small-town context, but I would imagine the experience is the same for people returning to big cities too, because at the end of the day, it's not so much about the community as it is the person returning. Really, why should returning after 20 years to an urban stoop on an inner-city street with a fire hydrant at the end of the block hit any different than returning to a dusty main street with lots of vacant store fronts running over a ravine on the way to the softball park with a county trunk running past it? 

City or country, it's your cradle, it's what you knew first and foremost for a big portion of your formative years. Coming home is really only about memories being sculpted by the hands of time, and I admit, I indulge the notion whenever I return to my hometown. Often, just for something to do during the 4-hour drive, I will write an improv movie treatment in my mind, in which I'm the star returning. 

This mental cosplay is easy to do, given a) I grew up entirely in one town, and b) I didn't actually leave until I was in my thirties, which means I have not only childhood memories but a generous portion of adult memories to write into the script, to brush and primp gently in the mirror of my mind's eye whenever I roll into town and glimpse the big lake I grew up on with fresh eyes.  

Something is different this time, though. 

In the past, trips home were kept in balance by an agenda. I always had a reason to be coming home, something for me to do, to take care of, someone to visit or meet up with. An agenda kept me focused on the here and now, away from any seductive but ultimately disenchanting deep dive into the past, to dwelling for too long in the basement of my brain, where boxes and boxes of memories get stored.

But a paradigm shift has taken place in my life since I last visited three years ago. A lot has changed. Loved ones have passed away, friends have moved on (and passed away). My parents are gone. I have no ties to the area now, and as a result, my hometown has become a place holding only memories, rather than that crucial blend of memories with new, developing moments to emulsify the experience into something pleasant, or at least satisfying. 

NORTHWOODS THRUWAY - A Midwestern drive to be sure, but the tree line's

invasive creep right up to the edge of the road indicates in no uncertain terms

that you're somewhere a little more North than merely Mid or West.

With the exception of one family member, there's simply nobody around anymore, and so I'm left only to hang out by myself and consume all those memories. And consuming too many memories is sort of like consuming too many doughnuts: the first is delicious, so yes, I'll have another one, please. And why not, you only live once, hit me again with a third! 

But then I keep snarfing, turn gluttonous, start thinking that if I don't have just one more I'll be missing out. Time disappears lickety split, and before I know it, that baker's dozen of cream-filled rings, holes, ears, johns, fritters and crullers has banded together and is now forming a groaning brick in my colon.

So it is with memories, if I'm not careful: they too can form a groaning brick in the basement of my brain.

Driving around on this almost sensually protracted June evening (June 19, to be exact, close to that most lovely shortest of short short nights), I'm noticing things about my town, things I was always aware of but have never really stood back and taken a good look at, not with fresh eyes. Or at least not with fresh eyes so completely undistracted by anything better to look at.

A rust belt casualty of America's industrial decline in the time I was growing up, my hometown possessed a love-hate relationship with its early 20th century hey-day, which, like a lot of other early 20th century hey-days, started to fizzle out in the 50s and 60s, and continued fizzling in dribs and drabs for decades after, as each remaining mine, plant and factory closed, businesses shuttered and local schools consolidated.

Being a small town of not even ten thousand residents probably helped blunt the impact of that decline, because it never actually died completely. In certain critical ways it remained the hub of the region, and in the 90s and 2000s, started trying to reconcile its past with initiatives to revitalize and re-identify in the future, a process that started with simply cleaning itself up. 

To that end, the abandoned train tracks and cars, chunks of re-barred concrete, blankets of taconite pellets, unused docks and wood pilings - essentially the post-industrial jungle gym I and others of Gen X played on growing up - were removed. The shoreline was prettied up with walking trails, a marina, an historic hotel and green space holding it all together, while at the same time, in what reads to me as great irony, the blight it was trying so hard to scrub away started getting memorialized in "historic" murals on the sides of downtown buildings, depicting my town's contribution to a roaring industrial age and various war efforts. The goal was to attract visitors or at least get them to stop for a while on their way to someplace else, and all of it was centered around the town's most vital and precious resource, the actual thing that blunted the impact of the decline: Lake Superior.  

But it seems nothing has ever been able to stick, nothing has ever really taken root. I won't venture an opinion why, it simply never became the tourist destination it wanted to be and probably should have been, and distance to market, among other factors, has kept it from becoming a place where anything gets made in quantities great enough to have any impact. 

To be sure, the news is not all bad, at least not all that different from other small towns affected by the Galactic shift in American manufacturing, technology and culture over the last 60 years. But this summer, with so much time on my hands, the decay, the dilapidation and most notably the tired slant of lingering evening sunlight revealing it, is much more apparent. 

What's more, and I guess this is really the issue, when I'm out and about, I don't recognize anyone. I encounter no friends or friends of friends, no old co-workers or classmates, nobody who recognizes me and comes up to say hello. It's all young people around here now. Not kids, but young adults with kids of their own, in whose eyes I see no glimpse whatsoever of someone I may have known once, someone I grew up next door to, or once whiled away a stale, gray Wednesday morning smoke break with. 

I come to realize that's it's not really the town itself that has changed. It hasn't gotten better or worse; it is, in fact, carrying on as it always has, caught somewhere in that middle place between laying down to die and standing up to keep fighting. 

I'm just not part of it. I don't know anybody here anymore. Being somewhere where nobody knows your name can be a pleasant sensation when you're traveling, but this isn't traveling. This is supposed to be a homecoming. I'm supposed to know people, see them around here and there, catch up a little, even if only briefly while standing in line at a convenience store, or even just an over-the-shoulder acknowledgement as we pass in a Wal-Mart aisle.  

But there's been none of that on this visit. It's a rattling and lonely feeling to realize your hometown has become a town full of strangers.

The evening sunlight drapes itself damply across quiet intersections where only occasionally a car passes or a stranger crosses with a dog or a baby stroller.  I feel like I'm on that big road trip, the one I've been planning for years, feel as though I'm stopped in a random town in a random state. Sure, it very much looks like my hometown. "A dusty main street with lots of vacant store fronts running over a ravine on the way to the softball park with a county trunk running past it..."  But it's not my hometown. It can't be. The streets, avenues and alleys, bars, businesses and ballparks are right. But the faces are all wrong. 

I'm led to wonder, for the first time ever, if I may not be back this way again. 

One More (?) Go Around: A Hundred Songs I Absolutely Must Have With Me on 1/48/50

 #382) "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" by Crosby, Stills and Nash - Over time, I've had an unreliable relationship with Crosby, Stills and Nash. For years and years, the only song of theirs that ever wound up on any playlist of mine was "Southern Cross", a tune from later in their career - that is, after their peak in popularity - that appealed to me the first time I heard it on Top 40 radio at the age of ten, and still very much does.

Aside from that, I didn't really pay attention to CSN, and what I actually knew about them, as compared to what I knew about other acts from the late 60s/early 70s that were considered "classic" by the time I came of age, was spotty at best, factually inaccurate at worst: I always assumed David Crosby was the leader of the group, merely because his name appears first. Nowadays, I wouldn't suggest there is or ever was a leader, per se. All three members of this "supergroup", each coming from a notable band before (Crosby from The Byrds, Graham Nash from The Hollies, Stephen Stills from Buffalo Springfield), contribute something valuable to the overall sound. I knew that Neil Young (also from Buffalo Springfield) made them a foursome for a short while (CSNY!), but that it didn't last. I always thought "Teach Your Children" was lovely, an anthem for a generation and all that, but for some reason, I never wanted to listen to it all the way through. Same with "Our House".  And "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" was just a song I caught fragmented stretches of on "classic rock" radio while at work on a Tuesday morning, a tune I never bothered to listen to for more than a minute. I'm not sure why. It always seemed a little too of the 1960s to be relatable, I just can't possibly explain what I mean by that.

I do know that the fact that I felt that way is a real shame. I'd give anything to have been able to experience this song, really listen to it, make it relatable, when I was twenty. For my money, the seemingly disjointed, rambling lyrics are anything but. Rather, they so capture the rarefied torture of going through a breakup when you're young. Stills wrote the song about his imminent breakup with singer Judy Collins, whom he'd been dating for a couple of years. He was 23 or 24 at the time, and you can tell, and I mean that in a good way. The professions and confessions sprinkled throughout the seven-minute masterpiece would seem to be torn straight from the pages of every young man's romantically muddled psyche, a little bit of everything: raw and random, earnest, pathetic, poetic and potent, easily distracted, ever anguished, restless, meaningless and inspired all at once. Gorgeous and awkward. Too much, and at the same time never quite enough.

This has to be true, because it's all pretty much the same stuff I used to write in notebooks when I was an emotionally muddled young man, the very same kind of addled all-over-the-place emotional imagery I tried mightily to work into my fiction, in days when I had everything before me and a much loftier sense of relevance driving me forward.  

It's something every young person who has ever been in - and/or lost - love can relate to, hitting its mark without ever being too specific, too much about Stephan Stills and Judy Collins, and that, coupled with stellar musicianship (moments of true floral notes both in the trio's vocal harmonies and Stills' expert guitar work) makes "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" nothing short of immortal ... far outlasting the mere 1960s, or Crosby, Stills and Nash, or me.

I mean come on, "Friday evening ... Sunday in the afternoon ..."  Nothing else needs to be said, right? ;-)

"I've got an answer / I'm going to fly away / What have I got to lose?"

#383) "Stray Cat Strut" by The Stray Cats - This is one of those songs that some might be inclined to dismiss as a novelty. It's so catchy, the subject matter borderline silly, lending itself to cartoons and other pop culture fare. The Stray Cats, with their upright bass and pompadours, were themselves a "novelty" act, decidedly retro if nothing else, although I do not mean that in any disparaging way. 

How could I? Brian Setzer is a talented guy musically speaking, and if you take a moment to do so, "Stray Cat Strut" is downright beautiful to listen to. The restless lyrics, equally restless rhythms, the angsty and theatrical chord progressions, bring out silliness, longing and sass in equal measure, all dressed in Setzer's wet, wonderful guitar work.

"Howling to the moonlight on a hot summer night ..."

Road Rage

The other day I was waiting in the drive-thru at the bank, and in a fairly pissy mood. The weather had been shit all day, I'd been stuck in the line for over twenty minutes, and when the vehicle ahead of me didn't move on quick enough so that I could finally get up to the window, make my deposit, and go home, I blew my horn as a means of nudging it along. I didn't lay on the horn, but didn't merely tap it either. It was about a one-second yawp in the Key of F to express my impatience with this driver, and yes, also my general aggravation with an entirely unconcerned world.

The gentlemen driving the vehicle had just started to pull away, but when I blew my horn he braked, put it back in park, and climbed out. He took two steps toward me, spread his hands out and said, "Is there something wrong with me?"

Yes, there is, I thought. You sat there diddling on your phone with your foot holding the brake for a full 45 seconds before moving forward, demonstrating a gross lack of courtesy, a total disregard for the preciousness of anyone's time other than your own.

I didn't say that though. Instead, I passively swiped my hand in front of me, shook my head, and said, "Naw, we're good."

He was not a physically imposing individual; that wasn't the issue. He was short, and thin, and in his early 60s, if not older. Whether I could "take" him in a physical fight didn't matter, just as whether he should have immediately moved his ass after the bank teller completed his transaction didn't ultimately matter, no matter how much I thought it should in the moment. I'd inadvertently baited him, he was outraged, and it was incumbent upon me to suck up my pride and keep the situation from escalating. I had no way of knowing how pissed off he was (read: what he might have been capable of), and no way of telling if he might have had a gun in his vehicle, or on his person, in this state, which allows permitted concealed carry, so I "squashed it" (to borrow a line from Beverly Hills 90210 a hundred years ago), and it was the right call. I cooled my own jets, and he cooled his, got back in his car and drove off.

But the near-incident illustrated how low the flashpoint of people's rage is. It really doesn't take much to get someone flying off the handle, and that's got me reconsidering my own behavior when I'm driving around, especially on any extended trip. I'm not a hot head, exactly, I don't freak out over every little slight that comes my way (in a reversed situation, my response to him blowing his horn would have been to mutter, "yeah, okay, calm down, asshole..." to myself, before moving on...), but I can't say I've never laid on the horn, can't say I've never flipped anyone the bird, although it's almost always been in response to the other person doing it first. What can I say? I'm human. I fuck up sometimes, don't always have the right answer. But I will say that the older I get, the less often it happens. Thank God for that.

Road rage isn't really a new phenomenon. There were TV news stories about it when I was growing up in the 80s. Back then it was presented as a new, burgeoning phenomenon, and largely centered around urban areas, where traffic congestion tweaked the nerves of drivers on a daily basis. I seem to recall a kind of, "What's happening to our nation's urban freeways...?" theme. 

That, of course, is no longer true, if it ever really was. Road rage happens everywhere now, on all types of roads, in all types of places, involving all types of people of all ages, and YouTube provides a harrowing glimpse into how frequently it happens, how easily it can escalate, and indeed, just what people are capable of when it does. You watch enough of those videos depicting intersection screaming matches, angry tapping on driver-side glass or punching of hoods, the aggressive, multi-lane maneuvers, the occasional brandishing of firearms, it's hard to keep faith that anyone "squashes" anything anymore, hard to believe that we're not going (or gone) off the rails as a society.

I have a couple of completely unscientific theories as to why road rage happens (that is, frequently enough to qualify as a phenomenon):  

1) We're in motion when we're in a car, but we're not in control of that motion really, or at least always on the precipice of losing it. Instinctively, we know that something catastrophic could happen in a split second to wrest it from our grasp, and even if it's not something we consciously think about all the time, we're not at all okay with that notion. It makes us anxious ... puts us on guard.

2) Our feet aren't touching the ground, which further makes us feel vulnerable, and we're sitting down to boot, so when someone gets too close, or almost sideswipes us, or cuts us off, our kneejerk response is amplified.

I don't know if there's any warrant to either of those points, but they make sense, don't they?

Road rage is, in any case, a pretty horrible part of modern American life, and something to consider when I take this long road trip. On one hand, 1/48/50 will be an epically restorative experience. There will be something grand about having nowhere to be for an extended period of time, just tooling around here and there, wherever the wind (or the road) takes me, going places I've never been and will be unlikely to ever visit again.

But there will be a lot of driving, a lot of time stuck in my vehicle - that is, sitting down with my feet off the ground - and I wouldn't want a situation like what began to boil at my bank the other day to escalate when I'm in an unfamiliar town, or a thousand miles from nowhere (or anywhere ever, actually).  I can't really control how anyone else responds or reacts, but I can do my part, by keeping off the horn and keeping my middle finger in its holster. 

Also just by keeping my own anger in check, and the best way to do this is by keeping perspective: about how insignificant I am in the great cosmic all, and how unconcerned the world really is whether I get angry or not. It's not worth the elevated blood pressure, much less (God forbid) facing what may lie in wait at the end of an escalation. 

Just shake it off, reset, and drive on.

"Squash it!" ;-) 

One More (?) Go Around: A Hundred Songs I Absolutely Must Have With Me on 1/48/50

#372) "Here Comes the Rain Again" by The Eurythmics - I didn't truly appreciate the Eurythmics when I was young (navigating my 5th grade playground dressed in camouflage pants and matching hat), primarily because Annie Lennox didn't appeal to me on the brink of puberty. I never liked the short orange hair, or (at the time) the whole androgenous look (give me a break, I was a kid...). Couple that with the fact that the music was (perhaps) a bit too sophisticated for me at age eleven. Although, maybe "sophisticated" isn't the right word. It just seemed unrelatable, in a way that other music of the time, from the likes of Madonna, Huey Lewis and Culture Club didn't.

Of course, I'm long past all of that. It's all about the music now - good, bad or indifferent - as opposed to anything even remotely visual or style-based, and insomuch as it matters (which it really doesn't), Annie Lennox was actually quite beautiful, and the Eurythmics'  heavily-laden synth-pop sound has stood the test of time, proven itself to be durable by only getting better with age.

Whereas there is a certain hostility prevalent in their other notable hit, "Sweet Dreams", "Here Comes the Rain Again" is more winsome; indeed, rainier. It was, and is, one of those songs that sent my mind off shore. Still does ... just a few hundred yards, not so far as I can no longer see land, just far enough to dose me with anxiety that the land could disappear ... but probably won't. 

"Here comes the rain again / Raining in my head like a tragedy..."

#373) "Ebony and Ivory" by Paul McCartney - Oh yes, I've said it numerous times in this space: Paul McCartney is, for my money and roundly speaking, the greatest performer of the last hundred years. No, he's not the only great songwriter out there, nor the greatest vocalist (although he's crazy stellar in both those departments), but with Macca, it's more a matter of sheer artistic range - his ability to shriek convincingly in songs like "Helter Skelter", then equally as convincingly croon out "Yesterday". It's about that way he had of whipping his voice into a creamy froth for "Oh Darling!", then engage a seamless transition into, say, "Mother Nature's Son" with completely convincing tenderness. He has been churning out sets of songs sporting these wildly disparate styles for almost 60 years, first with The Beatles, then Wings, then as a solo artist from the 80s on ... whatever he was singing, it never seemed like something he shouldn't be trying to sing, and what I've actually said numerous times in this space is that for a self-proclaimed singer of silly love songs, when he does want to make a point, he makes it well. 

Nowhere is this more true than with "Ebony and Ivory", a kind of last word on race relations, which McCartney thought to share, appropriately enough, with Stevie Wonder. The lyrics are simple in what they are saying, the business about the black and white keys on the piano working in harmony ("why don't we...?" indeed), and vocally, Wonder and McCartney each brings something pretty amazing to the party, their voices ideally suited to their parts. The music is, well, light and refreshing, like any good McCartney song, but also an oddly potent joy to listen to.  

No it's not rock and roll, not music to fall in or out of love to, or music to cobble together a mood or vibe with ... it is merely light and refreshing, and the charge that it was some sad attempt by McCartney to stay relevant when the the luster of his career had started to fade by the dawn of the 1980s might have had some truth to it.

But on the other hand, it's not true at all. Come on, he's fuckin' Paul McCartney. If he's going to write a song about racial harmony, "Ebony and Ivory" is kind of exactly the way he's going to go about it.  And I sort of wish we still lived in a world where a song like this could possibly chart the way it did in 1982.

"Why don't we...?"

One More (?) Go Around: A Hundred Songs I Absolutely Must Have With Me on 1/48/50

#364) "You Are Everything" by The Stylistics - Philadelphia soul in the 1970s was primarily about production. The composite sound I have simply adored since first hearing it dribble out of an AM radio somewhere in the sunny spaces of my parents' bookstore in the days when my favorite TV show was CHIPs, was created by writers/producers like Thom Bell skillfully joining just the right vocals to an even righter musical arrangement, which was usually spartan, but completely satisfying to listen to.

Like its musical cousin Motown, I think there is a purity to this kind of music, an emotional timbre that is raw and vulnerable, strangely haunting and hopeful all at once. Philly soul is a bit more polished for its heightened production value, but that's not a bad thing. Yes, Russell Thompkins Jr's vocals are impressive, low and sturdy one moment, then crisp, clear and sky-bound the next, but it's really the accompaniment that holds the Philly sound together. It's a delicate discipline lacing together drums and strings and other assorted instrumentation (a kind of musical flea market...in a good way) and having it complement rather than overwhelm, share space rather than conquer land.

Also like Motown, I think Philadelphia soul is timeless, comprised of songs that exist forever in the secluded corners of our minds, where - forever - they administer measured doses of their austere but monumental beauty to the memories collected there.

"I just can't go on living life as I do, comparing each girl to you, knowing they just won't do / They're not you..."

✅ And there are other gems courtesy of the Stylistics that not only deserve to be remembered, but recognized. I think The Stylistics were in a class by themselves.  

#365) "You Make Me Feel Brand New" by The Stylistics - See above.

#366) "Betcha By Golly, Wow" by The Stylistics - See above.

----- 

 #367) "How Deep is Your Love" by The Bee Gees - You know, the real tragedy is that when all the dust has settled, and these times of ours are just another footnote in the annals of history, the Bee Gees are most likely going to be remembered for "Stayin' Alive". That's all anybody I knew (and myself) ever gave them credit for back in the day, and usually in a mocking way. I remember being in high school, and everyone, everyone, making fun of the tight pants, big hair, silly-sounding falsetto and contrived swagger; it was SOP when "Stayin' Alive" played or the Bee Gees were so much as brought up in conversation, to start doing the John Travolta apple-picking dance and squealing "aah aah aah aah stayin' alive...!!!!!!!!!" , safe in the knowledge that you'd get a laugh from someone, and it was a good bet they'd join in. "Stayin' Alive" was barely ten years old at the time, but it seemed much older, and so lame, so of the 1970s, that decade with all the ugly clothing, cars and décor. 

But seriously, what the fuck did I know? 

First off, for the record, I don't think there is anything wrong with "Stayin' Alive". It's a disco song, yes, but so what? It's not a bad disco song. Great bass line, and the "swagger" actually reads more legitimate when it's confined to the song itself...same goes for the lyrics. At the end of the day, it was just a sell-out move for the otherwise uber-talented Brothers Gibb, who'd been around since the mid-1960s, and whose command of melody, harmony and message when it comes to songwriting rivaled, in my opinion, many universally recognized greats of the 20th century.  

I'm willing to back that up, too. As a pop ballad, I'd put "How Deep is Your Love" up against just about any other song for comparison, any song enjoying a fully secure spot in those annals of history - "Something" by the Beatles, anything by The Beatles, or Fleetwood Mac or the Stones or Billy Joel or Elton John or a Motown luminary like Smokey Robinson. A lot of great music, ballads and otherwise, came out of the 60s and 70s, but so many people are quick to laud the genius of The Beatles, Fleetwood Mac or Smokey Robinson (as well they should), while just continuing to the do the apple picking dance whenever someone mentions the Bee Gees. 

"How Deep is Your Love" takes the Bee Gees' distinctive harmonies and turns them breathy and hypnotic. This song comes to me on a summer breeze, man, no joke. It was among the first songs I ever heard on the radio, when I was very, very young, the first to make me feel things, that is, my first exposure to music that moved me emotionally, but in an ill-defined kind of way. I was seven once, I know I was, riding in the back seat of my parents station wagon, hearing this song and feeling an emotional mélange - one part sorrow, one part intoxicated love, one part loneliness, and one and a quarter parts anxiety.  

Forty years later, it still has the exact same effect.

"'Cause we're living in a world of fools, breaking us down, when they all should let us be / We belong to you and me..."

✅ And there are other gems courtesy of The Bee Gees that not only deserve to be remembered, but recognized. Turns out, The Bee Gees were in a class by themselves.  

#368) "Too Much Heaven" by The Bee Gees - See above.

#369) "To Love Somebody" by The Bee Gees - See above.

#370) "I Started a Joke" by The Bee Gees - See above.

#371) "How Can You Mend a Broken Heart" by The Bee Gees - See above.

One More (?) Go Around: A Hundred Songs I Absolutely Must Have With Me on 1/48/50

 #361) "Rich Girl" by Hall and Oates - Ahh, blue-eyed soul with a little bit of that sublime Philadelphia sound thrown in...or is it that sublime Philadelphia sound with a little blue-eyed soul thrown in? 

Either way, it's sublime. Maybe this is one of those situations where labels have no meaning (and really, should they ever...?), but they're kind of hard to avoid. In true "Philadelphia sound" style, "Rich Girl" is a richly-textured blend of production and vocal prowess, so what's not to love, no matter what you call it?  When the strings and horns spiral upwards and climax in the spaces above the clouds and all the voices sing as one, nothing less than a sense of utter daylight is produced, a headspace where it's always either Saturday evening or Sunday afternoon and everything is just fine, even if it isn't. 

"Rich Girl" may be from the "blue-eyed soul" camp, but is no less worthy for this. No less exhilarating. Solid is solid, no matter the color or creed.

"You can rely on the old man's money, you can rely on the old man's money..."

#362) "Times of Your Life" by Paul Anka - This is one of those songs that - by now - only shows up on the "old time" radio station nobody listens to anymore, the one with the "beautiful music" format, wholesome beacon to the most recent geriatric crowd, a station whose hey day was when Bush 41 was president (and maybe even earlier), broadcasting at 25,000 watts from a lonely corner of the FM (or worse, AM) dial, right on the edge of town there, at that intersection where, say, Sycamore Road meets up with County Trunk H. 

There it sits, in a world that no longer really needs it, a world where everyone can be his own dee jay and listen to whatever he wants whenever he wants to, just running out the clock until its license expires with minimal staff: a nice lady named Kay, let's say, working the front desk, who knits the majority of her work day away, and ol' Bucky, the engineer, never around but always on call, and maybe one other person, a Skip or a Don perhaps, who was there in the old days, when the station was more relevant than it is today, and now finds himself finishing out his career doing sales, traffic, and production for the few commercials that need to be done. The station has no live on-air talent whatsoever, just a musical cavalcade of moldy oldies beamed in via satellite, broken up four times an hour by a computer-generated voice burbling, "It's 62 degrees at ... 8:45." 

Following that auditory sedative, also known as the station ident, you're likely to hear "Times of Your Life" by Paul Anka, a song perfectly suited to the Kodak commercial it appeared in back in the 1970s. This might be called, "blue-eyed marshmallow fluff", but I've always enjoyed it. In a different way, or for different reasons perhaps, it also generates its own daylight as it plays. Maybe it's later in the day, maybe the sun's beginning to set, shadows growing long, and it's possible everything might not be okay, so you better start taking a look at the things around you and deciding what really matters. 

Man, it's really true, the older I get, the more so many of these songs start making sense in a way they never did (could) before. 

"Good morning, yesterday / You wake up and time has slipped away..."

 

One More (?) Go Around: A Hundred Songs I Absolutely Must Have With Me on 1/48/50

#349) "I Let Her Lie" by Daryle Singletary - The best country songs are the ones that don't spew redneck braggadocio, or self-righteous nonsense about bad behavior and good times being strung together by the uber patriotic act of keeping a job and raising kids, but instead paint a reliable portrait of rural or small town life as it actually exists. Make no mistake, this doesn't always have to be a portrait of misery and sorrow, in other words, the woman doesn't always have to be leaving and taking the kids and the dog with her, but life is a shit sandwich sometimes, and I know from experience there is a unique flavor to the main ingredient of that sandwich when you live in a small town, which is not always captured by every country ballad that comes down the pike. I've said it many times: the best country ballads, the ones that really get at the heart of a matter, tell truth in a moving, memorable way, are as much folk songs as anything.

There's no braggadocio in "I Let Her Lie", not much of anything deserving to be called drama, for that matter. Just an anguish as intimately dull as a cloudy Wednesday afternoon on Main Street, where traffic is never anything more than light and the local gift shop didn't have a single customer all morning. It is here, in the town where the pace is a little slower because not much ever happens, where a romantic relationship that has started to show signs of its death throes bears its sharpest claws.

There are lots of songs about breakups and failed relationships, particularly in country music, but "I Let Her Lie" has always struck an especially potent chord with me. Maybe because it concerns itself with the response, rather than what is happening. In the song, the woman is cheating, the man is suffering - all too easy in this bad ol' world to shrug and say, "Natch." - but in this instance, the man's response isn't all that decisive, because in real life it wouldn't be. It would be informed - distracted - by a host of complex and contradictory emotions, and it's this balk that has created the heartache, the regret, the confusion. There comes the inevitable gossip, because it's a small town after all, and the more talk there is floating around a small town, in and out of bars and work places and that Main Street gift shop, the owner of which almost certainly knows someone who knows someone who knows you, the harder it is to make the move you know you will eventually have to make.

I get it. In some measure, to some extent, long ago, I was there. "I Let Her Lie" will always serve as a totem to that specific time in my life.

And isn't that what songs are meant for? ;-)

"We were that small town scandal, but she was my only world..."


#350) "Goin' Up the Country" by Canned Heat - It's all in the voice, I'd say. The late but fairly great Alan Wilson lent his distinctive vocal style to the two Canned Heat songs most people remember. Wilson overdosed in 1970 (a member of that lamentable "27" club, actually), but left behind the quintessential counterculture anthem, although in actuality, the song has a deep musical history dating back to the 1920s. But this version, with updated lyrics that reflect the times in which it was recorded, has other nifty things going on - a spunky bass line and spritely flute line are held together by the tautest drum line, all of which weirdly (but splendidly) complement Wilson's froggy vocals. Fifty years on, "Goin' Up the Country" is simply fun to listen to, and though on one hand it's pretty dated, from another point of view it's entirely timeless.

"We might even leave the USA / 'Cause there's a brand new game that I don't want to play...."

One More (?) Go Around: A Hundred Songs I Absolutely Must Have With Me on 1/48/50

#339) "Off to the Races" by Lana Del Rey - On the surface, "Off to the Races" is kind of ridiculous, because Lana Del Rey is kind of ridiculous, just not necessarily in a bad way. Throughout its five minutes, the song, about a Lolita-style love affair in which there does not appear to be any winners, teeters on the edge of self-indulgence, always seeming about to collapse under the weight of its own overkill, but it also seems aware of this fact...almost self-aware. There is a cinematic luster at play, as the song phases between a fiercely guarded (and potentially dangerous) emotional mystery and a kind of hedonistic, deliberately "fuck you" exhibitionism, during the chorus especially, which I find immensely stirring, without knowing exactly why.

"You are my one true love / you are my one true love..."


#340) "Only Women Bleed" by Alice Cooper - According to Wikipedia (and as always, take it for what you will), there are people in this world who hear this song and assume it's about menstruation.

No joke. This "fact" (and let's hope the dismissive quotations really are warranted) is not only hilarious, but also kind of depressing. To think that anyone out there reads this uniquely lovely, Beatles-esque ballad, among the first of its kind from a hard rock artist, as nothing more than a 9th grade Health class lecture, rather than a surprisingly sensitive portrayal of a put-upon woman in an abusive relationship/marriage, is something I don't want to dwell on.  Only women bleed, indeed.

"Next, kids, we learn about a young man's changing body..."

This is one instance where I pray Wikipedia is as unreliable as people say it is.

"Man makes your hair gray, he's your life's mistake / All you're really looking for is an even break..."

One More (?) Go Around: A Hundred Songs I Absolutely Must Have With Me on 1/48/50

#331) "Have You Ever Seen the Rain?" by Creedence Clearwater Revival - From a musical standpoint, there's nothing not to like about CCR. At the height of the tumultuous 1960s, the Fogerty brothers, Tom and John, along with Stu Cook and Doug Clifford, came onto the scene with a homespun sound that was no less agitated, no less emotionally chaotic and intense, than anything from the time that might now be called acid rock. They weren't exactly the downhome bayou brothers their music suggested, they hailed from the San Francisco area, but they weren't "hippies" either, though they were aware of what was going on around them and certainly had something to say about it, which they did, quite powerfully, through their music.

Music's a funny, wonderful thing, isn't it?  Songs have a way of becoming personal property in the listener's mind, and playlists like this one, whether designed for a road trip or just sitting at home chilling, have a way of reading as nothing less than a soundtrack of the listener's life.

But tastes, and therefore influences, change over time. If I'd started a list like this when I was 22, I don't think it would have been nearly as diverse or interesting, as I would have been far more inclined to include only music I felt told my story, as I believed it to be.

That's still somewhat true now, of course, but far less so than once would have been the case.  As I've aged, I think I've broadened my musical scope. I appreciate songs simply for their musicality now, appreciate the artist's moment rendering that music in whatever way they have. In other words, it no longer has to be something I can relate to on a personal level in order to get my attention, and yet (and here's the "funny and wonderful" part), I still do feel it personally, just in a broader - and frankly, more satisfying - way.  I appreciate live music more than ever before as well, perhaps because I dabble a little myself, and while I can play, I never feel like I could get up in front of people and play with a bunch of other musicians, with precise timing, or engage in some epic guitar or keyboard solo without fucking up, having (or wanting) to start over. I know it's about practice, practice, practice, but it also involves a certain God-given gift bestowed upon the Billy Joels, Les Claypools, Princes and Walter Becketts of the world (among others), which I just don't have. Most people just don't have.

"Have You Ever Seen the Rain?" gets interpreted different ways by different people, probably because it was recorded at such a crazy time in history, and there's definitely a heaviness present to reflect that fact, a sense that it's saying something, has an important message. It's not entirely clear what that message is, you just know its heavy, and you feel compelled to find it.

John Fogerty has said the song isn't really about the Sixties, or Vietnam, or any one momentously bad thing that happened at the time, but actually about the band's unhappiness being superstars. At first glance, that might seem to cheapen it, but I don't think it does. It makes the song greater, turns it into a broad collector of all the sadness, frustration and heartache and melancholy Life can dish out, a universal anthem, with one size fitting all.

The straightforward notion that it's just about a sun shower is valid too, because I've truly always thought, musically, it sounds like rain falling on a sunny day.

Doesn't it...?! It sounds like a sun shower.  Which, at the end of the day, is all it needs to sound like.

"And forever on it goes, through the circle, fast and slow..."


#332) "Fortunate Son" by Creedance Clearwater Revival - Here, CCR doesn't fuck around with metaphor, no need to interpret what this song is about. Although, in keeping with the band's offbeat vibe, it's a slightly different take on the antiwar message: not about the horror or futility of war, as such, but the class warfare that went on in the time of something so crazy as a national military draft. 'Twas ever thus: the poor, furthest away from ever being able to enjoy the American dream as it was presented, were the ones expected to fight for it....and then totally shit on by the American public if they were lucky enough to come marching home.  Liberal, conservative...there is a lot of blame to go around for what happened back then.

But none of it ever sullied (or sullies) the unique splendor of John Fogerty's voice.


"Some folks are born silver spoon in hand / Lord, don't they help themselves..."

One More (?) Go Around: A Hundred Songs I Absolutely Must Have With Me on 1/48/50

#329) "So Far Away" by Carole King - How lovely is this song? Really....just how lovely? Like a fire crackling or the night whispering or a really good cup of coffee just waiting for you to lift it up to your needy and grateful lips for that soul-feeding first sip in the bright morning sunshine....er, something like that.

I discovered "So Far Away" when I was in high school, when it - like I - was less than 20 years old. I was in the throes of a fairly potent singer/songwriter phase at the time, and big on remembering the 1970s not for the awkwardly troubled and anxious times they were, but simply as I remembered experiencing them as a young kid, which involved less trouble and anxiety, more late morning sunshine illuminating the woods behind our house, where all I had to do was play Army (and the only threat was wood ticks), while my parents sat around drinking coffee and talking about interesting stuff, selling books for a living.

Admittedly, my memories of that time are a bit rose-colored, but they're not completely off base or fabricated. AM Gold was always playing in the background, leaking from some tiny radio somewhere, and "So Far Away" (along with other "woodsy" [in my mind] music from the likes of The Carpenters, James Taylor, Barry Manilow...) has always represented the calm, almost primitive beauty I enjoyed when I was still very young, for which (although I didn't realize it at the time, and wish I had), I was very lucky.

So the song has always held a deeply personal significance for me, but nowadays, I also think its timing was historically significant: released in 1971, at the tail end of an era of social upheaval, which gave rise to a winsome restlessness that would in turn imbue popular culture for the next ten years, Carole King offers a different tack for her generation at the trailhead of the 1970s, and in a way (although this may or may not have been her intent), foreshadowed what was to become of the modern American family: not physically far away, necessarily, but emotionally and psychologically distant, perfect strangers living and raising children under one roof, strained circumstances that led her generation to its soaring divorce rate. The lyrics could be considered a metaphor, really: doesn't anybody stay in one place, anymore?, King sings.

From about 1970 on, they didn't as much, even in (or especially in) their hearts and minds.

"One more song about moving along the highway / Can't say much of anything that's new..."


#330) "Laura" by Billy Joel - I've said it before (I've said lots of things more than once on this page, I've come to realize), but I feel it bears repeating: Billy Joel gets a bad rap, skewered by music purists for being too slick, too polished, and for this, inauthentic, lacking a certain critical rawness in the whole smoky, gritty, street-wise thing that was a recurring theme of his music/image, at least early on.

But to me, that's always meant that he's just too damn good.  A masterful songwriter and performer, Billy Joel identified as the piano man, but he really could have gotten away with calling himself the music man. Seriously, if Michael Jackson was the king of pop, and Howard Stern is the king of all media, then Billy Joel gets my nomination for the king of all music.  He's one of those artists who sees music - the notes, the chords, their harmonious mesh with rhythm - in multiple dimensions, multiple colors, and was able to forge a seemingly effortless presentation by pairing beyond-handy chops on multiple instruments with not just a rock solid understanding of, but an innovative approach to, the songwriting process.  His album The Nylon Curtain (1982) is a perfect example of his experimental side, and "Laura", a clear homage to the Beatles that nevertheless stands on its own, is front and center.

And speaking my truth, I, like doubtless every man at some point in his life, knew a few girls like Laura back in my day. Just sayin'...;-)

"Here I am, feeling like a fucking fool...."

One More (?) Go Around: A Hundred Songs I Absolutely Must Have With Me on 1/48/50

#325) "Goodbye Stranger" by Supertramp - I was introduced to this song on the television show WKRP in Cincinnati when I was a kid (it started playing during a dramatic scene...or at least as dramatic as can be achieved on a sit-com), and like Bob Seger's "Roll Me Away" at the end of the movie Mask, it sparked a powerful stirring - an electrical charge of restlessness that bordered on titillation. In my mind, the elegantly simple electric piano riff that starts the song and pulses its way reliably throughout has forever remained on that short list of musical sounds sure to get the hairs on the back of my neck standing at attention. But there is something else about this song that I love, and it has nothing to do with musicality. Musical styles and stylizations come and go, and at the end of the day, what's good and what's bad, what's moving and what's not, are never more than subjective at best.

It's the sentiment of the song: the notion of moving on or hoping to move on to something new, something better, or maybe feeling the need to keep on moving on in order to keep yourself right, making travel plans for a completely uninspiring and uncertain future as a means of coping.

Concepts like that don't seem to be much of a thing in popular music anymore, certainly not the way they were for the likes of Bob Seger, Jackson Browne and Lynard Skynard back in the day. Nobody rambles and roams anymore, or even thinks they might want to, or need to. Maybe they never did; maybe it was always a bit of a smoke and mirrors illusion. But a lot of the music from the late 70s, when "Goodbye Stranger" was released, seemed to suggest the notion that personal peace-of-mind was directly linked to physical freedom, the ability to come and go at will, with no chains, no one to answer to, nothing holding you back, holding you down.

No longer. Music is all about staying put these days - or at least being perfectly content with how things are, how you are - and that's not really surprising, I guess, with the Internet being a virtual means of escape. Nobody's stuck staring at the same four walls, even if they're surrounded by the same four walls. They can essentially travel the world without ever leaving the house, see things, talk to people, choose to talk to no one if they so desire. This leaves - that I've noticed - young people, who don't know a world any different, with little or no inclination to go anywhere, ever. They're living with their parents well into their twenties, or thirties, barely bothering to get driver's licenses unless it becomes absolutely necessary.  This is weird to me.

Yes, the whole "freedom" think is dangerously idealistic, and a bit of a tread-worn trope, and yes, it can certainly be argued that it was a uniquely Baby Boomer thing to put such a premium on unmitigated freedom. Millennials and Gen Y might be self-absorbed, but it's no secret the "Me" generation was selfish.  The frosty farewell evident in "Goodbye Stranger"...literally the lyrics, "goodbye stranger" and "I have to have things my own way to keep me in my youth"... were doubtless spoken to wives, husbands and children all too often back in the aftermath of 1960s, when it might be argued that too many doors were left wide open.

But that it doesn't turn up in songs at all these days is something lost, as far as I'm concerned. Once in a great while, "freedom" - in terms of hitting the road not merely to get from point A to point B, but to disappear into the sunshine - pops up in the odd country song, but not often. Usually in country music these days, you get a lot of thick, pasty patriotism and/or a completely cartoonish portrayal of redneckism that reveals no inclination to leave whatsoever, would even appear to suggest rambling and roaming is the coward's way out.  This is my land, the modern country artist is far more inclined to croon smugly, my country, my family, my roots are here, I'm not going anywhere! I got everything I need right here, and every right to be here! I'm staying put. I'm blessed. So fuck you.

In her lovely 1971 ballad "So Far Away", Carole King sang (negatively): "...one more song about moving along the highway / can't say much of anything that's new..."

I feel that way now, but for the opposite reason.  Nobody seems to want to hit the highway anymore, they don't want a sprawling leap into an unknown creating soul-feeding distance and perspective. They really do just want to sit at home and play on their computer in whatever capacity they prefer, let the world come to them in RGB. And make no mistake, I fall victim to that impulse (or lack of impulse) all the time, and I am by no means a Millennial.

But am I right in the assertion that it's more than a little too bad?

"It was early morning yesterday, I was up before the dawn..."


#326) "Awoo" by Sofi Tukker - Since their debut in 2016, Sofi Tukker, a New York based duo consisting of Sophie Hawley-Weld, Tucker Halpern and an extensive list of collaborative and/or contributing guests, have proven themselves to be a force to be reckoned with, existing and thriving on the funky and just a little kooky fringe of pop music, where they can blend equal portions of ultra cool and ultra ridiculous, do both very well, and appeal to everyone. I hear a little Prince in their sound, a little Lady Gaga, a lot of the B-52s, even a little Steely Dan, yet they've created their own vibe that is unflinchingly unique to their time, their generation.

Pop music, rock and roll, whatever you want to call it, is first and foremost all about being interesting.  Being boring - basic  - is the only real offense, and Sofi Tukker are anything but that. "Awoo" is sexy and playful, never taking itself too seriously, yet coming across entirely legit.

"I was there and then I quit..."

SUMMER PROJECT: Songs That Will Definitely NOT Be Coming Along on 1/48/50

Music, like all things creative, is subjective. I know the list of "road songs" I've been cobbling together on this page for quite a while is not the last word. I'm fully aware everyone has a vastly different list of songs to place on something so heady as a road trip mix.  I like to think I have fairly eclectic taste, fed by an open mind. If something moves me, it moves me. I don't get bogged down by age, image, genre or coolness factor and looking back, I'm proud of the fact that my list has been all over the road, so to speak.

But there are some songs I simply cannot get on board with, for any number of reasons. Sometimes they try too hard. Sometimes they don't try hard enough.  Sometimes it's a song from a band or an artist I otherwise like, just an odd left turn into a musically bad neighborhood that rubs me the wrong way.   Sometimes there's no reason for a certain song to be rubbing me the wrong way, it just does. I can't explain it. Sometimes there's not really anything wrong with a song, as such, it just reminds me of a time in my life I don't wish to remember (don't wish to bring along on a 14,000 mile road trip).  

And yes, sometimes it is true that a certain song is just horrible, so lame or poorly or lazily rendered, so insulting to its genre, the artist performing it, and the LISTENER, it makes my skin crawl, even pisses me off a little.

Here are a few of the musical lemons that will not be coming along for the ride on 1/48/50.  I won't comment beyond the listing.  Readers can take them for what they will, or not take them at all. They may decide I don't know what I'm talking about (if they haven't already), or they may cry out 'Hallelujah!'  Either way is fine with me.  ;-)

❌  "From a Distance" by Bette Midler

❌  "Disco Duck" by Rick Dees

❌  "Walk the Dinosaur" by Was (Not Was)

SUMMER PROJECT: Songs That Will Definitely NOT Be Coming Along on 1/48/50

Music, like all things creative, is subjective. I know the list of "road songs" I've been cobbling together on this page for quite a while is not the last word. I'm fully aware everyone has a vastly different list of songs to place on something so heady as a road trip mix.  I like to think I have fairly eclectic taste, fed by an open mind. If something moves me, it moves me. I don't get bogged down by age, image, genre or coolness factor and looking back, I'm proud of the fact that my list has been all over the road, so to speak.

But there are some songs I simply cannot get on board with, for any number of reasons. Sometimes they try too hard. Sometimes they don't try hard enough.  Sometimes it's a song from a band or an artist I otherwise like, just an odd left turn into a musically bad neighborhood that rubs me the wrong way.   Sometimes there's no reason for a certain song to be rubbing me the wrong way, it just does. I can't explain it. Sometimes there's not really anything wrong with a song, as such, it just reminds me of a time in my life I don't wish to remember (don't wish to bring along on a 14,000 mile road trip).  

And yes, sometimes it is true that a certain song is just horrible, so lame or poorly or lazily rendered, so insulting to its genre, the artist performing it, and the LISTENER, it makes my skin crawl, even pisses me off a little.

Here are a few of the musical lemons that will not be coming along for the ride on 1/48/50.  I won't comment beyond the listing.  Readers can take them for what they will, or not take them at all. They may decide I don't know what I'm talking about (if they haven't already), or they may cry out 'Hallelujah!'  Either way is fine with me.  ;-)

❌  "Don't Trust Me" by 3OH!3

❌  "Leader of the Pats" by Bob and Zip

❌  "The Superbowl Shuffle" by The Chicago Bears Shufflin' Crew  (even when I was a completely uncool 12-year-old, I felt I was too cool for this...)