Brush It Colorless

 Song 750: This week the playlist comes around to Paint it, Black by The Rolling Stones, written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. The week with the shortest day of light in the northern hemisphere seems like an appropriate time to feature this RS anthem, despite the fact that it actually first appeared around the opposite point of the global illumination cycle. Near the end of my freshman HS year, as we students began to enjoy summer vacation in 1966, the circling five that had become major British competitors to the Fab Four got our attention with their advice to apply a dark tone to our surroundings. Similar to the previous summer when their complaint about a lack of satisfaction (Song 256) got us teenies singing along, during that warm season our transistor radios had us chanting about seeing a red door and wanting it to get painted black, and also wanting to see the sun blotted out from the sky, although I doubt that any of us actually would have wished for such a dark reality.

Magenta Drizzle

 Song 749: This week on the playlist you can hear Purple Rain by Prince, who also wrote the song, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. As we in the northeast section of the U.S. get close to the end of the fall season, our precipitation might look darker than it did a few months earlier, but I don't expect the downpour to take on a lavender tone. Back when the Orwellian year arrived, I lived in Berkeley, CA, and most of the music that I paid attention to at the time came from the singer/songwriter group that I hung out with there, but I also did still listen to the radio sometimes, particularly when I rode in one of the cars I obtained during that stretch. It didn't take long for Mr. Prince's anthem to grab my ears and if I rode in a car by myself, I soon could sing along with his lines. Back then, we knew times were changing, and we would have liked to reach out for something new, but I did not see anyone bathing in the purple rain, and perhaps I should feel good about that.

Observatory Occupancy

 Song 748: This week the playlist puts the spotlight on All Along the Watchtower by Bob Dylan, who also wrote the song, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. About a year and a half after I had the experience of hearing the Jimi Hendrix version of this tune, which I featured last week, I had the unexpected privilege of getting to hear the songwriter's original recording of it. My folks dropped me off in the parking lot of Bobb Hall at Northwestern University in early September of 1969, and when I got up to the floor of my dorm room, I met another student who had a room close to mine, and he invited me to come in and hang out with him, which I did. His name was actually Smiley, and he soon put his John Wesley Harding LP on his turntable, so then I got to hear Mr. BD's voice for the first time. My initial reaction to hearing Bob was to think that his rough singing sound explained why he had greater fame as a songwriter than a performer. Living in that dormitory, though, it didn't take long to get to hear a lot more of Mr. Dylan's recordings, and my appreciation of his talent quickly moved past any critique of his vocal tones. Before long, I also concluded that even when there's too much confusion in my area, personally, I COULD get some relief.

Elevated Observation Point

 Song 747: This week the playlist applauds All Along the Watchtower by the Jimi Hendrix Experience, written by Bob Dylan, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. When this wild story came along during the cold months of my HS junior year, back in early 1968, I listened to the TOP 40 as often as I could, and I especially liked hearing Mr. Hendrix's newest hit. Already being a songwriter myself, I paid attention to who wrote the songs I enjoyed, and this quickly became the third Dylan tune I really appreciated. Peter, Paul and Mary had introduced me to Blowin' in the Wind and I met Mr. Tambourine Man by riding along with the Byrds, so Jimi gave me an even bigger reason to find out more about the Bob guy. Of course, at the time I didn't know anyone who thought life is but a joke, and I wondered if when I became an adult a couple of years later, I might actually get to do a visit all along the watchtower and to hang out while all the women came and went. I did not know then that I would spend most of the next decade living in the Chicago area, where, around this time of year, I would often hear when the wind began to howl.

Late Fall Downpour

 Song 746: This week the playlist recognizes November Rain by Guns N' Roses, written by Axl Rose, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. I had moved from California to Brooklyn a few years before this snappy forecast came along and I hung out with the Fast Folk bunch a lot, but I also still listened to the radio and got moved by some of the more magnetic chart toppers. This piece actually became the longest song ever to reach the top ten of the Billboard Hot 100 at the time in early 1992 and would hold that distinction for a number of years. Of course, nothing lasts forever and over time, hearts can change. Meanwhile, given the weather forecast in my area, I'm not looking forward to it, but it seems quite likely that at least once or twice this week I'll have the privilege of walkin' in the cold November rain.

Lacking Favorable Fortune

 Song 745: Seven weeks after my previous personal friend song post, this week's roaming ballad Out of Luck comes from another one of my Fast Folk colleagues Ilene Weiss, who also wrote the song, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. In the summer of 1987 I did a trip to NYC, intending to move there the following year, and during that visit, I got to see Ilene do a set at Folk City which quickly turned me into an IW fan. Not long after I moved to Brooklyn in September of 1988, I joined the Manhattan Fast Folk circle and soon had a copy of Ms. Weiss's Nine Songs Basically cassette, which included this moving excursion, and which got a lot of spins on my player. It didn't take long to understand how it might feel if I made a crazy deal but I also figured out that after my loss of innocence, I would want to say la la la la la la la a lot!

Harvest Season Foliage

 Song 744: This week the playlist features Autumn Leaves by Roger Williams, written by Joseph Kosma, and you can find a cool YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Anyone living in the northeast area of the U.S., or somewhere else with a similar climate, can understand the implications of this tune's title, and has probably seen plenty of examples of the term in the last few weeks, as I have. The YouTube video here comes from an appearance by Roger Williams on the Ed Sullivan Show on January 1, 1956. At some point in that era, my folks got our family's first TV, and very soon, we got to see the Ed Sullivan Show regularly, so it's possible that we might have witnessed that appearance. However, I'm not sure if we even had the tube when Mr. Williams appeared on the show on the first day of 1956. The descending piano riffs he features in the piece do sound quite familiar, so it is possible that I did get to see and hear that segment, though I also might have experienced a rerun of the sequence on a later date. My family at the time had an upright piano sitting next to the TV back then, and even before we got the tube, I had spent some time pounding my fingers on that keyboard, so it's possible that I might have figured out those descending riffs myself and given my own family a musical sense of autumn leaves.

Raising Hair

 Song 743: This week the playlist comes around to Spooky by Classics IV, written by James B. Cobb Jr., Buddy Buie, Mike Shapiro and Harry Middlebrooks Jr., and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. With a ghostly holiday set to arrive this week, it seems like the appropriate time to feature an eerie narrative that got us all shaking along back in February of 1968. While I don't think I ever added the 45 to my hidden collection, I did get to sing along with the haunting rhythm when I had the transistor radio in hand and the touching phantom came rocking across the airwaves. A few months earlier, I had indeed had my first date with an attractive young woman who was actually a year older than me, and I had enjoyed our time together in the cool of the evenin' on that night, but I would never have asked her if she would have liked to go with me and see a movie because the church we both attended (and where we met each other) did not approve of movies, and actually classified viewing a movie in a theater as being A SIN! Some of the older generation of that church also raised the idea that observing the 10/31 holiday might violate fundamentalist principles, but fortunately for me and my brothers, our folks DID let us play the Halloween trick or treat game.

Combustion Pipe Firebolt

 Song 742: This week the playlist comes around to Smokestack Lightning by Howlin' Wolf, who also wrote the song (credited under his name Chester Burnett), and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. The first version of this song I heard came along in 1972 when Chicago radios introduced me to the Mike Harrison renditon, which I applauded on this list as Song 158. Soon after that recording roped me in, I found out about the Yardbirds one (Song 691) and also became aware of this original one. During the 1970s, some Chicago radio stations featured rocking classics from the 1950s, so I may very well have heard it from them, though I don't recall the details now. I definitely did get to know this recording in that era, and when I got to hear it, it felt like it was shinin' just like gold. Of course, even in the previous decade, growing up in a house near a railroad line, I knew that whether or not the engineer might stop the train, even to let a poor boy ride, I would never see a smokestack, since those fuming pipes did not appear on the diesel electric locomotives that had taken over the train tracks by then.

Darkness Approaching

 Song 741: This week the playlist recognizes Here Comes the Night by Them, written by Bert Berns, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. While this informing uplift came along in the early spring of 1965, it seems more appropriate to applaud its observations during the early fall period when days have begun to get noticeably shorter. A year before these attentive notes arrived, the Fab Four had rocked my world, and after becoming a fan of that moving quartet, I soon got to know and appreciate a bunch of their fellow British Invaders, including Them. I could understand how seeing another guy holding a former lover the way I used to do could make me wonder what is wrong with me but experiencing such sadness still would never make me want to die.

Swaying Under Lunar Illumination

Song 740: This week the playlist applauds Dancing in the Moonlight by King Harvest, written by Sherman Kelly, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Around this time in the fall of 1972, as my wife and I searched for an apartment on the south end of Evanston, IL, we started hearing about how making certain moves after dark could and would alleviate particular types of anxiety. I did not at the time look forward to the coming Windy City area frigid season, but it did feel good to imagine that on a somewhat-cool night, dancin' in the moonlight could make someone feel warm and right. The fundamentalist family where I grew up had not approved of dancing, and had never allowed my 2 brothers and/or me to ever do it in any way, but soon after I had left that home a few years before this hit arrived, I got to appreciate how sharing moves with a special attractive partner could feel like a supernatural delight. 

Fantasy Follower

 Song 739: This week the playlist puts the spotlight on Daydream Believer by The Monkees, written by John Stewart, and you can find a cool YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. This musing vision came along around this time in 1967, soon after I began my junior HS year and our school's football team had their homecoming event (which it again had a couple of days ago). While my parents and grandparents did not approve of the devil's music, I did get to experience the Monkees more than a lot of other rockers I liked because of their TV show, which I sometimes got to watch when the folks were not around. That being the case, I quickly learned a number of their tunes and could soon sing along with them. Back then, my good times would often start and end without dollar one to spend because my family had very little money available for entertainment, but they did manage to figure out inexpensive ways to generate pleasure, such as by hiking in the Adirondack Park. I also appreciated my folks providing me with an electric shaver in my last year or two of HS, so I never had to use a shavin' razor that was cold and that stings.

Jagged Jewel

 Song 738: Seven weeks after my previous personal friend song post, this week's ruffled gem Diamond in the Rough comes from one of my Berkeley, CA, comrades Shawn Colvin.The song was written by Shawn Colvin and John Leventhal, and you can find a cool YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. She and her musical partner Jim Bruno had both moved from Illinois to the East Bay area around the time that I did that in the summer of 1978, and in the spring of 1979, I met them at this small folkie spot in San Francisco. I had already gotten roped into the Berkeley singer/songwriter circle, and I invited them to do the same thing, which they did do after their second open mic performance at the pizza place where we all hung out. Shawn soon became one of the stars of that circle, but then in the summer of 1986, she moved to NYC. When I did a trip there the following summer, I got to see her perform at The Bottom Line in Manhattan, and I really enjoyed her set. A year later, I moved to NYC, and soon after I did, I had a copy of Shawn's LIVE TAPE cassette, which opens with this melodic rhinestone, and it didn't take long to start singing along with it. Even in the present, every now and then I can see that I'm getting somewhere, and though last night I lost too much sleep, hopefully tonight I'm gonna find it.

Supply Shortage

Song 737: This week on the playlist you can hear Can't Get Enough by Bad Company, written by Mick Ralphs, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. My wife and I fled the frigid Windy City region in February of 1974 and soon found a really pleasant spot to reside in the milder area of Atlanta, GA. Our attractive apartment had a nice comfortable front porch where I often spent time strumming my 6-string axe and also listening to the local radio station sharing the current chart toppers, which included this melodic deficiency compliment. Back then, I could not picture how a romantic partner might hang me up in a doorway, or even how love could break me in two, but as a typical young male with high testosterone levels, I sure did know how it feels when you can't get enough of someone's love.

Bouncing Crimson Globe

 Song 736: This week the playlist features Red Rubber Ball by The Cyrkle, written by Paul Simon and Bruce Woodley, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Initially when the Beatles rocked my world in February of 1964, I mostly paid attention to them and their fellow British Invaders, but by the time this single came along in the summer of 1966, I had widened my ear radar to whatever climbed into the Top 40, and it didn't take long to learn the chorus of this chart topper and sing along with it. During that stretch, as a young male teenager I admired the attractive females that I shared HS classtime with, but I did not have a romantic connection with one, or even a focused amorous dream, so when I mouthed the tune I didn't picture anyone in particular as its target. In fact, at the time, it bothered me that I hadn't yet had a rollercoaster ride, regardless of the outcome, and I hoped that soon I might get to find a starfish in the sea.

Triangular Currency

 Song 735: This week the playlist comes around to Three Dollar Bill by Maria Muldaur, written by Mac Rebennack, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Ms. MM started grabbing our ears around the end of the summer 51 years ago by telling us about an evening excursion at a haven (which is Song 560), and not only did I like what I heard, but I pictured a very attractive young woman mouthing that melody. Soon enough I got a copy of her initial LP and her appearance on the disc’s cover did look erotically-appealing to a young man in his early twenties. That 33 got a lot of spins on the turntable, so when this third hit from the album climbed the charts, I could already sing along with it. I had decided back then that whatever I could afford to spend on music I liked I would put towards records I could hear repeatedly, so I went to very few concerts in my younger years, but around the time I turned 30, while living in the East Bay of CA, I did get to see a show Maria did, so she became an exception to that rule. When growing up, my parents had regularly gotten me copies of Mad Magazine, so I did know about their three dollar bill, and when doing research for this piece, I found images of such a currency with a picture of Bill Clinton, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, so I guess now each one of them is a three dollar bill that spent some time kissin' babies and hustlin' votes.

Sizzling Pleasure

 Song 734: This week the playlist applauds Hot Fun In The Summertime by Sly and the Family Stone, written by Sly Stone, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Around the time this scorching anthem started climbing the charts, I joined a bunch of my fellow HS vocalists in riding a bus to NYC and then riding a plane to Switzerland. Our select choir group did a European tour that lasted about four weeks, Them summer days sure felt good to us all, and gave us a lot of memorable moments that we could treasure for the rest of our lives. We got to ride cloud nine to get back to NYC, and as we rode the bus back to our hometown, we saw a bunch of fellow teenagers hitching for rides in the Bethel area. Our bus driver explained that a major music festival had just happened in that area, and I later found out that the performers on that Woodstock stage had included a certain crafty fellow and his rocky relatives. When we got back to our neighborhood, we all sure did feel like everything is cool, and we could smile at each other as we waved Bye, bye, bye, bye there.

Extremely Self-Centered

 Song 733: This week the playlist recognizes You're So Vain by Carly Simon, who also wrote the song, and you can find an entertaining YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. When this roving accusation started riding the airwaves in early 1973, my wife and I resided in a comfortable apartment on the south end of my college town, Evanston, and I worked as a local cab driver, having left my university education behind without achieving a graduation. When I found out that Mick Jagger sang harmony on the tune, I thought he might be the target of the lyrics, though I also considered Ms. Simon's former husband James Taylor as an alternative possibility. I had no idea back then that a couple of decades later, I would hang out with someone who had met Carly shortly before she became famous. CS has played a number of games over the years about the identity of the vain guy, and when she made a new recording of the song in 2009, she whispered a moniker that a radio crew thought sounded like David. To be clear, that could not be me. I never flew a Lear jet up to Nova Scotia, and while I have visited Saratoga at least once or twice, I never had a horse there that naturally won.

Roasting Precipitation

 Song 732: This week the playlist puts the spotlight on Summer Rain by Johnny Rivers, written by Jim Hendricks, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Given how much downpour we've had in my neighborhood over the past week, it seems appropriate to feature a song that focuses on warm falling moisture. This roaming weather report actually arrived in the late fall of 1967 as I rolled through my junior HS year, and JR mentions how during the previous warm season, the jukebox kept on playin' Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. I knew exactly what he meant by that, and at the time I still did not know what to make of the new psychedelic direction that the Fab Four and some other prominent rockers had decided to start rumbling around. I could, however, easily picture a romantic partner who had stepped out of the rainbow with golden hair shinin' like moon glow, and as this song’s numbers got higher and the thermometer numbers got lower, I enjoyed imagining the warmth that such a companion could bring to moments when the snow drifts by my window and I could hear the North wind blowin' like thunder.

Focused Recollection

 Song 731: Seven weeks after my previous personal friend song post, this week's stirring vision Forget Me Not comes from another one of my Fast Folk colleagues, Jack Hardy. In fact, Jack was essentially the leader of FF, and this actually marks the first time I've included him in this collection. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, I regularly visited Jack's apartment on Houston St. in Manhattan once a week, along with many others of the group, as we shared our most recent anthems and did critiques of each other's work. I really respected him doing what he did for the organization, and though he left the land of the living in 2011, those of us who had been part of that circle will not forget him and the role he played in our past. However, we also might possibly hear another voice in time, before or after summer's end, that sounds as blue as his once did.

Hot Urban Season

 Song 730: This week the playlist features Summer in the City by The Lovin' Spoonful, written by John Sebastian, Mark Sebastian and Steve Boone, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. I think I made my first visit to NYC in the spring of 1966 when my ninth grade biology class did a field trip to the Bronx Zoo, and I really enjoyed that outing. This musical excursion appropriately arrived soon after summer vacation started, and growing up in a somewhat rural area, I had at that point never experienced the kind of boiling discomfort that the singer complains about in the tune, but I could imagine how it might feel. My family had previously acquired a transistor radio, and during warm weather spells, I relished hearing the current hits while engaging in outdoor activities. It didn't take long to learn this saunter's chorus notes and lines, and then I could sing along when I felt like doing so. I did not know then that a few years later, I would spend my young adult phase residing in a place where in the summer, when I went walking on the sidewalk, the concrete could feel hotter than a match head.

Scorching Urban Juvenile

 Song 729: This week the playlist recognizes Hot Child in the City by Nick Gilder, written by Nick Gilder and James McCulloch, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. When the warm weather season arrived in the Windy City area in 1978, I took some necessary steps and then started stretching out my thumb in a westward direction. It didn't take very long for me to get the rides that brought me to the East Bay in CA, where I would then reside for a decade. A few months after I reached my destination, Mr. Gilder got a lot of attention with this anthem about a fiery youngster, and understandably so. Back then, I did not notice the child prostitution implications of the piece's lyrics, but taking a closer look now, I did wonder about that angle, and then found out that Nick really did get his inspiration from an observance of that phenomenon. All too often, a female so young to be loose and on her own is, in reality, NOT on her own, and when she's runnin' wild and lookin' pretty, most observers don't know what her game is, and that when she goes downtown, that's not really her decision.

Quite Bright Affection

 Song 728: This week the playlist comes around to Sunshine of Your Love by Cream, written by Pete Brown, Jack Bruce and Eric Clapton, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. During the summer of 1967, I started hearing about a rocking Cream trio who had begun amazing audiences, and then, a few months later, as the cooler and darker season arrived in my upstate NY hometown, a shiny moving banger by those three came across the airwaves and grabbed my attention. Before that hit made the scene, I had questioned how just three rockers could make as strong and heavy a sound as the common quartets and quintets of that era did, but then I truly had a striking answer to my question - one that I really relished riding. Every time I got to hear this mover, it felt like I could see the light shinin' through on my old question mark and giving me a clue about where I could be going in the near future.

Dark Warm Weather Stretch

 Song 727: This week the playlist puts the spotlight on Black Day in July by Gordon Lightfoot, who also wrote the song, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. I don't think I even knew who Mr. GL was when the album that included this ballad came along during the winter months of my junior HS year in 1968, but a couple of years later, as I expanded my knowledge and collection of fellow singer/songwriter types, I soon got to know a bunch of Gordon's melodies and messages, and this one came across quite strongly. I had known some of the details when Motor City madness had touched the countryside, but by the time I had a copy of the 33 that included this gem, I understood a lot more about the abuse that the sons and daughters of the fathers who were carried to this land had had to endure and unfortunately still continue to face all too often. Why can't we live in peace? Probably because a small group of very wealthy puppeteers have a stronger grip as long as the hands of the have-nots keep falling out of reach.

Enlightening Someone’s Existence

 Song 726: This week the playlist applauds You Are the Sunshine of My Life by Stevie Wonder, who also wrote the song, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. As we roll into the brighter moments of the northern hemisphere's warmest season, the clarity might remind some of us about a sparkly illumination that we got to hear 51 years ago, actually beginning a few months earlier, just as the temperatures began to rise. My wife and I had found a very comfortable and affordable apartment along the south end of Evanston during the previous fall season, and as the Windy City area got shinier, we expanded our enjoyment of our community and liked hearing about Mr. Wonder's amorous admiration for his twinkling romantic partner. I appreciated the presence of the one who had become the apple of my eye, but I also felt haunted by a weird sense of something missing in the relationship, and that would eventually trigger me to not stay around her.

Scarlet Bloom

 Song 725: This week the playlist recognizes Roses Are Red by Bobby Vinton, written by Paul Evans and Al Byron, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. With graduation day arriving this week in my hometown, many of us living in somewhat rural areas have recently gotten reminded that roses are red and violets are blue. I had learned that colorful phrase during my single-digit years, and in the spring of my first double-digit year, a musical characterization of that flowery idea started regularly flying across the airwaves. While I don't remember any specific moment in the 1962 warm months when I heard Bobby's blooming anthem, it probably came across a lot of transistor radio speakers in places where I hung out with friends and played sports games, since I quickly got to know the tune's melody and lyrics. I did not have a romantic partner at that point, but I had met someone around that time who lit my fuse, and I hoped to soon connect with her and tell her, Sugar is sweet, My Love, But not as sweet as you. On a side note, as I mention in my book Expecting the Broken Brain to Do Mental Pushups, back when I lived in Berkeley, CA, during the 1980s, my singer/songwriter friend Jim Bruno said to me, "Roses are red, violets are blue, I'm a little schizzed and so am I." I chuckled at his joke but I didn't tell him that schizophrenics do not have multiple personality disorder, though people commonly did confuse the two conditions at the time. I had not yet come close to understanding my mother, but I did know that she heard voices in her head. It would take a couple more decades for me to finally realize that she had aural hallucinations.

The Sucker’s Final Distance

 Song 724: Seven weeks after my previous personal friend song post, this week's entertaining excursion The Fool's Last Mile comes from another one of my Fast Folk colleagues, a fellow named Richard Meyer, who also wrote the song, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. I have a vague memory of meeting Richard in the late summer of 1987 during a brief visit to NYC, and finding out then that he worked as the editor of the monthly Fast Folk magazine. A year later, I moved from Berkeley, CA, to Brooklyn, NY, and I soon began mingling with the FF crowd, particularly during their weekly gatherings at Jack Hardy's apartment where everyone got to share a new tune with the group. I liked a lot of what I heard coming from Richard, including this amusing lift. Along that stretch, I did a certain amount of work for FF, but I decided to move on in late 1993. However, a couple of years later I ended up doing the digital designs for the final FF issues, including Issue 8 of Volume 8 which is the collection of songs recorded at a show at The Bottom Line in Manhattan on January 27, 1996. That CD includes this ride, in which Mr. Meyer told us he had learned one of life's hard lessons. Sadly, he learned other hard lessons in the 21st century, including one that put him in pain and ended his life in 2012.

Solar Lightening of Joints

 Song 723: This week the playlist features Sunshine on My Shoulders by John Denver, written by John Denver, Dick Kniss and Mike Taylor, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. In early 1974 my wife and I left the chilly Windy City area and found a nice place to reside in Atlanta, GA, and so I soon got to enjoy feeling the Sunshine on My Shoulders as I sat on our house's porch, often with my guitar in hand. As Mr. Denver's hit climbed the charts, I felt it fit our situation very well and I would frequently harmonize with his vocal as it rode the airwaves. I got a job at a nearby pizza joint and became their featured pianist, though I didn't get paid to do any lead vocals myself. In that era, as the nefarious War on Drugs unfolded, I often felt relieved that Sunshine almost always makes me high, so I didn't have to rely on Mary Jane. A few years earlier I had shared a joint in Atlanta with a friend, and he told me that it made him wonderfully high, which surprised me because I felt no noticeable lift at all from the smoke. I did not condemn him or others for their attraction to weed - in fact, I had a lot of respect for him, regardless of what made him feel good, and I'm sure we would have agreed that Sunshine on the water looks so lovely.

Aligning With a Deity

 Song 722: This week the playlist applauds With God on Our Side by Bob Dylan, who also wrote the song, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. I learned Mr. Dylan's name soon after Peter, Paul and Mary got us riding along with Blowin' in the Wind, and then, by the time of my HS phase, I had noticed that moniker appearing on a bunch of other tunes I really relished, but I didn't actually hear his own versions until I got to college in the fall of 1969. I had a roommate change after the December recess, and with my new roommate being a big BD fan, I got to hear a lot of Bob's impressive lifts, and he quickly became possibly my top lyrical style inspiration. I added a few of his LPs to my collection, including the one that featured this hymn, and they all got plenty of spins on the turntable. In my years growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, I had also learned to hate the Russians, and I believed that the Germans had God on their side, though I later found out that during WWII, the soldiers saluting the swastika regularly wore belt buckles that had the phrase Gott Mit Uns on them, and I don't think they actually had God on their side then. Understanding that for the last 6 decades the U.S., Russia and China have all had large nuclear weapons arsenals, and that the use of too big a portion of just one of those stockpiles could potentially end human civilization on our planet, I strongly agree with Bob that if God's on our side he'll stop the next war!

Historic Conflict Ends

 Song 721: This week the playlist comes around to The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down by Joan Baez, written by Robbie Robertson, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Tonight I highlight a ballad about an event that occurred 159 years ago on this evening. I think I first became aware of Joan Baez during my junior HS year when I heard a warning given to my religious group about a bunch of commies and Soviet puppets who had infiltrated our Top 40 airwaves, with Pete Seeger and Ms. Joan ranking as major adversarial agents. A couple of years later, as I increased my personal knowledge and collection of modern music, I soon learned a lot more about a certain Bob guy and how JB played a big role in expanding his audience. As I got to appreciate him more and more, I also added her 33s to my stack, including the one that featured this melodic tale soon after it came along in the summer of 1971, and it got plenty of spins on the turntable in that era. I had spent that summer in Atlanta, GA, which was the first time I lived in a southern state. Previously, during my years growing up in upstate NY, I actually had an interest in the history of the U.S. Civil War, so I could certainly have imagined when the bells were ringing on a particular night and all the people were singing.

Mobile Flyer

 Song 720: This week the playlist recognizes Rockin' Robin by Bobby Day, written by Leon René, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Before the Beatles rocked my world in early 1964, I paid little attention to most of the music on the radio, with a couple of exceptions, so I probably knew nothing about this tune when it arrived in 1958. I may very well have heard it after I started listening to RnR, but I also would not have known about it being a Golden Oldie unless it got that label when it got played. In the early 1970s, when, as a young adult, I expanded my knowledge of, and collections of, the music I liked to listen to, I also learned a lot about the earlier phase of the rockers, mainly from my Rolling Stone subscription. However, at least one Chicago-area radio station at the time did a revival of rock's founders, and so I got to enjoy hearing about how a certain flying character rocks in the tree-top all the day long, particularly around the time Michael Jackson got his version riding the airwaves. In doing so, I felt especially impressed by a winger who out-bopped the buzzard and the oriole.

Dark Moisture

 Song 719: This week the playlist features Black Water by The Doobie Brothers, written by Patrick Simmons, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. As the early spring of 1975 started to unfold, this aquatic anthem hit the top of the charts. I had found an affordable place to live in south Evanston, only a few blocks from the Lake Michigan beach, and sometimes when driving in my neighborhood, i got to hear the song on the radio while also seeing a part of the lake nearby, although the waves from that body of water had a turquoise tone, not an inky one. I enjoyed the tune's lyric flow, and I had a vague thought about someday crafting a similar message about a dark tide. What I ended up doing, three decades later, was writing a ballad about the Blackwater Boys and you can see a lyric video of that song about the 2005 New Orleans situation by clicking on the title. Back during the era when I went rollin' along with this ride's waves, I did not like the Windy City's snowy season, but during the warmer months, I felt that if it rains, I don't care - that would make no difference to me.

Constructive Support from a Blossom

 Song 718: This week the playlist puts the spotlight on Build Me Up Buttercup by The Foundations, written by Mike d'Abo and Tony Macaulay, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Now that the April showers have brought us May flowers, we can celebrate a blooming melody that actually started growing on the charts during the winter of my HS senior year in early 1969. Along those colder stretches, I couldn't listen to the local top-40 station inside my parents' home because they didn't approve of the devil's music, but I could get to hear some moving hits when hanging out with friends, which I frequently did in that era. One friend that I often visited back then had an attractive sister who I also hung out with, and as the scenes unfolded, eventually I could have pointed a finger at her and vocalized this piece's lyrics. Initially I didn't feel that way, although, from the start, I did sense that she wanted to rope me in. After I came around to having a date with her, I felt attracted to her all the more, and at that point, she seemed to want to build me up, not to have a genuine romantic exchange, but simply just to let me down and mess me around.

Racing in the Drizzle

 Song 717: Seven weeks after my previous personal friend song post, this week's roving jaunt Running in the Rain comes from another one of my Fast Folk colleagues Jane Byaela, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. While I didn't have a close connection with Ms. JB, I did often see her and share spaces with her at FF gatherings. I also saw her perform one of her tunes at a FF event on a street in The Village one afternoon, and the piece she played that day might have been this moving ramble. As the final week of the shower month arrives in my area, sometimes I feel the clouds spinning and I might wrestle with the wind, so maybe I can conquer my misfortune and turn it into fate.

The Shower’s Anthem

 Song 716: This week the playlist comes around to The Rain Song by Led Zeppelin, written by Jimmy Page and Robert Plant, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. As the April moisture continues to come down from the sky in the Northeast, another ballad about downpour currently has a strong resonance in this area. When the LZ Houses of the Holy 33 arrived in the early spring of 1973, my wife and I lived in an attractive apartment at the south end of Evanston, IL. The place's living room had a gas-powered fireplace, which could make an entertaining flame appear, although neither of us had any particular interest in relaxing next to such a blaze, so we rarely watched the fire that grew so low. We did find out, much to our surprise, that soon after we adopted a pair of feline siblings, the male tabby climbed up the fireplace's small vent and got to the building's roof. Fortunately, our upstairs neighbor alerted us to the meow sounds coming from above her space, so I rescued our furry buddy Joker. A few months earlier, I had felt the coldness of my winter in the Windy City region, and I would experience that frigidity more times over the next few years before heading to the milder temperatures of the East Bay. During my decade on the West Coast, I did not have to see the white flakes coming down - just a little rain during certain stretches.

Humor During Precipitation

 Song 715: This week the playlist applauds Laughter in the Rain by Neil Sedaka, written by Neil Sedaka and Phil Cody, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Facing another week of likely April showers puddling up my neighborhood again, I don't dismiss the possibility of hearing giggling during the downpour, although I doubt that I myself will snicker at any of the precipitation. When Mr. Sedaka started to get folks chuckling over the drizzle in the early fall of 1974, my wife and I had returned to the Chicago area, splitting up and finding separate places to snooze under covers. We had parted due to my sense of something missing in the relationship - a misunderstanding triggered by a previous romance, as I explain in the second edition of my book Expecting the Broken Brain to Do Mental Pushups, which I now have released, and which can be purchased from Amazon - the links are at mentalpushups.com. While singing along with Neil could raise a smile 50 years ago, I personally did NOT love the rainy days then, and I don't feel that way these days either. I do try to always remember to take my parasol with me whenever I might need it, because without an umbrella, I could get soaked to the skin.

Understanding Necessary Downpour

 Song 714: This week the playlist recognizes Baby the Rain Must Fall by Glenn Yarbrough, written by Elmer Bernstein and Ernie Sheldon, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. As the April showers start falling in the U.S. northeastern states, all of us in that area understand the basic reality expressed by this tune's title and chorus line. After the Beatles rocked my world in early 1964, at first I mostly paid attention to them and their fellow British invaders, but by the time the following year arrived I also had noticed at least a few memorable musical rambles coming from domestic sources, including this melodic forecast which climbed the charts during the colder stretch of early 1965. I was not rich or famous at the time, but I didn't dismiss the possibility - I did NOT swim the sea or fly above the sky, but I DID climb a mountain or two, and I always understood that wherever my heart leads me, that's the place I must go.

The Comic

 Song 713: This week the playlist features The Joker by The Steve Miller Band, written by Eddie Curtis, Ahmet Ertegun and Steve Miller, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. With tomorrow being this year's April Fool's Day, tonight feels like a good time to feature a particular musical comedian. When this farcical gag came along in the fall of 1973, my wife and I had lived in the southern part of my college town of Evanston, IL, for about a year. During that stretch, I got to know a fellow I would describe as a low-level crook, and who once said to me, "Getting high is not my thing." While I soon concluded that I had little in common with this guy, I did share his POV regarding alcohol and/or drug intake. I did not become a smoker or a midnight toker, despite being a picker and a grinner. I would gladly play my music in the sun whenever possible, though I had limited options during the Windy City frigid months, but I would get to do it a lot more often starting in the following February when my partner and I moved to the much milder Atlanta, GA, area. Back in that era, I had decided that regardless of my own personal situation, I sure don't want to hurt no one and it would bother me if I did do so, even in some unintended manner.

Enjoying Wet Evenings

 Song 712: This week on the playlist you can hear I Love a Rainy Night by Eddie Rabbitt, written by David Malloy, Eddie Rabbitt and Even Stevens, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. When this amorous anthem came along around the beginning of 1981, I had gotten a few months into a third year at an attractive comfortable home in Oakland, CA. I would often spend time sitting by the place's small front porch with my housemate and close friend Doug, listening to the interesting sounds the radio brought our way as we savored the moderate Bay Area temperatures, and this one quickly got us both roped in. While I didn't feel the same enjoyment of precipitous experiences that the singer expressed, I greatly appreciated having left the frigid Windy City, and, given the choice, I would much prefer warm downpour over chilly white flurries. I might NOT love to hear the thunder, but I could watch the lightning when it would light up the sky at night, and it felt good to know I would probably wake up to a sunny day the next morning.

Small Pair Vehicle

 Song 711: This week the playlist puts the spotlight on Little Deuce Coupe by The Beach Boys, written by Brian Wilson and Roger Christian, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. After the Beatles rocked my world 60 years ago in February, I mostly paid attention to the British Invaders, but a few hits from this side of the Atlantic Ocean also lit my ears, including a handful of chart toppers from a particular West Coast quintet of seashore fellows. This moving hot rod ride had arrived during the previous summer, before I got pulled into the RnR airwave current, and when I heard it soon after I started spending more time with the transistor radio, I probably didn’t know it was a golden oldie, but I sure did know that I enjoyed the musical zone that it quickly covered. Hearing it felt like coming off the line when the light turns green, and it made me feel like maybe I had a set of wings so that, in a tuneful way, I could fly. On a sad side note, I decided to do a Beach Boys song this week after hearing the sad news that Brian Wilson lost his wife in January of this year. I feel sorry for his loss, and I wanted to send some good vibes his way.

Fantastic Guy's Aging Difficulties

 Song 710: Seven weeks after my previous personal friend song post, this week's amusing lift Superman's Midlife Crisis comes from a buddy who I connected with in the 1990s named Joe Giacoio, who also wrote the song, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. He joined my mailing list after attending a performance I did on a Bronx folk stage, and not long after, I heard him play at another place in the area and I liked what I heard from him. We soon developed a close friendship, and when he compiled the 1997 album CD that would have this ballad as its title track, I took pictures of him for the project and helped him put together the record's imagery, which I'd say personifies this tune's message. If you haven't heard the song, you might not know that Spiderman took a job with accounting, but you may very well understand that you can't turn back the clock for a quick trip home and you probably realize that you can't change clothes behind a cellular phone.

Checked You Out

 Song 709: This week the playlist recognizes I Looked at You by The Doors, who also wrote the song, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Three years and a half after the Fab Four rocked my world, just as they started heading in a psychedelic direction, a fresh L.A. quartet rocked the charts and while I couldn't own a devil's music 33 at the time, I had plenty of friends who could, and did, open up The Doors LP and ride around its spins, so I soon got to know the entire album, even though I never listened to it at home, and it quickly became one of my favorite discs. Over the next two years, as I worked on the student newspaper with a handful of my fellow classmates, we would put together the periodical in a certain room at the HS after classes ended, leaving the school when we finished it a few hours after most of the other students had departed. As we put together each issue, we would also listen to records we liked, and I know we always had The Doors on the turntable for every edition we assembled in those years. When I remember the student newspaper work we did, I always associate it with The Doors, to the point that I don't recall any of the other records we listened to, even though I know we did spin other discs on the player as well. When we started getting an issue's articles together and editing the contents, once we were on our way, we could, and would, never turn back - we would get the job done, even when it meant that a few of us might get home from school too late.

Provide Your Complete Passion

 Song 708: Last week's thought was Let's Work Together and the week before was the moment for All My Loving, so this week seems like the right time to Gimme All Your Lovin' by ZZ Top, written by Billy Gibbons, and you can find an amusing YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. By the time such a rocking plea got a lot of listeners going along with that request in early 1983, I had resided for about a year and a half in a really pleasant home in Berkeley, CA, that sat near the pizza joint where the singer/songwriter circle that I had joined a few years earlier would regularly gather and share compositions. I had become a fan of the lurching Texas trio soon after they appeared near the beginning of the 1970s, and had actually attended a concert they did in Chicago in early 1977, so it didn't take long for them to get me singing along with their 1983 bluesy call. I soon understood that when someone has got to move it up that they should work it like a screwball would.

Common Efforts

 Song 707: This week on the playlist you can hear Let's Work Together by Canned Heat, written by Wilbert Harrison, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Shortly before my sophomore college year began in September of 1970, this bluesy anthem started getting everyone to sing along, and it conveyed a message that most of my classmates, and probably the majority of university scholars around the country, had come to understand quite clearly in the spring of that year. Soon after the 5/4/70 event, I joined demonstrations at N.U. which echoed gatherings across the nation that expressed our anger at the killing of four Kent State pupils, and while our voices speaking out didn't end the Vietnam War, as far as I know, no other student protesters in the U.S. got shot down during the following years as opposition to the Southeast Asia conflict continued to swell. Many of us would walk hand in hand when we had a good place to stand to voice our disapproval of that mass murder.

My Entire Passion

 Song 706: This week the playlist applauds All My Loving by The Beatles, written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Sixty years ago, fairly soon after I got to my junior high school on the morning of 2/10, I started hearing my classmates use a word that I thought referred to a group of insects, but I couldn't imagine why such conversations would happen in the middle of a cold upstate NY winter. Since I had no clue about the big story I had missed, I also didn't know what question to ask, but after a couple of days I finally did pose a question to my neighbor playmate. He chuckled to learn that his smart buddy didn't know the biggest news of the previous week. Finding out about what my family and I had missed on Sunday night, we all planned to watch the 2/16 Ed Sullivan Show, and when we did so, although the rest of our circle had no interest in what they heard and saw, my younger brother and I got roped in, and we insisted on viewing the entire program, contrary to other family members who wanted to shut off the TV. Watching them perform She Loves You, (Song 653), the Fab Four rocked my world. I thought their next tune sounded really cool, and then they got to this one, which felt even better. Witnessing that performance sparked a whole new view of the musical world for me, and gave me hope that my dreams will come true.

Transporting Over a Notable Stream

 Song 705: This week the playlist puts the spotlight on Ferry Cross the Mersey by Gerry and the Pacemakers, written by Gerry Marsden, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Not long after a certain Fab Four rocked my world six decades ago, I started paying a lot more attention to the radio than I ever had before, and particularly riding along with a whole bunch of British Invader musical rambles. This lift arrived about a year later, and became yet one more anthem from the English noisemakers that moved me in a very rocking way. I had probably not known much about the United Kingdom's geography previously, but by the time this ride came along the airwaves, I had learned about the stream that the ferry crossed and its proximity to an urban area that had achieved a lot more public recognition, thanks to the quartet who I plan to feature next week. While Life goes on day after day and People they rush everywhere, I personally have not taken a Ferry Cross the Mersey, and I don't expect to do so any time soon, but maybe it could happen someday.

Feline in the Crib

Song 704: This week the playlist features Cat's in the Cradle by Harry Chapin, written by Harry Chapin and Sandra Chapin, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. Around the time that a lot of listeners got purrty impressed by this furry ballad, I managed to luckily find an affordable room in an apartment on the south end of Evanston. My wife and I had returned to the area in July as our romance came to an unfortunate climax, mainly due to a misunderstanding on my side that would haunt me for many years to come. Although I don't remember the moment when I first caught HC's meow melody, during that stretch I very soon had the chorus lines completely in hand and on my mind. Growing up, I had often heard my folks say, "There aren't enough hours in the day.” Even back then, most working class types understood that message, which resonates much stronger in the present day. While we can have numerous differences, the one thing so many of us have in common is that we have got a lot to do. All too often, we can't seem to find the time to get together and have a good time then.