Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. CLXI--Matt Nathanson: Come On Get Higher

Another week, another song discovered on Roadies...

A couple of months back the Beautiful Girl and I were at the mall and for shits and grins we went into the music store...of which about 10% of the store was actually devoted to music.  It was one of those life goes on moments, but with a little regret that there will be kids growing up who will never know the joy I had in the thousands of hours I spent browsing record shops. Yet while parts of music's history are dying others remain:  this week's tune continues the fine tradition of one hit wonders....

Massachusetts native Matt Nathanson began his recording career in 1993, and over the course of the past 25 years has released 11 albums and has managed to have a modestly successful run.  Nathanson has had a host of songs featured on TV shows, and tours regularly.  While not knowing the thrill (one supposes) of mega stardom (his best selling LP sold just north of 300,000 copies), Nathanson has nonetheless carved out a tiny place in the music world and is still making a living singing and playing some 25 years down the road--not a bad claim to fame.

Released on his album Some Mad Hope in 2008, "Come On Get Higher" would only reach #59 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100, but would go on to sell over 1.8 million copies and be certified platinum by the RIAA.

I've noted a time or two here on Friday Night Jukebox that my indoctrination to the Gospel of Rock and Roll came from the top forty radio of WLS in Chicago.  And if there's ever been a song I've featured on FNJ that would have felt right at home in mid seventies top forty pop, it's "Come on Get Higher."  Opening with a lightly strummed acoustic guitar, Nathanson sings a paean to a woman in a relationship at a crossroads, trying mightily to get her to give him a second chance.  Nathanson sings of the power of love with a catchy as all hell melody, and a chorus that is (emaycee fave!) repeated often, especially in the closing.  In the end, it's another in a long but beautiful line of songs that are a piece of pop heaven--or as the Stones noted, it's only rock and roll but I like it....

Liner Notes:  "If I could walk on water/If I could tell you what's next/I'd make you believe/I'd make you forget..."

Enjoy:

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee