Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. DXCI--Ian and Sylvia: Four Strong Winds

Oh to live on Sugar Mountain, with the barkers and the colored balloons, you can't be twenty on Sugar Mountain, though you're thinking that...I'm (eight days) late again....

My introduction to this week's tune came when I was writing my first post about Neil Young (here).  As I did my weekly half-assed research, I discovered that Young was much smitten with this song as a young man and how much it influenced his career, so I gave it a listen.  Turns out, it was a hell of a song even if I didn't discover until I did my half-assed research this week that it wasn't a solo effort but rather a duo....

Ian and Sylvia began performing as a duo in 1959, were married in 1964, and divorced and stopped performing together in 1975.  Ian Tyson set out to be a rodeo performer, but while recuperating from injuries incurred while striving for that goal, he learned the guitar and it eventually led to a long career.  Sylvia Tyson (nee Fricker) began playing in clubs in Toronto at the ripe old age of nineteen before meeting up with Ian and forming their duo.  They had some success, mostly in their native Canada, before their divorce and their band Great Speckled Bird (formed in 1969) is considered one of the progenitors of country rock.  After their demise, Ian raised horses and performed sporadically as a solo artist; Sylvia became a solo artist before joining Quartette in 1993 and later performing one-woman shows.  Along the way they were inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame as a duo, and both were also inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Canadian Country Music Hall of Fame individually.  For their career as a duo, they released twelve studio albums, one live album, and six singles.  Ian passed away in 2022, but Sylvia is still performing and released her latest album in 2023.

"Four Strong Winds" was the first single from their 1963 album, the rather uniquely titled Four Strong Winds (again no Wikipedia entry--again, WTF?).  The single did not chart in America but hit #9 in Canada (so many cool kids in the Great White North!).  The album hit #115 on the Billboard 200 but surprisingly did not chart in their homeland.

Fun Fact:  In a poll conducted by the Canadian Broadcasting Company in 2005, "Four Strong Winds" was voted the greatest Canadian song of all time.  That's a pretty damn good legacy.

Fun Fact #2:  "Four Strong Winds" was the first song Ian Tyson ever wrote.  Their other charting hit in Canada (it reached #4 and through the years has become something of a folk standard), "You Were on My Mind," was likewise the first song that Sylvia Tyson wrote.  Talk about your strong starts....

"Four Strong Winds" may be one of the saddest songs ever written.  It tells the tale of a man heading out to find a job and leaving a relationship that's over.  But he still holds out hope--but nope they've gone over it again and again.  Maybe when he gets where he's going (Alberta) he can send her fare--but nope, it'll be very cold in the winter and not much to do.  But he still knows he'll go looking for her if he ever comes back--but regardless of his sadness the world is going to keep spinning.  Ian Tyson sings with the plaintive voice of a man who's still in love but knows his love will be unrequited.  Sylvia Tyson provides backing vocals throughout that seem to only deepen his sorrow.  Softly sung, softly performed, and acoustic from beginning to end--if this one isn't a modern (ish) folk classic I don't know what is.  A beautiful, beautiful song (says the old fart folkie...).

Lyric Sheet: "Still I wish you'd change your mind/If I ask you one more time/But we've been through this a hundred times or more..."

Enjoy:

Fuck Donald Trump

Peace,

emaycee

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. CDLXII--Sarah McLachlan: Ice Cream

Once again, I'm a week late...someday I'll get caught up (or not).

 

As I've gotten older there seems to be a number of artists--like this week's featured artist--that as I listen to them it seems as if I should have devoted more of my time to their talents, especially artists who are a little after my formative years musically (Dave Matthews, John Mayer, and Jack Johnson also come to mind).  Perhaps it's a lack of time--raising a family and working to provide for them take up a good bit of mine--or maybe it's just a generational bias, but each of the artists I've listed above have all had a tune that I loved, much like this week's tune....

Sarah McLachlan was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada in 1968 and was placed with a family who later adopted her.  She began playing music at the age of four (ukulele), and studied classical piano, classical guitar, and voice while in High School.  She formed her first band while still a teenager, and after one performance was offered a contract.  Her parents made her a) finish high school, and b) a year of college before accepting the offer and moving to Vancouver--and the rest, as they say, is history.  McLachlan released her first album at the ripe old age of nineteen in 1987, and in the thirty-six years since then has gone one to sell over forty million albums, win twelve Juno Awards, three Grammys, and was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame.  For her career, she has released nine studio albums (with four #1's in her native Canada and five top ten albums in the U.S.), and fifty-three singles (with one number one and nine top tens in Canada as well as five hitting the top ten here in the States).  McLachlan was also one of the founders of the immensely popular Lilith Fair tours of the nineties and has been quite active with numerous charities.  She continues to record and tour.

"Ice Cream" was released as the tenth song on McLachlan's 1993 album, the rather fallibly named Fumbling Towards Ecstasy.  The song was not originally released as a single, but a live version of it reached #9 in her native Canada (so many cool kids north of the border!).  The album hit #5 in the Great White North, and #50 on the Billboard 200.

Not really sure I know fuck all of what this song is about, but I suspect it has something to do with the highs and lows of love.  Still, McLachlan delivers a virtuoso performance--her vocals are spot on and her piano gives the song a wistful ambiance, but with just enough of the marvel that is love to keep it honest.  I never really noticed until I was reading some comments about the song, but as you listen give careful attention to the drums--just a magnificent rhythmic display.  In the end, though, the wonder of the song is how so much is said with so little--the feelings it evokes in its sparseness, both lyrically and musically, is amazing.

Lyric Sheet:  "Your love is better than ice cream/Better than anything else that I've tried/Your love is better than ice cream/Everyone here knows how to fight..."

Enjoy:

Republicans = Nazis

Peace,

emaycee

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. CCCXXVI--Gordon Lightfoot: If You Could Read My Mind

I've noted a time or two here on Friday Night Jukebox that I pick out the songs for each week years in advance, and every now and again there's an odd coincidence that gives a particular week's song more relevance to me.  For whatever reason (mostly that I've been off work for a year now), I've been playing my guitar (still badly, unfortunately) a lot more these days, and as I perused through old music song books a few weeks back I came across this week's featured tune...and promptly decided to add being able to play "If You Could Read My Mind" on my guitar (easy guitar version--I'd have to live another hundred years to pick it like Gordon Lightfoot) to my bucket list.  What an exciting life I lead!

As I already wrote about Gordon Lightfoot in Vol. LVIII, I'll just note in this week's artist bio paragraph that Lightfoot released his twenty-first studio album in 2020 at the age of 81, and it came fifty-four years after the release of his debut album.  That's a hell of a run, folks.  I'd also like to mention that it is a damn shame that the Canadian Bob Dylan, whose songs and songwriting are widely revered in the music industry, is still not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  What's a poor boy to do?

Fun Fact:  While Lightfoot is not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, he was inducted into the Songwriting Hall of Fame in 2012 in New York...with Michigan's own Bob Seger.  That's two songwriting heavyweights--both have written a song that would easily br in emaycee's all-time top ten.

"If You Could Read My Mind" was released in 1970 on the album Sit Down Young Stranger (due to the success of the single, the album's title was eventually changed to If You Could Read My Mind, but being the anal-retentive curmudgeon I am, I'm sticking with the original).  The song reached #1 in Lightfoot's native Canada, and #5 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100.  The album peaked at #12 in both Canada and the United States.

I could note that "If You Could Read My Mind" features an understated yet heartfelt vocal that carries the song from beginning to end.  I could also note that Lightfoot's gentle acoustic guitar picking and the silky smooth strings that accompany him set a perfect tone for a song about a relationship that's ending.  But in the end, what truly makes the song remarkable is Lightfoot's lyrics, which solely from a craftsmanship standpoint rivals (and I say this without hyperbole) Dylan's "It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)," Springsteen's "Born to Run," and Seger's "Night Moves."  Lightfoot deftly juxtaposes the relationship's partners (unfortunately for Lightfoot and his first wife, it's about their marriage) with a movie love story, and paints a sad tale of how, unlike movies, real life doesn't always have a happy ending.  I was in my fifties before I realized the true greatness of this week's tune, and I have spent the last several years making up for all the time I lost not listening to it enough.  A stellar offering from an underrated and underappreciated musician.

Lyric Sheet:  (This is one of my favorite sequences ever written in a song) "When you reach the part where the heartaches come/The hero would be me/But heroes often fail/And you won't read that book again/Because the ending's just too hard to take..."

Enjoy:

400,000 Needless American Deaths Because the Pro-Life Party Botched the Pandemic

Peace,

emaycee

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. CXXVI--Bachman-Turner Overdrive: Takin' Care of Business

One of the first recollections I have of this week's tune is of an air band formed in the year of its release by me (air guitar), my brother (air drums), and my brother's friend (air guitar as well) and it being one of the essential songs in our air repertoire on those few nights our parents went out and gave us the run of the house.

And yes, yes--my time as a Prince of Dorkdom began very early in my life.

Originally formed in 1971 in Winnipeg, Manitoba as Brave Belt (first good career move:  renaming band), Bachman-Turner Overdrive had a string of hits from 1974 to 1977 that are still staples of AOR radio to this day.   Led by Randy Bachman (who also had some success with the Guess Who), BTO released nine studio albums, had twelve top 100 hits, five live albums, and, uh, eleven compilation albums (the cash must be good when you're a great singles band).  In the years since their heyday, they've had roughly a zillion lineup changes, several lawsuits, and much bad blood, but they're still touring and releasing the odd single.  They also have been inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, and they won several Junos (Canadian Grammy) in the 70's.

Fun Fact:  Elvis (Presley, not Costello) was a big fan of this week's tune and supposedly did a cover version of it that will probably never be released.  Bummer--it might actually be worth a listen and it certainly couldn't be any worse that some of the shit cover songs music industry cretins have released through the years....

Released in 1974 from their cleverly titled second LP, Bachman-Turner Overdrive II, "Takin' Care of Business"is considered "the Provincial rock anthem of Manitoba" (hey--you take your accolades where you can get them in this goofy old world) and is one of the ten most covered rock songs of all-time.  It reached #12 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100 and celebrates what has been a theme of FNJ numerous times this year:  being a musician is a much better career than being a retail manager (duh!).  Opening with some killer three chord guitar riffs, joined by a honky tonk piano, and some deft solo guitar, and livened by power drumming throughout, "Takin' Care of Business" is a joyous romp through the perks and promises of being a musician.  Bachman's throaty vocals are both light-hearted and encouraging--hell, he even tells you if you get sick of the 9 to 5 grind, that you can pick up a guitar and be a musician, too (hey, who needs this "slavin' job" anyway?).  It's a power pop gem and a perfect encapsulation of so much of what was right about music in the 1970's.

Lyric Sheet: "Get a second-hand guitar/Chances are you'll go far/If you get in with the right bunch of fellows...."

Enjoy (and please note that I own a 45 just like the one that provides the background for the video--can you say "old fart" boys and girls?):

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. LXXXIII--Joni Mitchell: Coyote

What better way to celebrate the nomination of the first woman in American history to be President of the United States than a Friday Night Jukebox dedicated to a song by (arguably) the first lady of rock and roll?

My introduction to Joni Mitchell came in (arguably) the greatest rockumentary ever, Martin Scorsese's The Last Waltz.  There's nothing particularly special about Mitchell's performance--she was one superstar among many on the stage that night.  But what was particularly special was the song itself"  "Coyote."  And what really made it stand out was how little hoopla it received--Mitchell is announced, The Band performs behind her, and everyone let the song stand on strictly its merit.  And believe me, it stood taller than tall.

Joni Mitchell began performing in 1962 in her native Canada and has been recording and touring ever since.  While her heyday was in the 70's, she has remained a seminal influence on women and songwriters.  She has won 9 Grammy Awards, is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, and her album Blue was #30 on Rolling Stone's list of the greatest five hundred albums of all-time.  Oddly enough, though, she's never really become a household name in the way that say, Aretha Franklin is.  This may be due (my opinion), in part, to her foray into jazz in the late seventies--jazz is a wonderful musical style but has never really caught on with the masses in America.  I'd also venture that part of it is the inherent sexism in America--Mitchell is as good of a songwriter and her career output is easily the match of say, Bob Dylan, but I'd bet a whole hell of a lot more people have heard of Bob Dylan than Joni Mitchell (and yes, she's that good,,,)--men are front and center even in rock and roll.

Released on her Hejira (loosely translated as "journey" in Arabic--Mitchell wrote all of the album's songs while traveling by car from Maine to California) LP, "Coyote" is kind of a different song to feature for a pop music lover like me.  While there is a chorus ("You just picked up a hitcher/A prisoner of the white lines of the freeway"), it's not featured prominently and the song is more of a story than your typical pop song.  It's basically a song about a one night stand--it's been conjectured that the song is autobiographical and that the male protagonist is playwright/actor Sam Shepherd, but Mitchell has never confirmed it.  It's also to a degree about the difficulty of having a normal life within the musical world, what with late night recording sessions and constant touring.

"Coyote" was the first single released from Hejira, but it never charted (no bullets this week!).

There are three things to note about the song (in no particular order):  1) Mitchell's songwriting is incredible always, but especially so on this song--it is almost like a short story and she uses subtle imagery that isn't used often in pop songs ("And with this flame/You put here in this Eskimo") 2) Mitchell's vocals--as is often the case on Jukebox songs--are just as incredible, moving from questioning to playful to soul searching with an ease not often seen in pop songs 3) The instrumentation is the final piece and it's a joy to behold--between Mitchell's incredibly catchy acoustic guitar and the fretless bass (many people noted this, and while you can't miss the bass in the song, I have no idea there was such a thing as a fretless bass or what it even looks like) played by jazz virtuoso Jaco Pastorius.  It all comes together to form one of the most perfect songs ever written--at least to an old literary fart like me.

Fascinating fact:  Mitchell had polio as a child and as a result her left hand would not let her play notes and chords like most guitar players--as a result she came up with numerous different tunings that would match both her ability and her vocals.

Lyric sheet: "No regrets coyote..."

Enjoy:

Peace,
emaycee

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. LXXVI--The Guess Who: Share the Land

Every now and again in rock and roll's history, a "Peace! Love! Dope!" song comes along that isn't a schmaltzy soul-sapping piece of drivel like say, "We Are the World."  And "Share the Land" by The Guess Who is just such a song.

Fun fact:  In 1965, Chad Allan and the Expressions had a number one hit in Canada (#22 U.S.) with a cover version of "Shakin' All Over."  In a desperate attempt to attach some sort of mystique to the single, the label released the decidedly British Beat song as being by "Guess Who?" to attract folks who might think it secretly done by one of the British Invasion artists.  Alas, the name stuck and the band became forever known as The Guess Who.

Formed in 1959 in Winnipeg, Manitoba (that hotbed of rock and roll) The Guess Who would go through numerous incarnations before finding success in the late 60's.  They had a nice run through the mid 70's, with several hit singles (most notably their only number one hit in the U.S., "American Woman," later one of the five worst cover versions in rock and roll history by Lenny Kravitz).  After 1975, they pretty much disappeared, though various members continued touring under The Guess Who moniker.  Lead singer Burton Cummings would go on to have some solo success, and lead guitarist Randy Bachman would go onto  much similar single success with Bachman Turner Overdrive.  While I would never confuse The Guess Who with the great bands of rock and roll (though they are in the Canadian Music Hall of Fame!), I still put on their Best Of  LP and enjoy the living shit out of it--ain't nothing wrong with a great singles band.  And The Guess Who had a bunch of great ones.

And none more so than "Share the Land" a paean to the communal spirit of the 60's (which somehow brought us to where we are today in the land of extreme income inequality--no one ever said it was going to be easy).  Released in 1970 on their aptly named Share the Land album, the song would reach #10 (with a bullet!) on The Billboard Hot 100.  The song is more or less a series of questions asking if you've done your part to make the world a better place, before breaking into the catchy as all hell chorus which reminds you that one day we're all going to live in harmony.  Throughout there's wonderful gospelesque backing vocals echoing Burton Cummings heartfelt singing.  The creme de la creme, though, is the song's closing, which is Cummings wailing a scat like rap of lots of shiny happy thoughts, with all of us holding hands down by the river.  Corny drivel?  You bet--but it's cool corny drivel from some boys from the Great White North.  Good enough for me....

Lyric sheet:  "Every day coming sunshine, everyday, everybody laughin'...."

Enjoy:

Peace,
emaycee