the friday five: the voices

Feb 082013
 

(No, not the ones in my head.)

So you know how sometimes you go to look one thing up on the intrawebz and then you find yourself sucked into about 20 other things, and then as you go to close your browser, you remember that you never even looked up the first thing you meant to?

Yeah, that’s how I came up with

Five of the Greatest. Dead. Voices. Ever!

1. Karen Carpenter – This is how this whole post started—I was looking up something about drumming in regard to my son (who is taking lessons), and I remembered how during Christmas I amazed my sister and wife with this little trivia nugget: Karen Carpenter is the greatest drummer to come out of New Haven, Connecticut!

They laughed because: A. They’re not old enough to remember any actual performances by The Carpenters; and B. They had no idea that The Carpenters came from New Haven; and C. They thought I was joking.

Well, I’m not:

That aside, Karen Carpenter had one of the most haunting, mellifluous voices in music history, and one of the most distinctive—as soon as you hear it, you know it’s her and absolutely no one else. Every note seem effortless, and she possessed that remarkable bittersweet quality. If you watch the clip above, you can see she sounded as good live as she did on record. Amazing.

Although there are plenty of songs from which to choose, I’m going with “Top of the World” because it’s probably their most happy song.

2. Eva Cassidy – Not many people know of this brilliant vocalist, who sadly died of cancer in 1996 before she really hit big. She had one CD, but thankfully, someone had the presence of mind to record a bunch of her live performances, which were simply remarkable.

After she died, some of those recordings were released, including her version of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” which found it way onto the BBC radio’s “Top of the Pops” program in Great Britain, where it lit up the phone banks—people called in demanding that they play it again and again. It became a hit, and a few of her covers, including “Time after Time,” also received a lot of airplay in England, and then eventually here in the U.S.

If you’ve never heard her version of Sting’s “Fields of Gold, prepare yourself for a beautiful, pure voice and maybe a few goosebumps … oh, and never wanting to hear any other version again.

3. Freddie Mercury – Really, do I need to explain this? A four-octave range, operatic sensibilities and the consummate showman.

4. Johnny Cash – Again, maybe known more for his distinctive baritone and delivery than his actual vocal abilities, but ol’ J.R. could belt it out when he wanted to.

With Johnny Cash, there are hundreds of examples of how he made his voice part of the song. This is one of my favorites, not because of the subject (obviously), but the way he *sings* this song (as opposed to that sort of talk-sing thing he often did)—it was late in his life, his once-formidable voice is weakening, but you can hear how he seems to be summoning everything he has left in it to reach his Lord. Inspiring to even us atheists.

5. Elvis – Before the gyrating pelvis, screaming girls and white jumpsuit, there was a guy from Tupelo Mississippi who could really sing, brandishing an amazing voice that could be at turns raucous and tender and that had tremendous range. Power ballads, rock’n roll, blues, gospel, that crappy stuff he did for the movies—there was pretty much nothing he couldn’t sing and not make memorable.

Even at the end, when he was fat, bloated, drug-addled Elvis, that voice was still there.

Again, like Johnny Cash, there are thousands of tunes from which to choose, but I’ll go with my wedding song.

He wasn’t The King by accident!

the friday five: sad songs

Dec 072012
 

The other day I saw (via Fark.com) Rolling Stone‘s list of the saddest songs ever written, and my first impression is that their list is pretty lame. But that could be because I don’t know half the tunes on the list, and the ones I do know, don’t really seem all that sad. “I Will Always Love You”? Really? I mean, I guess it can be sad because Whitney went and killed herself, but generally, I don’t get weepy or have an empty weight in my chest after hearing it. “Are You Lonesome Tonight?” “Nothing Compares 2 U” …. not all that tear-inducing, in my opinion.

But I guess what anyone’s idea of “sad” is open to interpretation. For example, Elton John’s “Sad Songs” seems to be about as sad to me as a commercial for designer jeans. (See what I did there?)

But maybe the problem is that a lot of artists are just not writing sad songs any more. Sure, there are songs about heartache and pain, but so many of them just don’t *sound* sad. My girl Lucinda Williams has created more than a few amazing songs around the themes of loss, depression, hard livin’ and death, but they don’t really choke me up, you know? Something about the drums and guitar, maybe? The pacing? The arrangements? I’m not sure exactly what’s missing. I love her music, but it’s not *sad* to me.

Ditto Johnny Cash, who certainly recorded hundreds of songs about heartbreak, death and addiction. I would argue his version of Nine Inch Nails “Hurt” is about a dark and troubled a song as you’ll ever hear, and wields even more impact by the stage of his life during which he was recording it.

Again, lyrically, as dark a song as you’ll ever hear, and matched perfectly to Cash’s rasped voice, but even with the moving video, it doesn’t make me weepy. Close, though.

To me, the 1970s was the Golden Era of sad songs. Not only were many of the lyrics about unhappy moments, but something about the arrangements and the sound of the time just make for gloom and doom. Artists weren’t worried about churning out pop hits, nor were they afraid to look inward or reach into dark places.

So grab a few tissues and listen to—

Five of the Saddest Songs from the 1970s

1. “Alone Again, Naturally” – Gilbert O’Sullivan

To me, this is the King of All Sad Songs. Period. O’Sullivan’s haunted voice, the arrangement, the strings, everyone in the song dying … this is the perfect storm of sorrow.

2. “Seasons in the Sun” – Terry Jacks

A wistful look back at a life lived from someone about to die—he literally is saying goodbye to everyone in his life as the birds sing and the sun shines and he’s freakin’ taking his last breath! Come on!

3. “Time in a Bottle” – Jim Croce

Okay, another song about life slipping away, and maybe not the saddest song on the list lyrically, but the sparse guitar arrangement just does me in—especially the bit at the end. It’s also more poignant given Croce’s untimely demise, only a year after the song was released.

4. “Rainy Days And Mondays” – The Carpenters

Yeah, the song is clearly about dealing with chronic depression, but it’s the arrangement and the danged harmonica that does it, I think. Plus, you had the inimitable voice of Karen Carpenter—and her whole tragic back story. Her voice always just sounds so full of melancholy, even when she’s supposed to be happy.

5. “Taxi” – Harry Chapin

Another talented singer/songwriter who died prematurely, thus imbuing his work with an added layer of sad. Now I know you’re saying “What about ‘Cat’s in the Cradle’?” and if you want to substitute that over this lesser-known song, I wouldn’t argue. For pure sadness, I go with this one because the story is about two terribly lonely people and how their lives didn’t work out. There is no happy ending, they don’t get together, instead going their own ways and pitying each other’s pathetic life. Chapin’s voice is pitch perfect, as is the entire arrangement, except maybe the falsetto guy near the end—look away if you want to keep the sad going.

Oh, and happy Friday!