Alex Cavanaugh’s THE TOP TEN TUNES Blogfest

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[Forewarning: Currently I am suffering from a cold that I caught from a woman where I work. So, read this blog bit at your own risk. If you proceed anyway, you might want to spray your eyes and your computer monitor with disinfectant afterwards.]
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Hey, look, it’s a square record. It must be a polka!

‘I won’t be able to participate in this blogfest.’

That was my first thought upon learning of Alex Cavanaugh’s upcoming ‘TOP TEN TUNES’ blogfest.

You see, I love such a wide variety of music that I figured it would be virtually impossible for me to narrow my choices down to a mere ten songs or musical selections. But just to prove I couldn’t do it, I sat down with a pen and a piece of paper and in no more than five minutes I had done it – without even once looking at my compact disc collection!

And, actually, I think that was probably the trick to it. The songs that a person loves the absolute most, the person doesn’t need to be reminded of – they spring right to mind immediately.

Now, to be sure, any list of my all-time favorite songs and musical compositions is preposterously incomplete if it doesn’t include anything by The Carpenters, Waylon Jennings, Howlin’ Wolf, Tom Waits, the song ‘The Same Thing’ by Muddy Waters, the instrumental ‘If Ever I Would Leave You’ by Richie Cole, ‘Sarah’s Crime’ by Toshi Hinata, nor ‘Good Vibrations’ and ‘Long Promised Road’ by The Beach Boys.

Nevertheless, below is my preposterously incomplete list. Every song title is a link to a video for the appropriate musical piece. I couldn’t possibly rate these songs in order of preference, so my Top Ten Tunes list has been alphabetized by title:

BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY’S by Henry Mancini And His Orchestra / Chorus
2:48 (Instrumental)

What a sublime piece of music. It flows like a wistful, lonely, melancholy stream emanating from some ancient, half-remembered dream. It always breaks my heart.

BUMPIN’ ON SUNSET by Brian Auger’s Oblivion Express
10:07 (Instrumental with a few lyrics)

I first heard this on AM radio (yes, AM!) circa 1979, and this was the song that initially made me sit up and take notice of Jazz – later to become my favorite musical form. Previously, all I had cared about was the Rock music of my day.

‘Bumpin’ On Sunset’ was written by the great Wes Montgomery (and I own his original version, also), but Brian Auger gave it his Hammond B-3 treatment and it became Auger’s “signature tune”. This particular live version is my favorite, and I’ll bet I have whistled this melody more than any other in my entire life. The drummer on this track was Steve Ferrone. Remember that, you’ll need it later.

HOW I GOT OVER by Mahalia Jackson
6:26 (Song)

Holy God Almighty! I can’t believe I found a video of this! Despite poor picture quality and a few audio glitches here and there, if this doesn’t give you chills, you’re dead, my friend, you’re just dead!

In my opinion, this is the most Divinely-inspired, and hence the most powerful, intense vocal performance of all time - EVER! Mahalia’s face is just so beautiful and there’s an almost unearthly, spiritual light that can be discerned shining in her eyes as this song just pours out of her! The moment you see Mahalia start in with that odd, non-rhythmic clapping at the four minute and eight second mark (4:08), you know it’s on, baby, IT’S ON!!! Scoot over, The Holy Spirit’s drivin’ now! Oh, my God!!!

I AM WOMAN by Helen Reddy
3:04 (Song)

This one is sort of a personal anthem for me. I can’t listen to Helen Reddy’s ‘I Am Woman’ without feeling very empowered!

OK, I jest! I jest!

Alright, m-m-m-ove along now. Th-th-there's nothing left to see here. That's all folks. Hmmm... I like the sound of that... Th-th-th-that's all, folks!

IT’S ALRIGHT, MA (I’M ONLY BLEEDING) by Bob Dylan
7:30 (Song)

The song title is a link to a video of Bob Dylan playing the first two minutes of this seven and a half minute song.

In 2008, I rediscovered this song from my youth and was amazed to suddenly realize what an impact it had on my writing and whatever capacity I have to think creatively. When I was in my very early twenties, Bob Dylan’s album “Bringing It All Back Home”, and this song from it especially, really opened my mind, almost as if they were some sort of creativity-expanding drug.

These are some of the greatest lyrics ever penned; a song loaded with bons mots and a remarkable rhyming structure unlike any I’d found before or have encountered since. So great are these lyrics, that I’m posting them below. Had he written nothing else but ‘It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)’, this one alone would have marked Bob Dylan as a songwriting genius:

It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)

Darkness at the break of noon
Shadows even the silver spoon
The handmade blade, the child’s balloon
Eclipses both the sun and moon
To understand you know too soon
There is no sense in trying

Pointed threats, they bluff with scorn
Suicide remarks are torn
From the fool’s gold mouthpiece the hollow horn
Plays wasted words, proves to warn
That he not busy being born
Is busy dying

Temptation’s page flies out the door
You follow, find yourself at war
Watch waterfalls of pity roar
You feel to moan but unlike before
You discover that you’d just be one more
Person crying

So don’t fear if you hear
A foreign sound to your ear
It’s alright, Ma, I’m only sighing

As some warn victory, some downfall
Private reasons great or small
Can be seen in the eyes of those that call
To make all that should be killed to crawl
While others say don’t hate nothing at all
Except hatred

Disillusioned words like bullets bark
As human gods aim for their mark
Make everything from toy guns that spark
To flesh-colored Christs that glow in the dark
It’s easy to see without looking too far
That not much is really sacred

While preachers preach of evil fates
Teachers teach that knowledge waits
Can lead to hundred-dollar plates
Goodness hides behind its gates
But even the president of the United States
Sometimes must have to stand naked

And though the rules of the road have been lodged
It’s only people’s games that you got to dodge
And it’s alright, Ma, I can make it

Advertising signs they con
You into thinking you’re the one
That can do what’s never been done
That can win what’s never been won
Meantime life outside goes on
All around you

You lose yourself, you reappear
You suddenly find you got nothing to fear
Alone you stand with nobody near
When a trembling distant voice, unclear
Startles your sleeping ears to hear
That somebody thinks they really found you

A question in your nerves is lit
Yet you know there is no answer fit
To satisfy, insure you not to quit
To keep it in your mind and not forget
That it is not he or she or them or it
That you belong to

Although the masters make the rules
For the wise men and the fools
I got nothing, Ma, to live up to

For them that must obey authority
That they do not respect in any degree
Who despise their jobs, their destinies
Speak jealously of them that are free
Cultivate their flowers to be
Nothing more than something they invest in

While some on principles baptized
To strict party platform ties
Social clubs in drag disguise
Outsiders they can freely criticize
Tell nothing except who to idolize
And then say God bless him

While one who sings with his tongue on fire
Gargles in the rat race choir
Bent out of shape from society’s pliers
Cares not to come up any higher
But rather get you down in the hole
That he’s in

But I mean no harm nor put fault
On anyone that lives in a vault
But it’s alright, Ma, if I can’t please him

Old lady judges watch people in pairs
Limited in sex, they dare
To push fake morals, insult and stare
While money doesn’t talk, it swears
Obscenity, who really cares
Propaganda, all is phony

While them that defend what they cannot see
With a killer’s pride, security
It blows the minds most bitterly
For them that think death’s honesty
Won’t fall upon them naturally
Life sometimes must get lonely

My eyes collide head-on with stuffed
Graveyards, false gods, I scuff
At pettiness which plays so rough
Walk upside-down inside handcuffs
Kick my legs to crash it off
Say okay, I have had enough, what else can you show me?

And if my thought-dreams could be seen
They’d probably put my head in a guillotine
But it’s alright, Ma, it’s life, and life only

MOONLIGHT SERENADE by Glenn Miller
3:25 (Instrumental)

I think this is probably the most beautiful melody ever composed, and it is the very essence of “romance”. Quite likely my favorite musical piece of all time.

MY FAVORITE THINGS by . . . just about anyone - which only goes to show what a great song it is! This Jazzy version, however, is by Diana Ross And The Supremes, and it would be very hard to beat.
2:52 (Song)

When the dog bites, when the bee stings
When I’m feeling sad
I simply remember my favorite things
And then I don’t feel so bad

Very clever lyrics married to a very clever melody. In fact, to my ears, this is the catchiest melody ever composed. I can’t hear it once without it bouncing around in my head for days. And after every Christmas season has come to an end, it takes a month or more before I can stop whistling or humming it. For example: Christmas 2010 is now four weeks behind us but I’m still whistling this tune on nearly a daily basis. No, seriously!

SLEIGH RIDE by Leroy Anderson
2:50 (Instrumental)

There have been a zazillion versions of this tune recorded, but my favorite remains the 1948 original instrumental conducted by the composer himself, Leroy Anderson. This is such an inventive arrangement. And how about Anderson’s imagination? Did he have one? I should say so! From the files of Believe It Or Not: Did you know that Leroy Anderson composed ‘Sleigh Ride’ during a July heat wave in Woodbury, Connecticut? Perhaps he was just trying to make himself feel cooler.

SPIRIT IN THE SKY by Norman Greenbaum
4:01 (Song)

This was my favorite Rock song when it was getting played about once every hour on AM radio in 1970, and it’s my favorite Rock song today. It features one of the most immediately recognizable guitar riffs ever and a fabulous fuzzed-out howling solo. What’s not to love? I could NEVER get tired of this one. Well, heck, I haven’t so far, and it’s been 41 years!

THE TRUTH WILL ALWAYS BE by Pat Metheny
9:30 (Instrumental)

I know this isn’t what Pat Metheny had in mind when he composed this masterpiece, but to my mind, this is a musical retelling of the crucifixion and Resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is an extraordinary piece of music that slowly builds in power, layer by layer, with the most majestic sounding strings and horns eventually added. And then at the five minute and forty second mark (5:40), Metheny “winds up” his guitar and just lets it SOAR and SOAR!... And that, my friends, is the moment when our Savior is being Resurrected from the dead!

Although Metheny, it seems, is a non-believer, somehow or other God used him as the instrument by which one of the most spiritual pieces of music ever written came into being.

Steve Ferrone. I told you to remember that name, because you’d need it later. Well, it’s “later”. Ferrone was the drummer on Brian Auger’s ‘Bumpin’ On Sunset’. He’s also the drummer on Metheny’s ‘The Truth Will Always Be’. What’s Steve doing these days? He’s a Heartbreaker – the permanent drummer for Tom Petty’s band.

THE WARMTH OF THE SUN by The Beach Boys
2:51 (Song)

The finest harmonizing by the world’s finest harmonizers.
The sad news that President Kennedy had been assassinated prompted The Boys to capture their feelings in song, resulting in the gorgeously melancholy ‘The Warmth Of The Sun’. [Click the title and check out the YouTube video. Beautifully appropriate photos make this video a treat for both the ears and the eyes. Nice. Very nice!]

So, those are my all-time Top Ten Tunes.
Thanks for stopping by, y’all.

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

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