Ted Hawkins version of There Stands The Glass stands out among other amazing ones from Webb Pierce and Conway Twitty. I also included his song Sorry You’re Sick. Both of these songs are about drinking, specifically about how we use alcohol to treat suffering. It’s one of the oldest songwriting tropes but Hawkins used it in a surprising way. The lyrics in SYS are purely heartbreaking, but the melody and music are like a catchy pop rock song. Super weird, honestly. You should know about Ted Hawkins because he was almost a household name. He lived an incredibly hard life before dying too young. His care for music and how it can make some sense of a hard life is unique only to him and I hope you find more of his songs.
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A two for one week! I’m not the biggest Beck fan, but Paper Tiger is so great. The strings! The Serge Gainsbourg delivery! A real sonic treat. Now, I am a big Robyn fan, so it’s hard to pick one song to share. Call Your Girlfriend is as close to a perfect pop song as you can get. It is fun, has substance, but doesn’t take itself too seriously. Clean af. I’ll never get tired of this song.
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Lizzy is a special singer and writer, but I picked her cover of this Dawes song because it feels like she wrote it. That’s the sign of a good cover! This song is gutting and I love it. Every word is important. It paints a graphic picture. It’s your life story that you didn’t know you detached from. I encourage you to find the original Dawes version too because it is a totally different version of the same piece of art. Favorite lyric: “I think that love is so much easier than you realize. If you can give yourself to someone, then you should.”
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This week’s song is short and sweet and has no words. If you are into music that plays in the background as you drink mezcal in the desert, then Hermanos Gutierrez is for you. Cerca De Ti is a great introduction into the songs these Swiss/Ecuadorian brothers write. Their music is consistent proof that you don’t need lyrics to be lyrical or words to be emotive. It’s full of dust and ready for you.
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Labi Siffre has some great songs. Most famously, “I Got The Blues” was sampled for Eminem’s “My Name Is”. Another favorite is “It Must Be Love.” I picked “Bless The Telephone” because of how much in love he sounds. It’s the nylon-stringed guitar as much as it is his voice. It’s almost tripping over itself. My favorite lyric is “It’s nice the way you say my name . . . not very fast or slow . . . just soft and low.” Labi has had an amazing life as a renowned poet and activist, and can write a fucking BEAUTIFUL melody. You should know Labi Siffre.
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A friend showed me this song 10 years ago, but it feels like it could have been yesterday. I will say at the top that my absolute favorite part of this song is how I can hear the pads clicking on the baritone saxophone. If you’ve been following along, you know how important space is to me in the music I like. Easy has SO MUCH SPACE! Son Lux is an amazing band who do amazing work (the score to Everything Everywhere All At Once), and I think it’s important to note that this song helped set the stage for other artists’ decisions to shine.
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Keane was hugely inspirational for me in a time when I was learning to sing and write songs. Their first album, Hopes and Fears, is one of the strongest pop rock statements of the early 2000s. It might have been how I understood love at the time, but We Might As Well Be Strangers, in particular, is still a stunning piece of writing and performance. I remember watching a Keane tour documentary that came out a few years after this record and was struck by how success seemed to be affecting them in real time. It was beautiful, but it felt sad. Keane are certainly not the first band to have a complex relationship with success, but I found them during a formative time and their voice is undoubtedly part of mine.
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Massive Attack and Cocteau Twins are important because some of your favorite bands and songs wouldn’t exist without them. The songwriting, vocal affect, production quality and aesthetic level setting throughout their catalogs is astounding. Teardrop, specifically, is a masterclass on being dynamic with minimal elements. I feel like I’m in an epic hospital drama montage while I’m listening to it. What is happening? Who’s dying? Who’s giving birth? Who loves me? Find your own montage!
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Love Has No Pride should make you cry. It was written by Bonnie and Crosby Stills and Nash. This song is so full of desperation, yet I wouldn’t describe it as desperate. It’s pleading but not pitiful. Bonnie’s voice is ridiculous and one of few that, subjectively, has gotten sweeter with time. I’ve linked to the original recording in the playlist but there is also a live recording with CSN from a Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame induction concert, which is amazing, but felt tacky to include. Go cry now.
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John Lennon wrote this song, but this Donny Hathaway rendition is special.
First of all, it’s from a live album simply called LIVE, which feels beautifully audacious. Also, the vibe throughout this record is perfectly loose and tight, qualities I also envy. I found it when I was recording an album with my old band (which we recorded live). It taught me about craft and how there are literally no rules about how we work and create.
For instance, there’s a bass solo on another song that was taken from a totally different live performance that they liked, so they just spliced the tape to include it in a different live performance recorded across the country. I’m embarrassed to say I was critical, at first, of the clumsy edit and the decision overall. But now, I see it for what it is, and that is someone else’s art. Donny’s voice, keys chops, and the players he got to play alongside are next level, and should be an inspiration for us to create more than we judge.
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Camp Lo is important, especially if you like using the youthfully hip word “lit”, you can thank Camp Lo for “lit”. They aren’t the first artists to invent their own language, but when you hear it, the slang feels like you should already know it. The horn sample and beat are relatively slow, but the syncopated hits and overdriven mix give this song a great energy. Their flow is wordy but with great spacing at the same time, especially as it relates to the horns. This 27 year old song could be new today and I would believe it. I might even say . . . it is lit.
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Accidental Babies is a heavy title, and this is a heavy tune. Damien is an extraordinary songwriter. They are hooky enough that they feel familiar, but they are so raw and exposed it feels almost voyeuristic when you’re listening. This song is so full of longing it hurts. A complicated love with no good way out, as if the success of the love itself is dependent on someone getting hurt.
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Happy New Year. I am sharing a new playlist where I add one song a week for each week of 2024. These are songs you should know about. I don’t know when the world has ever been in a collectively good place, but I know that music has healed us in the past and I hope it will continue to do so in the future.
So to start off my 52 weeks 52 songs playlist I’m sharing three versions of the same song. Lilac Wine came to me via Nina Simone, and it floored me. Then I heard Jeff Buckley’s version, and it floored me into the basement. Then I heard Eartha Kitt’s version, and I was brought back to life. These three versions span about 50 years, with one coming every 20 years. Of course, covering songs is nothing new, but there was something different about artists sharing songs back when these were made. Same song, three very different artists representing their individual pain and beauty. Gutting.
I’m always happy to hear what you think of these songs, but just listening is good too.
Listen to the fifty-two 52 playlist.