Worst Song Notes: Today, Tom Sawyer Gets High On You

Apparently, the Dirges of Starbucks gets people's blood racing: we're getting new visitors, and the old friends are stepping up with some new suggestions.  Sadly, they don't make the cut... so I thought I'd get out the old guidelines and explain...

• kd lang, The Joker and Steve Miller, The Joker. I'm not a huge fan of The Steve Miller Band, one of those seventies album rock things that just never fit into my Motown/Disco/Pure Pop songbook.   Time, though, has brought me round full circle, and while I still don't love a lot of Miller's work, I've come to appreciate this easygoing paean to the free spirit.  Part of what got me there was lang's Drag album, which featured her cover of The Joker, which softened the instrumentation and played up the sly sexiness of the lyrics.  And me, I play my music in the sun.  What's not to love?
• Rush, Tom Sawyer.  RedStar, J in Baltimore, and I have a mutual friend who's a rabid Rush fan... and on Scott's behalf, I must say "cease and desist" with the Tom Sawyer talk.  Yes, Rush is an album-rock-era staple that should never have been part of the Junior High Dance, and Geddy Lee is a unique voice, to say the least... but even I have to admit that during Tom Sawyer's initial run up the Hot 100 (1981, I'd remind you - hardly a banner year for the pop single), it was not the most objectionable thing there; indeed, Rush was (and is) a tight, talented band, and their off the beaten path approach to music and lyrics is a welcome in between to the highly formulaic (Styx) and the genuinely weird (Traffic).

And now for one that does make the cut:

• Calexico and Charlotte Gainsbourg, Just Like A Woman. Daniel, our newcomer, offered this disaster in his comment, an item from the I'm Not There soundtrack (he didn't know who was responsible.  That's the kind of important research we can do here at NYCweboy). I may love I'm Not There, and the music in the film, but it's just like Starbucks to pick the slowest, dirgiest item on the compilation and put it in heavy rotation (and they have, natch). So okay, I didn't realize Neko Case was singing in a major key. I've still got some ability to separate the wheat form the chaff, and whatever icy brilliance there is to Dylan's original, it's lost in Gainsbourg's whispery, miserable reading. Good call!  And keep 'em coming!

And RedStar and J, you know I love you... we just disagree. :)

Comments

[Redstar]

I stand by my nominations.

[jinbaltimore]

I forgot about the friend (we need to get him to show up here) and Rush. Fair enough, but only because I'm feeling charitable that way.

I have to respectfully disagree on "The Joker," though. kd's version tanked too, and was enough to bring that entire smoking-themed album of hers down to coma-level energies. I was chainsmoking then, and should have been an easy sell; alas...

AND what of my earlier nominee, "Amanda," an 80's power ballad so bad, I can't even tell you who recorded it. Google says Boston, but surely that can't be right?

[weboy]

Next time, I promise; but yes, Boston, Amanda, definitely makes the cut. :)

[jinbaltimore]

also, I was wondering if, when new songs are added, we could get a view of the completed list after...and, perhaps, a nice little ceremony of sorts, but no speeches