THE NIGHT IS BITTER...

In my never ending quest to write about album covers I love and Frank Sinatra I offer this new “two for one” post.

The album is “She Shot Me Down” featuring the striking cover photo by Ed Thrasher. This photo finds our favorite saloon singer, and patron, taking stock of his life at age 65. That imaginary retirement age that claimed an earlier generation. Frank commands his usual spot at the bar. As is the case no one else takes their spot until he’s taken his. You don’t know if he’s drinking a double, a triple or the bartender just pored until he got the nod. When he lights up a smoke no one is thinking about ordinances or second hand smoke. He’s got a story to tell, if not a torch to be drowned. His eyes appear to be closed.

Sometimes they call them beer joints, sometimes a lounge or even the “hotel bar.” Names make no difference because whenever he’s at a bar it’s still a saloon and it’s New Jersey back in the day. He can recall long nights, decades ago when critics said he would fade before the next baseball season started. He can still hear the whispers when he closes those blue eyes. A couple of drinks, a few unfiltered Camels and they float away with the smoke. Billie Holiday singing “These Foolish Things” on the jukebox, a girl crying in the booth by the door and the sound of dice hitting the baseboard in the back room make him think he’s home again. The old gang won’t be there tonight though, but somewhere along the way he’ll have one for them. And then one for the road.

The time is now 1981 and he was just a year removed from recording his final signature song “New York, New York.” It would be the final shot as a chart artist in these rapidly changing times. (He would of course continue to find success right up to the end with his misguided “Duets” albums. The ones where he offers other performers the chance to have their name and voice next to his on something people would pay money for. The commerce end of the deal went off without a hitch, the musical history part didn’t pay as well though.)

Anyway, back to the scene at hand. This album of booze soaked melancholy was released in a year that found Christopher Cross, Air Supply, Sheena Easton, Rick Springfield and Hall & Oates polluting the airwaves of pop music. It was enough to drive anyone to drink and smoke. He had seen the best of music come and go. He had bested all of his generation, withstood rock and roll, made it through the sixties and even found some peace of mind in the seventies. The punk movement and the current wave of pop acts though were too much to overcome even if he wanted to. Most were passé before they released their first recordings. Music was moving into a “flavor of the month” mentality, no one was thinking career, just hits and little else.

It had been nearly ten years since his original retirement that he grew bored with after a few hundred rounds of golf. He was a singer, and singers don’t retire. They cut back, choose their songs a bit more carefully and try not to do any damage to any legacy they have acquired.

Gordon Jenkins was back on board as arranger for this last round and they picked up like only a moment or two had passed. (Don Costa, who also produces, and Nelson Riddle contribute one track each to round it out) The centerpiece of the album is the title track. A pop hit for Cher written by husband at the time Sonny Bono. It’s a strange metaphoric tale that incredibly carried no real weight in her poppy rendition. In the hands of a master singer it speaks volumes in its slight verses and eerie chorus. Jenkins does his part and gives Frank a musical bed to float this jaded tale on. Daughter Nancy had also recorded a version of this one and possibly offered the old man the direction to take this tune. With this version you really have to credit Sonny for writing such a compelling song that took fifteen or so years to be fully appreciated.

Other tracks include and update of “Thanks For The Memories” that rescues it from novelty, a recent Sonheim tune and finishes with a stunning medley of “The Gal That Got Away / It Never Entered My Mind” arranged by Nelson Riddle and harkening back to another time and place like only he can.

At a lean nine tracks and thirty seven minutes this one merits some careful and poignant listening that gets better with each spin. The songs are all told from the vantage point of the guy a couple of stools down who’s dispensing wisdom to those crowded at the bar. By the end of the evening, and the album he’s talking to only the bartender and himself.

“…bang bang, that awful sound…”

GHOSTS OF CHRISTMAS PAST

THE MEETING

After so long an absence
At last we meet again:
Does the meeting give us pleasure,
Or does it give us pain?

The tree of life has been shaken,
And but few of us linger now,
Like the Prophet's two or three berries
In the top of the uppermost bough.

We cordially greet each other
In the old, familiar tone;
And we think, though we do not say it,
How old and gray he is grown!

We speak of a Merry Christmas
And many a Happy New Year
But each in his heart is thinking
Of those that are not here.

We speak of friends and their fortunes,
And of what they did and said,
Till the dead alone seem living,
And the living alone seem dead.

And at last we hardly distinguish
Between the ghosts and the guests;
And a mist and shadow of sadness
Steals over our merriest jests.

(Henry Wodsworth Longfellow)

WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO YOU AND I?

A friend sent me a YouTube link the other day that ended up making my day. It’s some musician friends sharing a club stage together. Not unique, but still exciting when it works. One had become famous and ascended to the mountain top of popularity while trying to hang on to as much of himself as possible. He was trying to stay grounded even if his fans insisted he was more than a guy with a guitar.

Another had reached the top of the pop world but lacked the automatic credibility of the others. One has been a behind the scenes mover and shaker that carved his own niche in the musical landscape. The man behind the man.

Johnny, tonight's main act had gotten his shot at the big time by virtue of being a boyhood friend who also played music. They had all shared beers, sweat, girls, cars and cool nights on the boardwalk together in another lifetime. They were all in the music business, but not flying at the same altitude by any means. They were all making great music in their own way, but the public was only buying one in large quantities. He was the boss, the others were middle management at best.

One could wrongly assume that the boss was trying to help out his friends who hadn’t made it as far. I think more to the point, the boss missed those cool nights and those sweaty seaside bars more than he ever could have imagined. As he steps on the stage in front of a stunned crowd they think there is no better place on earth right now. The boss is thinking about how lucky his friend is and then proceeds to turn back the clock for at least the length of a single song.

This link will take you to that stage and that night.

WRITTEN IN MY SOUL, FROM ME TO YOU

Woody Guthrie was too far gone to be the mentor that Dylan may have envisioned during his trek to New York. In the absence of that Dylan allowed Guthrie’s music to help shape his early works for another generation, even though Dylan may have preferred to appeal to a previous generation with those first recordings.

In any student-mentor relationship there comes a point where the education ceases and you take what you’ve learned and it becomes a part of what you are. In some cases, it becomes apparent that the student has surpassed the mentor or at the very least equaled him. You learn something and take it to new places driven by your own will and no one else’s. It’s not conceit, it’s just that evolutionary process at work. The lesson has only been worthwhile when you acknowledge that you had help finding the path that told you which fork in the road was yours.

The point at which I think Dylan, in his own way, finally paid his final debt to Guthrie was in the song “George Jackson.” The single he issued in two versions to protest the killing of the black, prison activist in 1971. Guthrie had romanticized the exploits of the depression era outlaw Pretty Boy Floyd in verse. In his song Guthrie gave Floyd the type of stature that Jesse James had received in song decades before. It’s a fine line trying to convince people that a murderer is a modern day Robin Hood. “Pretty Boy Floyd” and “Jesse James” while not exactly historical documents still make for great songs that have certainly endured.

Dylan was not thinking campfire sing-a-long with his song “George Jackson.” Someone contemporary and all too real was dead. The anger and the delivery of the song were in stark contrast to what he had been recording the past few albums. And in this instant Dylan and Guthrie converge and part ways at the same time. The twain had finally met, and if from this point on Dylan had no direction home, then so be it.

Consider the words of the mentor from “Pretty Boy Floyd.”

“Yes, as through this world I've wandered
I've seen lots of funny men;
Some will rob you with a six-gun,
And some with a fountain pen.”

About as profound as any of his seminal lyrics. Now watch how Dylan acknowledges the debt he owes Guthrie by saying essentially the same thing while staying true to his own character.

“Sometimes I think this whole world
Is one big prison yard.
Some of us are prisoners
The rest of us are guards.”

The torch is passed in the span of a single verse and the circle stays unbroken yet again.

THE MOST WONDERFUL TIME OF THE YEAR

Bing, and even a little bit of Elvis were guests in our house when it came to holiday (can I say that?) music. Those were singles though, when it came to long players there was only one that I recall. That would be this Andy Williams album from 1963, sporting the moral majority approved title “Christmas Album.” His music was a favorite in our house and his television show was only missed if the power lines had been sabotaged by errant branches or a luckless squirrel.

What’s not to like? He was young, handsome, gentle voiced, good teeth, smiled when he had his picture taken (“wider than a mile“ no doubt), had manners and loved by my mother and her friends who discussed such things. Bing, was a bit too old for them even though he was their age. Elvis, they liked to look at, but he had too much hair. Frank and Dean drank too much and “ran around.“ (Incase I forgot to mention, celebrities were expected to follow the rules of the house also) Oddly enough, I swear we had every Nat Cole album except his Christmas one. Andy was non threatening and more likely to help them with groceries and bring in more firewood without being told.

In 1963 at the tender age of seven it was a real treat to have the handful of Christmas songs that I knew all on one album. The fact that they were all by the same artist was beside the point. I knew what my school choir was capable of with this music and they were no Andy Williams. He could sing, we couldn’t even face the same way. The reality that so many other artists also recorded this type of music was totally lost on me. Everything was at that age.

He’s recorded many other holiday albums over the years, but they don’t deliver the spirit of those early Christmas’s like this one. I have the CD of it somewhere, but I mostly rely on radio around the holidays to find the songs for me. Hearing one from that album out of the blue while running an errand or on the way home is enough to make the lines at the mall seem shorter. If I’m passing a Christmas tree lot at the same time it can transform the whole day. If I’m drinking when I hear it (not while driving of course) then I’m seven again and the Zenith console in the living room by the tree is spreading good cheer once again.

I’ve had a love affair with Christmas music ever since I was aware of it, no doubt this album played a pivotal role. Red Rider BB guns come and go, but music endures and rolls back the time like almost nothing else.

Andy turns seventy-eight this December. I hope all of his days have been merry and bright.