I was thinking about the our entanglements through love and sex, blood and money, politics and hopes, and all the other ways we become entangled. Crazy dreams played a part, as did my writing process as I work on April Showers 1921, coupling and uncoupling plot twists and character arcs.
And lo, a song did rise in my stream, a song from 1975, when I was but nineteen and serving in the military in the Philippines.
A true legend and Nobel Prize winner (the accepting of which became another facet in the complex musician’s life), here’s Bob Dylan with “Tangled Up in Blue”.
Listening to it always makes me nostalgic for what I thought was going to be.
Today’s theme music popped straight into the stream from memories and dreams. Here’s Rufus and Chaka Khan with a song that Stevie Wonder wrote, “Tell Me Something Good”, from the year I graduated high school, 1974.
I don’t know what dislodged in my stream last night that led this song to stream in as I sipped my coffee this morning.
“Guitar Man” was by Jerry Reed (1967). In this version, he’s playing with Glen Campbell. Both of these players have passed away, but a large sense of Jerry Reed’s personality shines through in this song. We’d call him a good ol’ boy.
I remember watching this. I would have been ’bout eleven. Guess I was an impressionable kid.
He repeated something that his wife had told him. “I never said that,” she said before anyone else could speak.
Indignation rose. Yes, you did, he began to say, but considered, maybe he’d heard it wrong. Maybe he was mis-remembering. Or maybe she’d said it wrong. Perhaps she didn’t remember saying it, or the people that told her had told her wrong. Or maybe she’d incorrectly remembered what she’d been told and then told him wrong, but didn’t remember it.
The only way to resolve this would be record and index everything so that he could go back and know exactly what was said.
Today’s theme music is a surprising turn for me. I blame my dreams.
I had a cluster of dreams last night that shared the theme of saving. I saved some people and animals in a few dreams, but I was also saved, most memorably once by a Jack Russell terrior. The dog led me out of what appeared to be a benign situation. After I thanked him, he left.
Keeping with the weirdness of all that, I awoke thinking, “And it said so in my dreams.” I immediately knew that line from “Candida”, a hit song by Tony Orlando and Dawn back in July 1970. I never had one of their albums, but they were immensely popular in the early seventies. That popularity translated to a lot of AM and FM radio play and appearances on television shows — or did the radio play and appearances on television shows lead to immense popularity? Either way, I heard them often. Pop culture tends to be like that.
You’d think that today’s theme music originated with feeding the cats or something, but, no, this one started with a dream.
The dream had to do with a man that I’d met and the movies. Throughout the dream, he was either trying to get me to go to the movies with him, be in a movie with him, or make a movie with him. A cheery, energetic guy, I never quite understood him or what was going on. But I recalled him saying, “Just how deeply do you believe?”
After thinking about the dream and feeding the cats, that phrase started Nine Inch Nails, “That Hand that Feeds” (2005), streaming through me. “Just how deep do you believe? Will you bite the hand that feeds? Will you chew until it bleeds?”
I’ve always had a place in my heart for the Clash, and I like the hard-edge they bring to today’s theme music. “I Fought the Law” by the Bobby Fuller Four was a hit when I was ten. Featuring clear and easy lyrics and a fast beat, I heard it on AM radio and picked it up and liked singing it. It was a decent song.
Over twenty years later (1979), with the Clash’s almost smug, sneering, raw cover, I felt it was more correct. Then, on reflection, I recognized, no, this is more about our cultural shift regarding music, and the evolution of taste. My mother disagreed. She liked Fuller’s smoother version.
I also thought it was humorous and odd after “White Riot” that the Clash recorded “I Fought the Law”. While the subject matter, an unlawful resistance theme, was similar, the songs’ structure were different. I decided the Clash were being ironic with their cover of “I Fought the Law”.
The trigger for releasing the song into my stream last night and today was a conversation with my spouse. I said, “I’m going to the ATM for some cash. Need any?” As I went, I thought, “I needed money ’cause I had none.” Naturally, the chorus followed. Fortunately, my ATM card worked, my account had cash, the law wasn’t involved, and the only fighting was within myself about how much cash to take out.
Here’s both versions. Hope you enjoy one of them. Cheers
After another night of multiple, interesting dreams (some involving playing games), I was mocking myself this morning. “These dreams go on when I close my eyes,” I said to the cats, who were not looking at me nor listening to me (because, the cats were all thinking — I could see it in the spread of their whiskers, the glints in their eyes, and the tilt of their ears — “The others are here, and who knows when one of those other cats will lose it and attack me, so I must stay vigilant!”), “but it feels like I’m thinking about them every second that I’m awake.” Of course, I was close to the song lyrics from “These Dreams”, a 1986 Heart hit.
“These Dreams” sounded different from Heart’s earlier music, IMO, but I liked the song. (Confession: I like songs ’bout dreams. It might be because I dream often, and seem to remember them.) Of course, the band’s line-up had changed, too, another reason for the different sound. Not long after buying Heart’s album, I discovered that Martin Page and Bernie Taupin wrote the song. Ah, hah.
The other aspect of this song, heavily noted during the song’s time on the pop chart, was that Nancy Wilson sang lead vocals instead of Ann, even though Nancy had a cold.
Another rejection last night. That always opens a darkside vein, for a bit, at least. I pondered the usual of whys and hows for an hour, slept on it and sluiced through some dreams. Then I arose this morning, told myself onward, and started humming this old classic to myself.
Oh lordy lord, oh lordy lord
It hurts me so bad, for us to part
But someday baby, I ain’t gonna worry my life anymore
“Worried Life Blues” have has been sung and played for decades. I’ve heard many performers do this song, but I went with B.B. King and Eric Clapton, two musicians I admire and enjoy. This version is from Riding with the King (2000). I especially love King’s deep, emphatic style on this song.
Pour a cup of something and listen with me. Sing along, if you’re so moved. Enjoy the day.
In my neck of existence, back when I was a child, snowstorms meant listening to the AM radio to see if school was canceled. Snowstorms meant bundling up to go outside to play in this substance, to sled, build, explore, and experience. The storms meant returning home to hot tomato soup with a grilled cheese sandwich with a dill pickle, or a cup of hot cocoa.
Snowstorms changed our neighborhood sounds, forcing out the usual ruckus in favor of cars’ soft sibilant hissing, or a spinning whine as tires looked for a bite in the slick mess. Rhythmic chains, clicking studs, and the snowplows’ grinding blades broke the stillness, enhancing the ambiance.
The house was hot and the outside was frigid. Sunshine seemed hidden by infinite layers. Trees were starkly outlined, but cars and houses were buried.
Snowstorms made the day special as routines bent and fractured under the snow’s weight. Now I anticipate the snowstorm for days, hoping it’ll return some of childhood’s joys when the snow closes us in, but the storms rarely stand up to hopes.
Michael Seidel, writer 