Robert Preston "Ya Got Trouble"

There is a long-running . . . let's call it "debate" between me and my wife about what makes a good song.

She does not enjoy, and will not listen to any artist whose music and/or voice, is secondary to their lyrical ability.

I, on the other hand, enjoy artists who don't necessarily have a great singing voice who or deliver their songs is a strummy, unadorned way, but whose words pack an emotional wallop.

Despite the fact that it's over 40 years old, I can listen to Bob Dylan's "It's Alright Ma, I'm Only Bleeding," and be stunned and amazed each and every time.

But to my wife, that song, with it's repetitive meter and bare bones instrumentation is about as interesting as a 4 year old humming through an empty cardboard paper towel roll (which we listen to a lot, due to having a small child).

To her way of thinking, if it is not musically interesting, it, by definition can not be a good song.  Period.  End of sentence.  End of argument.

Sure, "It's Alright Ma" can be considered great poetry.  But it is not great music.  And if it's not great music, she's not really interested in listening.  Or so she argues.

Naturally, I think that line of thinking is limiting, and a bit crazy.

I can easily love a song that that is musically wonderful, but lyrically vapid, or lame, or simply average.  "Wooly Bully" isn't Shakespeare, but it's a hell of a song.

Conversely, I am also totally willing to listen to a song that is simply strummed, or a bit monotone, or is delivered in a wavering or warbly voice, so long as the lyrics make me feel something.

Johnny Cash, or Springsteen's "Nebraska" or Gillian Welch might sound a little downbeat, or spare, or same-y from song to song, but the writing involved is incredible.

My wife and I will go back and forth about this for car trips on end, with no resolution in sight . . .

After we'd plumbed the depths of this discussion for the 87th time, I did start thinking about how both my wife and I grew up.

She always points out that her parents met, because they liked to dance.  Growing up, she was taken to shows like Sly And The Family Stone, and her folks played records from Earth Wind And Fire and Stevie Wonder.  The music was about the groove.

Meanwhile, over at the Finn household, growing up we listened to a lot of Show Tunes.  I loved Fiddler On The Roof, My Fair Lady, A Chorus Line and especially The Music Man.  (Yes, there weren't too many 4th Graders in my town, who loved Buddy Hackett like I did)

Here's the thing about Show Tunes:  Sure, some of the greatest musicians of the 20th Century, wrote some of the greatest pieces of music of the 20th Century, for Musicals.  But what the songs in Musicals are really about, are the lyrics.

In Musicals, songs are exposition, or show the character's true inner feelings, or resolve a particular plot point.  The songs are saying something, and the words are essential.

And that, I guess, is where we are coming from.  You don't need to know what Sly is saying, to love his music, but where would a musical be, without the lyrics?


Hear "Ya Got Trouble" on Youtube.


Hear Bob Dylan on Youtube.


Hear "Wooly Bully" on Youtube.

Mumford & Sons "Roll Away Your Stone"

There are a couple of musical things that we have been adamant about, as parents.

One, is crummy kid music.

Perhaps surprisingly, it's my wife that has zero patience for twee tunes. With the exception of a Sesame Street album, we really don't play any music for our kids, that was created for kids alone.

Instead we've worked really hard to find music that was made for adults, that appeals to kids.

The Beatles is kid music. Abba is kid music. Michael Franti is kid music.

The other thing we have strongly encouraged is unselfconscious dancing. And that's because my wife is a great dancer, and because I am a terrible dancer. We want our kids to experience the joy of movement.

I lost that joy somewhere along the way.

When I was a little kid, my sister and I used to dance around the living room. The kid songs we had, were Showtunes. We'd jump and groove to "The Music Man" and "Fiddler On The Roof" and such. We'd swing with wild abandon, until . . . well, I'll get back to that in a second.

My wife and I have tried to recreate that scene in our living room, and we were having a blast recently, with Mumford & Sons.

I can't really say that lyrically, Mumford & Sons is kid music. But musically? Hell yeah.

I was holding my daughter, and my wife was holding my sons, and we started shuffling to "Roll Away Your Stone," sashaying from one end of the living room to the other.

Then that instrumental part, right after the chorus, hit. The part that makes you want to stamp your feet. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.

And that's what we did. We stomped our feet. Stomped from one end of the room to the other.

As the song built, so did out stomping.

STOMP. STOMP. STOMP. STOMP. STOMP. STOMP. STOMP. STOMP. STOMP.

Where I had been charging into the rhythm with abandon, I suddenly had a hesitation, and I stopped.

I stopped stomping. I stopped jumping.

Why?

I smiled when I realized what had made me want to stop:

I didn't want the record player to skip.

Back in the 1970s, when my sister and I were stomping along to "76 Trombones" like we were in a Sousa marching band, there was a point where you had to pull in the reins of your unrestrained thumps.

If you thumped too hard, the needle would jump off the record. Why, you could get bounced right back into "Goodnight My Someone" if you weren't careful.

So you had to tread lightly, pull back the reins, not dance with full abandon, in deference to the limitations of the phonograph player.

I can't say that this is solely the reason that I grew up to be a terrible dancer. But it was a pretty startling realization.

In the living room, with my daughter in my arms, I realized no matter how hard I stomped, that Mumford & Sons MP3 was not going to skip.

There was nothing holding me back.


See the video on Youtube.

David Bowie “Ashes To Ashes”

Hitting Random on the iTunes playlist . . .

MTV came into my life at a pretty impressionable time.

For most people I know, from birth to your pre-teen years, your music tastes were formed by your parents’ music tastes. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I grew up listening to The Beatles and The Beach Boys and to Broadway Soundtracks like “The Music Man” and “Fiddler On The Roof.”

It’s when kids hit their pre-teens, or early teenage years, that they discover the world of music outside the cocoon of home.

When I hit those years, MTV hit the small screen. I was about 11 when the cable guys came and hooked us up. And it opened up this bizarre world beyond “Fun Fun Fun” and “76 Trombones.”

And sometimes, that world creeped me the fuck out.

It’s hard now to go back to such a blank slate mindset, after all the years of viewed videos, rock shows attended, and general loss of innocence toward (mainstream) weirdness. But I can still look at this David Bowie video, and feel a teenage sense of dread.

Not that I could take my eyes off this video, mind you. But I’d watch it in the darkness of our basement TV room, looking at this man in makeup and some kind of bizarre clown suit, and feel very ill at ease, not understanding why something that should be so enjoyable, seemed a little like a nightmare.

Clips of the artists mentioned in this post: