Friday Funtime: Pop Argot's DNC Party Playlist

Because clearly I should have been the music director for the Democratic National Convention.

1. Pointer Sisters (with Gaylord Birch), "Yes We Can Can"
2. The Impressions, "We're a Winner"
3. Heaven 17, "(We Don't Need This) Fascist Groove Thing"
4. Neil Young, "Let's Impeach the President"
5. Styx, "Renegade"
6. Bruce Springsteen, "O Mary Don't You Weep"
7. Freda Payne, "Bring the Boys Home"
8. Sam Cooke, "A Change Is Gonna Come" (or substitute the 5th Dimension cover done as a medley with "People Got to Be Free")
9. Rascals, "It's a Beautiful Morning"
10. Stevie Wonder, "Fear Can't Put Dreams to Sleep" (actual DNC performance!)

The Crazy World of Arthur Brown, "Fire"

"I am the god of hellfire! And I bring you ..." one of the greatest one-hit wonders of all time, and a true example of the species. I'd bet $100 you've never heard anything else Arthur Brown sang. There's a good reason for that. But he pulled off something marvelous with "Fire," a tune disturbingly simple (I'm convinced the bass line is simply one note throughout) and still rather shocking in its angry nihilism that somehow made it all the way to #2 in 1968. I remember watching this Beat Club performance on MTV's Closet Classics all those years ago; it's not ideal viewing at 10am for a 13-year-old. But it's one of the most sublime rock openings ever, and if Arthur couldn't match or top that, well, who could?

ETA: I make no effort to apologize for Arthur's navel-gazing (ahem) third-eye chakra on his torso. Acid corrodes sometimes.

Lobo, "I'd Love You to Want Me"

Oh, for the days when looks weren't necessary for songcraft to take an artist into the Top 10. Lobo, who scored a half-dozen or so hits as a minor embodiment of the '70s singer-songwriter movement, was perhaps the least star-looking of them all, particularly in this clip of his No. 2 hit "I'd Love You to Want Me". Frankly, he looks less like a guy calling himself Lobo in 1972 than like Amy Sedaris dressing up as a guy calling himself Lobo in 1972. And not quite mastering the art of lip-synching.

ILYTWM nevertheless nails the Southwest Aztec living-in-a-van vibe and stands as Lobo's biggest hit (even if "Me and You and a Dog Named Boo" is the one people remember more). And if we may indulge the song's vaguely creepy conceit, haven't we all felt that way at some point, even if discretion and good manners dictate that we brush the thought aside unspoken?

ETA: And damn, are those some mismatched fonts on the album cover, or what?

Sinead O'Connor, "Nothing Compares 2 U"

Heard this song in a pharmacy last week and on the radio the other day. Amazing that it still chokes me up 18 years later. I've never heard the Family's original take and am actually not curious to. I have, though, heard Prince do it live - but wonderful though Rosie Gaines can be, she couldn't hold a candle to the unpredictable O'Connor's take on "Nothing Compares 2 U".

PS: I had originally planned to link to the original, touching video, but every YouTube clip I found had the music excised. Wondering if that's Prince being hyperprotective as usual of his work.

Tocque Deville, "Obama, Please Don't Suck"

A humble supplication from one enterprising singer-songwriter/YouTube videographer to the presumptive next President, whose entreaty I share. Barack Obama - and Joe Biden - Please Don't Suck. I'm even overlooking that FISA thing. (For now.)

Hat tip to Jim of Borrowed Suits for cluing me in to this.

Friday Funtime: Pop Argot's Top 10 KISS Songs

My brother had a birthday this week. As he, like thousands of other guys in his age demographic, is the World's Biggest KISS Fan, here in tribute are my 10 favorite KISS songs (ordered, but not strictly in order). Lick them up with someone you love.

1. I Was Made for Lovin' You
2. Detroit Rock City
3. I Stole Your Love
4. Love Gun
5. I Want You
6. Hard Luck Woman
7. 100,000 Years
8. What Makes the World Go 'Round
9. Save Your Love
10. God Gave Rock & Roll to You II

Jefferson Starship, "No Way Out"

While I convalesce and recover from a cold, here's something appropriately hallucinatory: one of the most nonsensical yet weirdly entertaining videos of MTV's heyday.

"No Way Out" and its album Nuclear Furniture marked the end of the line for this iteration of the Jefferson Starship: after a few years of working banal arena-rock formula, Paul Kantner would take his ball and go home, acrimoniously taking the "Jefferson" with him. Funny thing, though: while the preceding albums Modern Times and Winds of Change were heavy on dire rock-by-numbers, Nuclear Furniture was something of a comeback in its songcraft, Kantner continuing his space-age saga of Rose in the quirky songs "Rose Goes to Yale" and "Champion" and Grace Slick offering the smart "Showdown." But mostly this was Mickey Thomas's show, and though he imparted his usual amounts of filler (unintelligent and uncurious like our president, Thomas rarely gave a shit what he sang, just as long as it let him belt), he had a few shining moments, including "No Way Out," which made Top 40 partly on the strength of its bizarre video.

How bizarre? I can't even summarize the plot sensibly. Mickey and his gal arrive at a castle, where Grace (in a role that I can only describe as Red Queen meets Blue Meanie) escorts him to a confession booth, where Father Guido Sarducci (!) interrogates him, catching him in his cheating-on-her lies (the only thing that makes sense in the context of the song). Meanwhile, Paul and keyboardist David Freiberg meander as mad scientists whose purpose is never made clear; guitarist Craig Chaquico runs interference (or telemarketing); bassist Pete Sears scuffles about as a chimney sweep in search of a chimney; and in another room, drummer Donny Baldwin responds to his Asian girlfriend's departure from his bed by cheerily curling a barbell. In bed.

It must be the NyQuil, but I rather enjoyed this today.

The Spinners, " 'They Just Can't Stop It' the (Games People Play)"

Time has not been terribly kind to the Spinners, nor terribly fair. They were a marvelous vocal outfit with a long string of hits, yet they're not treated with anywhere near the critical reverence of, say, the Chi-Lites or the Dramatics. And with their bass voice, Pervis Jackson, having passed away yesterday, now seems as good a time as any to offer a bit of reclamation.

To be fair, the group could be a bit silly and cloying at times, "Rubberband Man" being nothing short of supper-club vaudevillian novelty and Phillippe Wynne frequently veering off into eccentric/batshit land with his inflections and ad libs (but then, what do you expect from a guy who spelled his name Phillippe and pronounced it Felipe?). But their harmonies were spot on, their arrangements tight yet free-flowing, their productions sterling (especially "I'll Be Around," one of the half-dozen greatest single productions ever).

I could have cited any number of songs to make a critical case for them: "It's a Shame," titularly appropriate for the R.I.P. sentiment and an interesting story in its own right; "Ghetto Child," with its honest assessment of class-based realities; "Then Came You," their sole #1 pop hit, with the immortal coda comment "I'm a contented man!"

But today I'd like to shine a spotlight on my favorite song of theirs, " 'They Just Can't Stop It' the (Games People Play)". And not just because its title, aiming to avoid confusion with another hit song called "Games People Play," pulls off the worst execution of grammar and punctuation in chart-pop history. It's a marvelous vocal effort on all counts: second-lead vocalist Bobby Smith's reliable (if overacted in that Soul Train clip) lead; the feminine response vocal (sung by Barbara Ingram but rendered weirdly in that clip by the guy in the waxy handlebar 'stache); and Pervis's perfect pop moment expressed in one word: "12:45." This is soul-pop done right, folks, and it's our loss that there's no room on the pop-culture radar for these kinds of variety-show-worthy singles anymore.

I once spent a late night carousing in NYC's West Village with my friend the Princess of Cairo singing a medley of all the Spinners' great and wacky hits, random lines from "Sadie" and "Mighty Love" and "Love Don't Love Nobody." And, of course: I'm a contented man!

Matthew Sweet, "If Time Permits"

One of my very favorite albums of the '90s is the sorely overlooked In Reverse by Matthew Sweet. How overlooked? I had to trawl through several pages of YouTube clips to find anything decent to link to. ("What Matters," the lead single from the album and apparently the only video he made for it, is actually one of my least favorites on the disc.) The album's production technique is triple-chocolate cake for me: lots of backward-masked guitar; layers of ringing, jingling percussion and splashy drums; richly multitracked vocals; the thick, melodic bass work of the legendary Carol Kaye. And, of course, the equally melodic songcraft of Sweet himself, a master of concision who really made his Revolver with this album, even if no one recognized it as such.

I'd have loved to post a clip of "I Should Never Have Let You Know," but in its stead, here's an unusual and incongruous soap-opera-fan vid for "If Time Permits", an evocative love ode shrouded in fears of mortality. Sweet's best work since this album has been more directly Sixtophilic: namely, his 2006 Under the Covers album with Susanna Hoffs. Would that more artists today recognize the value of a strong melody and a rising refrain.

Friday Funtime: 5 Great Jerry Wexler Productions

1. Aretha Franklin, "Chain of Fools"
2. Dusty Springfield, Dusty in Memphis
3. Ray Charles, "I Got a Woman"
4. Otis Redding, "Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay"
5. Willie Nelson, Phases and Stages

Only a taste; there are many, many more where those came from. R.I.P., Jerry.

The Flower Pot Men, "Let's Go to San Francisco"

No big cultural observation here, just sharing a 1967 U.K. hit about my favorite city that was very much of its time. (And very similar to the glorious Beach Boys knockoff "My World Fell Down" from Sagittarius.) Great how the Flower Pot Men have continued to trot this out in identical oldies-package-tour rehashings in 1994 and 2008.

PS: Two of the Flower Pot Men, Nick Simper and Jon Lord, went on to join Deep Purple, while singer Tony Burrows had hits a few years later fronting the studio groups Brotherhood of Man ("United We Stand"), the Pipkins ("Gimme Dat Ding"), Edison Lighthouse ("Love Grows Where My Rosemary Goes"), and a few years after that, First Class ("Beach Baby"). Quite a c.v.!

The Mad Lads, "Patch My Heart"

Now I know where Color Me Badd got everything in "All 4 Love" from: the 1966 Isaac Hayes-produced "Patch My Heart" from an obscure R&B outfit called the Mad Lads. Thanks, Mike, for continuing to advance my musical education.

The Fifth Dimension, "If I Could Reach You"

Perhaps this blog should be a politics-free zone, but I've been thinking about the John Edwards caper over the past few days. I'm of several minds: His behavior is inexcusable, but infidelity isn't a crime and it doesn't say much about a person's ability to lead or govern. I'm pissed at him for wantonly imperiling the Democratic party (had he been the presidential candidate, this would have been nightmarish), and I agree that it's an actionable offense if he used his PAC monies or other fundraising dollars for hush money and other payoff costs. But I can't pretend I have a high horse to sit on where matters of fidelity are concerned. What can I say - I value honesty, but I find monogamy overrated; like veganism, it's a good idea, but it's not for everyone.

Which leads me, indirectly, to "If I Could Reach You", one of the last big hits for the Fifth Dimension and certainly one of their most unfairly overlooked. Marilyn McCoo sings from the perspective of The Other Woman: perhaps a prostitute, as my friend Mike has speculated, or maybe just someone who's being strung along by a man already in a relationship. "It's hours before dawn, and there's no one who'd rather be with you," she sings the effective and stark lyric, defeat resonating with every word. "I let you take my love, knowing you don't love me." Yet she continues in the sad situation, hoping against hope that something will change; that if he can't love her, he might at least recognize her deep and abiding love for him, and that might be enough for him to stay. Marilyn pays no mind at all to her lover's significant other, if indeed he has one, demonstrating how when love becomes all-consuming it can turn a world solipsistic, consequences be damned, other hearts be ignored.

The song has no direct resonance to John Edwards or Rielle Hunter, and I'm not justifying or condoning anything they've done. But I do have sympathy for the situation; more important, I hope it won't distract us any further from the subjects that actually need to be discussed in this presidential run-up. Let's focus on negotiating our own relationships with honesty and compassion rather than fussing over others'. Relationships, they're complicated things.

Friday Funtime: 8 "8" Songs for 08/08/08

1. Goon Squad, "Eight Arms to Hold You"
2. The Byrds, "Eight Miles High"
3. R.E.M., "Driver 8"
4. David Bowie, "Eight Line Poem"
5. Tom Robinson, "2-4-6-8 Motorway"
6. Rufus Wainwright, "Dinner at Eight"
7. The Beatles, "Eight Days a Week"
8. The "Eight Is Enough" theme

Paris Hilton, "Stars Are Blind"

Like countless others, I reacted to Paris Hilton's witheringly clever response to John McCain's use of her in an anti-Obama ad with dropped-jaw astonishment. "I didn't know she had it in her," went others' reactions throughout the blogosphere and the real world. But I've been thinking about how impressed I am with her media savvy.

Despite being of marginal intelligence, bony and birdish, and frequently unpleasant, Paris the heiress has created for herself an entire mythography of an existence, dabbling indifferently in field to field just long enough to get attention for it and not long enough to bear obligation to it. She's the ultimate free agent.

Take, f'rex, "Stars Are Blind", a slight reggae-pop tune that she took into the Top 20 two summers ago. It's a nick of UB40's "Kingston Town" (tip of the cap to friend Mshray for pointing that out to me back then) with little in the way of lyrical content, but Paris sells its breeziness with an undeniable carefree charm you can't AutoTune into being.

Paris, although your self-absorption and self-awareness represent a lot of what I hate about contemporary U.S. culture, I have to applaud you for exposing the absurdity of the "celebrity" meme in our presidential horse race. Loves it; keep up the good work.

Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds, "Winners and Losers"

To the minimal extent that '70s-pop fans know Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds at all, it's for either the 1971 Top 10 hit "Don't Pull Your Love" (sometimes given as "Don't Pull Your Love (Out)," which makes it seem like a "Rock Me Gently"-esque ode to being pegged) or the 1975 No. 1 hit "Fallin' in Love" (which their diction renders "Fawwin' in Love"). Since I'm a wannabe music historian who's had today's song stuck in his head for three days now, I'll point out a few more tidbits.

1. Several years before the hit under their own name, they scored a Top 10 surftastic novelty instrumental as part of the T-Bones with 1965's "No Matter What Shape (Your Stomach's In)".

2. They had one additional Top 40 hit, following up "Fallin' in Love" with the vaguely similar-sounding "Winners and Losers". It's kind of a nondescript song, but kind of catchy, and it somehow evokes a late-'70s sitcom in its melody. "It's a Living," maybe? Its sheer earworminess demanded that I share it here.

3. By the time "Winners" and "Fallin'" were hits, "Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds" was a misnomer, Tommy Reynolds having left the group over two years prior. So one of the credited artists does not appear on the tracks at all, which puts them in a league with the Pips (who are absent from Gladys Knight's reading of "Help Me Make It Through the Night" but credited all the same) and Cliff Nobles (the lead singer of Cliff Nobles & Co., whose sole hit was the instrumental "The Horse").

And that's about enough trivia for one day. Enjoy "Winners and Losers" and let me know if it sticks in your head as well. (Or in your craw.)

Barry Manilow, "New York City Rhythm"

It's a Barry Manilow twin-spin!

Yup, I'm revisiting the Brooklyn balladeer, because (a) I spent my to- and from-work commutes listening to the box set I mentioned yesterday, and (b) as a result, I've been thinking about the identity of being a New Yorker.

Barry's about as quintessentially New York as a musician can be: he embraced each aspect of the city's treasured musical history in his '70s albums, from show tunes to standards to swinging jazz to Tin Pan Alley to Brill Building to showbizzy schmaltz and even, in the case of "New York City Rhythm", to Nuyorican discotheque moves. The song's subject matter is quintessentially New York, too: defiant survival by sheer determination. In New York, you really can go as far as your ambition will take you, and it's all just a question of what you're willing to sacrifice in the name of that ambition.

You can't record stuff this unabashedly corny any more, and it's to our collective detriment that that's the case; a big part of Barry Manilow's appeal for me is his unselfconscious headlong diving into his arrangements and presentations, and the fact that his songs were about the songs rather than about him. I've connected with many of his tunes over the years, and today find a certain sense of triumph in what "New York City Rhythm" represents, even if what it represents is often cutthroat, often heartless, often insular, and often solitary. In New York City like nowhere else, armies of one can go quite far indeed.

Barry Manilow, "Daybreak"

This weekend I bought a Barry Manilow box set, The Complete Collection and Then Some, at a deep discount from the Virgin Megastore in Union Square. It's not like I needed more Manilow in my collection - this set is added to three other CDs, six cassettes, five vinyl LPs (but alas, no longer the 8-tracks) - but this package offered some unreleased and live cuts I wanted to hear, including an uptempo pre-hit recording of "Could It Be Magic" redolent of Tony Orlando & Dawn (and indeed, that recording, credited to the fictional outfit Featherbed, was produced by Tony O himself).

The main cut I wanted from the box set, apart from that CIBM reading, was the live version of "Daybreak," a minor chart hit in 19781977 taken from Barry Manilow Live that is notable in my world for being the very first 45 I ever bought. The studio version of "Daybreak" is pleasant post-vaudevillian positivity, but it's the stage that really makes "Daybreak" come alive. When Barry playfully does some call-and-response with his background singers Lady Flash, the listener can hardly help but grin widely like a simple child and sway back and forth. Kind of the way Kathleen Turner does in Serial Mom.

Sang, girls!

(ETA: Tip of the cap to reader Mike for his fact-checking.)

Friday Funtime: What August Means to Me

Ewww. Some onanism with your Porcupine Pie? Sorry to subject you to Neil's, um, longfellow serenade.