Tag Archives: life

#1156: Simon & Garfunkel – Save the Life of My Child

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A pre-Spotify/streaming service website used to exist back in the day. We7.com it was called. It allowed you to play a bunch of music in full, for free, without registration. And I came across it in early 2009, I think because Green Day’s 21st Century Breakdown had just been released and there it was, available to listen to, out in the open. The website doesn’t exist anymore, but when it did I got to hear a lot of the music I listen to now for the first time. And that’s where Simon & Garfunkel’s ‘Save the Life of My Child’ comes in. The track played on the site’s internet radio feature one day. Though I’m sure I would have heard ‘The Sound of Silence’ way before then, or ‘Bridge over Troubled Water’, I do believe it’s ‘Save…’ that was properly the first S&G track I’d fully paid attention with headphones at hand.

And the fat synthesizer that opens the song up is not what I was expecting on that initial hearing. I wonder how listeners back in 1968 would have felt too. It’s such a contrast compared to the usual acoustic numbers the duo did, and especially coming right after the light introduction that opens Bookends, the album on which ‘Save the Life…’ can be found. The track is one of the very first ever to utilise the Moog synthesizer, used predominantly for the bassline, and Paul Simon chugs away on the acoustic guitar while singing from the different perspectives of different people witnessing a boy sitting on the ledge of a high building, contemplating suicide. It’s a busy, busy scene. Passersby speculate, newspapers are rolling out with the story, the cops are called, and when one does arrive, they offer no considerable help in the slightest. Spotlights are put on the kid who, in that moment, decides to fall. That’s how the song ends.

I’ve always felt that the song is in some way providing a wider commentary than what’s being portrayed within. I wasn’t around in the ’60s, but from what I’ve gleaned by just reading around, things were much different in the America of 1968 than it was in ’67. The summer of love had long gone, and people wanted politicians to answer for poor decisions. Looking to musicians to provide some solidarity in their art. It was a general time of unrest. And that unrest is very much captured in the performance and general feel of ‘Save the Life…’. The song’s bridge includes an unsettling use of the duo’s aforementioned ‘Sound of Silence’ which, in context, I think symbolises a kind of momentary yearning for those young and innocent days before being abruptly brought back into reality, with the state of affairs of the then-current days being summed up in the final lines as the boy falls to the ground: “Oh, my grace, I got no hiding place.”

#1143: The Beatles – Run for Your Life

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I don’t care what anyone says. I really like this song. The Beatles’ ‘Run for Your Life’ has gained a bit of a stink amidst the Internet community in recent years. People hear the song’s first line and are immediately shocked. Appalled. “I’d rather see you dead, little girl, than to be with another man.” Gasp. “What? Oh, my God.” Then come the rest of the lyrics that detail this girl’s low survival rate at the hands of the song’s narrator who will kill her if she even dare tried to leave him. It strikes a chord. Then add in the whole ‘John Lennon beat women back in his day’ statement (which is true and is bad, but the guy’s dead – can’t get any more cancelled than that) and people have a field day with criticising it. Then there’s the argument that it doesn’t bring the most satisfying end to the band’s Rubber Soul album. That’s a notion I would be fine with agreeing with if I cared that much.

The track was the first to be recorded for the album in October 1965. Not much is known of how John Lennon came to write the words, but the opening line (stated in the above paragraph) was taken from the Elvis Presley song ‘Baby Let’s Play House’. I assume that everything that followed was made just to match the tone of that source of inspiration. Backing up the threatening lyrics is an upbeat performance by the four band members. Lennon’s vocal performance is one that I thoroughly enjoy too. He’s backed up by the harmonies of McCartney and Harrison on the choruses, which aid in building that sort of tension within the song, that’s then resolved in the slide guitar and rhythm guitar riff that arrive after each iteration. A piercing bluesy guitar solo adds the icing on the song’s cake. In the end, George Harrison really liked ‘Run for Your Life’. Lennon not so much. He would later state that it was his least favourite Beatles song. In fact, I’d probably say the reason the track was chosen as the album closer was because he thought it was the worst one out of all the songs they’d recorded for the album, rather than thinking it would be a good way to finish things off.

I dunno. I think at the end of the day, it’s just a song and shouldn’t be taken so literally. I mean, are there people living today who could very much hold the values and ideals held by the narrator of the song? I wouldn’t doubt it. And that sucks. But at the same time, it’s so outrageous coming from the Beatles that you almost sort of have to laugh at it. Is Lennon writing about himself? Don’t think you can objectively say no. But I think once people learn about Lennon’s history, they hear the track and judge the dude’s character solely based on it. A whole hypocrisy argument comes in because Lennon was the peace guy, even though this song was written years before he became the figurehead of that specific movement. Maybe it’s me who’s making a big deal out of all of this. I’m just writing about what I’ve seen, I swear. Whatever view you may hold on it, I’m gonna carry on listening regardless.

#1090: Pavement – Range Life

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Along the line, Pavement’s ‘Range Life’ became one of my favourite songs from the group’s 1994 Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain album. But there was once a time where I really didn’t care for it at all. After being convinced that Pavement could be one of the best bands ever after only hearing ‘Cut Your Hair’, ‘Shady Lane’ and ‘Stereo’ – in that order too – I went to seek out some of their other tunes that may have music videos on YouTube. This was a long, long time ago. Probably 2008 time, so much, much younger and a lot more foolish in terms of myself. ‘Range Life’ was there, I listened, and I’m sure I didn’t make it through the entire thing. It was almost five minutes long, which to a 12-year-old me seemed an eternity. But importantly the melody seemed to just meander and not go anywhere in those verses. And those reaches for the high notes in the choruses sounded like the singer wasn’t even trying. What was it all about? I didn’t get it. It took a few years after to come back to it that I eventually understood.

‘Range Life’ is the tale of a narrator, most likely Stephen Malkmus writing about himself, who’s the singer in a good, ol’ rock-n-roll band and tired of the constant touring and cycle of clichés that come along with the rock-n-roll lifestyle. He looks over the horizon and thinks about another way of living, one where he’s free to roam and doesn’t have to think about when his next rent payment is due. The trace of country rock I think adds to the idea of easy living and searching for those bigger horizons. So when Malkmus does reach those high notes with his voice breaking and all on the ‘Raaaange liiiife’ choruses, it’s not because he’s not trying. In fact, he’s trying very hard. Not saying he’s in pain when he’s singing it, but I think it’s meant to symbolize some sort of mental pain, like it’s signifying the strong urge to break away that’s eating away at him. But in the end, it’s not meant to be seen as song that’s sad or emotional. On the contrary, there are some incredibly relatable and witty lines in here, the most notable one being where Malkmus disses The Smashing Pumpkins. This act would begin a rivalry that people comment on to this day.

I think the track really solidified itself in my eyes upon finding a live performance of it by the band on HBO’s music television series Reverb. Bear in mind, the year’s 1999 so Malkmus was already thinking of ending Pavement during this time, so there’s much more of a couldn’t-give-a-fuck-vibe on his part than usual. Some marijuana may be involved in there too. More importantly though, the track is delivered with a lot more punch than in the original recording. Plus, Malkmus goes even deeper in the Stone Temple Pilots and Smashing Pumpkins lyrics in the final verse, referring to the former as the ‘Stone Temple Nothings’ and almost making a slight at D’arcy Wretzky’s plastic surgery for the latter. It’s pretty funny stuff, the crowd have a laugh at it too.

#890: Big Star – My Life Is Right

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This is the second post with Big Star that I’ve written in the entire history of this blog. Had I started the whole thing earlier, I would have a few more songs of theirs up. And if I did, you would have noticed that I prefer the band’s songs by Chris Bell compared to those of Alex Chilton. ‘Feel’ and ‘Don’t Lie to Me’ would have received my high praise in a few paragraphs made up of waffling sentences. And while ‘In the Street’ was a Chilton song, it’s Bell’s lead vocal on it that gives the track its grit. These three tracks are all from #1 Record, the only album of Big Star’s that Chris Bell featured on before leaving the group, and so is today’s.

‘My Life Is Right’ is another Bell-penned track, and an older song that he had performed with an previous band before joining Big Star. He was really into his Christianity. His love of the Lord was a message in quite a few of his compositions, and it’s clear in this one too. He sings about having no one to share his troubles with, until one day he was shown the way and now feels that he has purpose in life. He was lost and now he’s found. Though listening for the first time, you wouldn’t be wrong to assume that it was about a new love or a woman, something along those lines. But nope. It’s God. Or at the very least, Jesus.

And although it’s got a religious overtone to it, it’s nothing that’s preachy or overbearing. It’s a wonderful upbeat power pop tune with brilliant production and an uplifting tone. Things start off with this wandering piano with a double-tracked Bell singing the first few lines concerning loneliness and frustration, but then the bass guitar and acoustic guitars join in to mirror the change in mood with the lyrics where he then sings on how he’s been shown the way before the whole band kicks in for the huge chorus. For a track made in the early 70s, there’s a grandness and pristine sheen to every strike of the guitar and crash of the cymbals that make this track sound massive. It’s common throughout the whole album. Might just be one of my favourites of that decade.

#739: David Bowie – Life on Mars?

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Ah, 2016. Seems like such a simpler time. It was one of the best years of my life. I turned 21; I was on a hiatus from this blog but was working at a music magazine as an intern; I got to go to Glastonbury for free; I went to the USA on a long trip in the last few months that Obama was still president. It was a great time for me. But all the while that year will always be remembered as the one where everyone you loved in the entertainment industry suddenly started passing away. George Michael. Muhammad Ali. Gene Wilder. Prince. Alan Rickman. Leonard Cohen. Carrie Fisher. Debbie Reynolds, Fisher’s mother, who died the next day. There are many more I could mention. It seemed like every week of every month someone of notable fame was suddenly gone.

And it all started when David Bowie, who had just released his album Blackstar and looked like he was making a musical comeback, passed away from cancer just two days after the record came out. 10 days into January that happened. But it wasn’t until the 11th that the news came out. I was on the way to work on the underground flicking through the socials as you do, and there was a post that more or less said ‘RIP Starman’. That was how I found out. And coincidentally, the track ‘Life on Mars?’ was lined up on shuffle on my phone while I was listening to my music library. No lies. It was a sad day. And I just so happened to be working in Brixton of all places while this was going down. I just wanted to get home from work that evening. Hours later, the route I usually walked down to get to Brixton station was packed with fans paying tribute to him.

So this is ‘Life on Mars?’, and it’s on Bowie’s 1971 album Hunky Dory. It’s very much a classic. I think it’s known that Bowie took the chords of ‘My Way‘ and put his own spin on that track, adding surreal lyrics about a mousey-haired girl and Mickey Mouse turning into a cow. I don’t know what the song’s about, really. Though I think the things he describes in there are basically a way of saying, “Well if all this crazy stuff is happening here, couldn’t it be possible that there’s life on Mars too?” It’s probably much more complex than that. Even if the lyrics are quite strange, there’s no denying the beauty of the music. Rick Wakeman’s piano and Mick Ronson’s string arrangement lift the song to an entirely different level. It’s no surprise that this song is considered to be one of Bowie’s greatest, if not that, one of the greatest songs of all time.