I am still behind on getting posts caught back up, I’ll just skip things here and there until I can truly get caught up and then ahead. No real big deal, I don’t guess.
Anyway – today I want to have a look at Joe Walsh’s breakout song from his solo career. While Walsh’s marquee performance will always be tied to the Eagles and usually Hotel California, there’s little doubt that Rocky Mountain Way is one of a small handful of Walsh’s landmark solo cuts.
The song comes from what turns out to technically be Walsh’s debut solo album The Smoker You Drink, The Player You Get in 1973. The album was billed as Joe Walsh, though the players actually went by the name Barnstorm, the group Walsh formed after quitting The James Gang in 1971. Barnstorm released a self-titled record in 1972, which was well-received critically but not a hot seller.
This album would do better business, hitting number 6 on the Billboard Pop Albums chart and receiving a US gold certification. Rocky Mountain Way hit number 23 on the Billboard Hot 100, Walsh’s first true chart success.
Rocky Mountain Way is a blues-rock jam with one big, fat riff guiding it along. The song meanders along at an easy pace, it is not in a hurry to go anywhere and we are all the better for it lingering around. Walsh also employs the talk box in the song, while its use is panned in general it is a great fit in this particular song.
Lyrically, the song is about how Joe’s move from The James Gang to going solo was a good move for him. It was his way of pushing back the regret of leaving a band with success to risk it on his own. Joe relays in a 2021 interview with Howard Stern (embedded below) that he was mowing his lawn in Colorado when he was “knocked back” by the majesty of the Rocky Mountains in the background. He went into the house, suddenly having words for the music he’d already recorded, and also amusingly left his lawnmower running while crafting the lyrics. Walsh also calls this song the greatest solo song he ever wrote in the interview.
Over the years the song has remained as a staple of rock radio and is ever present in entertainment. Baseball’s Colorado Rockies play the song after every home win (insert jokes here), and the Denver Broncos use a Godsmack cover version during their games. The song has appeared in several movies and is also a part of the Grand Theft Auto franchise, having appeared on the rock radio station in GTA 4.
Rocky Mountain Way is Joe Walsh’s most-played live song, according to setlist.fm. Not only that, but it ranks number 8 in terms of the most-played songs on The Eagles list as well. The song even ranks in another artist’s list with no relation to Walsh – Canadian rockers Triumph covered the song and played it a lot on tour and it secures the number 6 spot on Triumph’s live list.
There’s little doubt that Joe Walsh will be most remembered for his contributions with The Eagles, not the least of which is his part in the solo that closes out Hotel California. But his solo material also deserves consideration, and Rocky Mountain Way is perhaps the top of the heap in terms of magnificence. That fat riff places you right in a smoky dive bar of days past and is one of music’s great moments.
Time now to look back on a song that’s 35 years old now and was never a single in the first place, but just last month got about the biggest bump in visibility a song could possibly get.
Tom Petty released his first actual solo album, as in not entirely written and recorded with his band the Heartbreakers, in 1989. Full Moon Fever was a smash hit, heading to five times platinum sales in the US and generating three Top 40 hits that are some of Petty’s most recognizable songs. Petty would work with his Traveling Wilburys buddy and ELO mastermind Jeff Lynne on much of the album, though today’s song was co-written with fellow Heartbreaker Mike Campbell.
Love Is A Long Road cuts a familiar vibe for late ’80’s music. There is a bit of synth but the song is otherwise standard rock and easily at home on a Tom Petty record. It’s a tale of getting into somebody but finding that the actual act of being in love and carrying on in that manner is a lot tougher than simply falling for someone. It’s another take on the mentality of “the chase is better than the catch” and it’s certainly a part of life. Mike Campbell stated that he was inspired by a motorcycle when writing the song.
This song didn’t get released as a single but it was the B-side to Petty’s massive hit Free Fallin’. Radio stations wound up putting on the other side of the 45 record and this one got a pretty decent amount of airplay, so much so that the song wound up charting at number 7 on the Modern Rock chart. That’s quite the feat for something that didn’t get the promotion machine of a single behind it.
If that was the end of this song’s story it would be fine enough – charting like that as a B-side is impressive. But 34 years after the song’s release it would gain one hell of a second life, becoming attached to the hottest entertainment property in existence.
In early December of 2023, Rockstar Games released the first trailer to Grand Theft Auto VI. To say this is a hotly anticipated game would be a vast understatement – it is easily the most anticipated video game of all time and probably the most widely anticipated entertainment release of any form, ever. The prior game raked in over a billion dollars in its first 24 hours on sale and it will likely be a 12 year gap between it and this new installment.
Rockstar have a history of using the right music to market their games as well as programming in-game radio stations with solid hits. In this case, Petty’s song was chosen to feature in this first trailer, which garnered over 120 million views in its first few days online.
This spotlight sent Love Is A Long Road into hyperspace. The song saw a nearly 37,000% increase in Spotify streams after the trailer released, and digital sales propelled the song to number 7 on the US Rock Digital Song Sales Billboard chart.
Merely being attached to the GTA 6 hype is pretty monumental for a song of this age, no matter the impressive stature of the artist in question. But there’s more to this pairing of Tom Petty and Rockstar Games. GTA 6 will be set in a fictionalized version of Florida, also Petty’s home state. The vibes of Love Is A Long Road perfectly fit the Florida-ized game and also call back some to GTA’s prior installment set in Florida, the total ’80’s atmosphere of GTA Vice City. It’s a multi-tiered stroke of genius to use this song to plug the game.
Love Is A Long Road is a nice song from a fantastic album, and here we are all these decades later with the song front in center in a way no one would have dreamed of way back when. A shame that Tom isn’t around to see his handiwork, but it will be fun to cruise the streets of Vice City in 2025 with this song playing on the system of whatever stolen car I’m in.
Originally I was going to discuss 2023 a bit more. I decided against that after I got to typing – this year has been a bit of a shit to me personally and I’d rather see it just go the hell away. Instead, I’ll go with what is supposed to be my normal Wednesday routine and talk about a song instead.
Whatever, indeed.
Our song today hails from Oasis, and was their first ever non-album single. We are now 29 years and 1 day removed from its single release, it was a UK Christmas single in 1994. This would do very well for what was about to become a behemoth of British rock, the song went to number 3 on the UK charts and sold over 540,00 copies.
This was recorded as part of the sessions for the debut album Definitely Maybe, and in fact I believe it was released on a few international versions of the album. I can’t immediately corroborate this, so if anyone has more concrete information about this, please share and I’ll be happy to correct this.
The thing that kept Whatever off the debut album was the use of orchestra strings, which were recorded by the London Session Orchestra. Among the players was violinist Wilfred Gibson, who had previously been part of Electric Light Orchestra, as well as contributing to early King Crimson work, among others. Imagine being this guy who had been on decades of mountain-moving work.
But Oasis and the powers that be, likely Alan McGee and Creation Records, decided that Whatever didn’t fit the debut album. I’d honestly say it’s a fair call, this song does stand out as different from the vibe on the record. It might have worked, but Definitely Maybe does work just great as it is, so it’s probably for the best that this is a bonus track.
Our song today isn’t that difficult to go through, most Oasis songs aren’t. It’s an ode to being free and embracing whoever you are, like a lot of Oasis it’s a celebration of the everyday person. It’s an embrace of the free spirit of the brief Britpop time of the mid-90’s where things weren’t as grim and everyone could take on the new form of rock music while still having a good time. It’s a celebration of self, it isn’t overly intellectual and it works pretty well.
The signature part of this song might be at the end, as the last minute or so sees the strings lead the song out. It leads to memes like the one just below, and it sums up the spirit of the song. We aren’t supposed to take it all that seriously, yet in that time for us of the right age in the mid-90’s, this was pretty serious. For a brief moment in time, relatively speaking, Oasis were the voice of a generation.
Now, this song did give primary songwriter Noel Gallagher a bit of a fit – there was a lawsuit from celebrated English act Neil Innes, who contended that this song lifted parts from Innes’ 1973 song How Sweet To Be An Idiot. Oasis management chose to settle, and Innes is listed as a co-writer of Whatever.
This got played out live a fair bit, including during Oasis’ high time of 1996, and the Knebworth set that I go on and on about on here. All in all this is listed as being played 99 times during the band’s career, and was one they were playing on their final tour when shit came to shit and the band imploded. Both Noel and Liam have played this in solo sets post-split.
So at the end of the day we have a Christmas song, although it’s not about Christmas, as if Oasis would ever do that. But we do have a very nice song that didn’t quite fit the album they were putting out and we got this as a bonus single instead. A fine piece of work, if I do say.
It’s time this week for one of rock and metal’s most immortal albums. Deep Purple were looking to build on momentum from a prior album and also do a better job of capturing their live sound on a studio album when they made a series of recording choices that would both cement them as rock titans and also contribute one of rock and roll’s most infamous song origin stories.
Deep Purple – Machine Head
Released March 25, 1972 via Purple Records
My Favorite Tracks – Space Truckin’, Smoke On The Water, Highway Star
The story of Machine Head and its recording has long been etched into rock music lore. Deep Purple were out to better capture their live sound on a record. The band had established some success on the basis of their album two records ago, Deep Purple In Rock, and were convinced that bringing their live sound to a studio record would help them along. The band booked the famous Rolling Stones Mobile Studio and lined up to record at the Montreux Casino in Switzerland. The original plan was to record a live set as well as the studio album and release a double record. Of course, those plans went up in flames, as we’ll get to.
Tracking Deep Purple line-ups could drive the world’s foremost scholars mad, there is a whole lore and science behind it. This album featured the band’s Mark II roster, which would be the band’s most successful configuration. It featured Ritchie Blackmore on guitar, Ian Gillan on vocals, Roger Glover with the bass, the immortal Jon Lord on keyboards and the band’s lone constant member Ian Paice on drums.
Deep Purple would be credited as album producers. They were joined by engineer Martin Birch, who had worked with Purple on previous albums as well as Fleetwood Mac in their early career. Birch would go on to produce for Blackmore again in Rainbow, handle the early Whitesnake albums as well as the first two Dio-fronted Black Sabbath records before settling in as the long-time producer of another British band I might happen to talk about all the time on this site.
Today’s album has a fairly lean 7 songs running at 37:46. Several deluxe editions of the album are also available.
Highway Star
The album opens with a quick hard rocker that was literally written in front of journalists on a bus after one reporter asked how the band wrote songs. Blackmore started jamming on a guitar while Gillan composed lyrics on the fly about simply “being a rock and roll band.” This was also released as a single.
This ode to cars and women accomplished its mission of depicting rock and roll, and the music laid a blueprint for many bands to follow – keep things simple and just rock out.
Maybe I’m A Leo
Up next is a blues jam soaked in Blackmore’s guitar tone and spiced up with Lord’s organ work. It’s a really nice song and a good bridge from rock’s recent past to what it was becoming. There are sparse lyrics here, but Gillan laments the loss of a woman, who maybe was taken away against her will, it’s hard to tell. But she is gone and Gillan is a Leo, but not a lion. (Hey, me too. And it turns out Ian Gillan and I have the same birthday, didn’t know that.)
Pictures Of Home
We have a very amped up jam session here, as each instrument player gets a spot to go off on his chosen weapon of rock. It’s far from just an individual showcase though, it’s also a cohesive song that works when everyone’s playing together as well as when one person takes the spotlight. It also features a harrowing lyrical tale of a mountain climber stuck on a mountain, which would be a pretty awful position to be in. And there’s probably not a British rock royalty jam session going on up on the mountain to pass the time with.
Never Before
It’s another blues-based tune here also with a bit of funk creeping in on occasion. While Lord and Blackmore are up to their usual mastery here, it’s Ian Gillan that really gets a chance to shine vocally here. His tale is one of sorrow, as he’s been done wrong by a woman, but the song is pretty hard hitting and ready to soar.
Smoke On The Water
And here we are. The truth is that this song’s full details deserve their own post so I will Cliffnotes things today. DP were set to record at the Montreaux Casino after it shut down for the winter, the last gig the venue booked was Frank Zappa. A “stupid with a flare gun” decided to burn the place down instead. DP had to find another place to record and also found lyrical inspiration for a song in the fire. In fact, the song’s lyrics give most of the details of the events.
Smoke On The Water was not immediately recognized as a hit. In fact, the band had a live album and another studio record out before this was officially released as a single. The song went on to hit number 4 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and was also certified gold in the US.
But the song’s true success goes far beyond charts and sales. The Blackmore riff is perhaps rock and roll’s most recognizable guitar sound. It is simple yet highly effective, and it led to generations of future guitar players annoying music shop employees with repeated plays of a riff so simple that most anyone could play it in a few minutes. This is quite possibly the greatest contribution to rock music ever, it is that massive and influential.
Lazy
This one is nearly an instrumental and is a fantastic jam between Blackmore and Lord. The song is 7:22 in length and these two take up most of the track. It is a jam in the truest sense, with them simply going off and doing what they want to do. The small verse section is about, well, being lazy. It is split in two with Ian Gillan on the harmonica between.
Space Truckin’
The album closes with a brilliant rock and, honestly, heavy metal track. It’s a fantastic, trippy march through the idea of being just what the title says – a space trucker. It’s like Han Solo a few years before he came around. The song is carried by Jon Lord’s just plain gross keyboard riffing. This song got turned into a massive jam in live settings, including an infamous one in 1974 when Blackmore was pissed off and destroyed thousands of dollars in gear.
Machine Head was to be the magnum opus of Deep Purple’s long and storied career. The album hit number 7 on the Billboard 200, and number 1 in 8 countries, including their home UK. It was certified gold in 4 countries and 2 times platinum in the US. Bear in mind that most record labels stop certification counts due to expense and it’s likely that the record has gone on to sell vastly more.
The immortality and legend of Machine Head is undisputed. When there is a list of the greatest rock and metal albums, this album is on there. When there is a list of the greatest songs, Smoke On The Water is on there. When there is a list of rocks’ greatest guitarists, Ritchie Blackmore is there. Deep Purple would, along with Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, form the “holy trinity” of rock music in the 1970’s. It is the influence of these three bands that shaped the face of music to come and the foundation upon what a lot of the stuff I listen to was built on. It was Deep Purple that influenced a lot of what I and we listen to, and specifically Machine Head that spun on the turntables of the next generation of musicians over and over again. There truly is nothing without this piece of rock history.
I was just talking about Robert Palmer a bit yesterday so I might as well have at it and go over his best-known song. While this song is well known there is still a fair bit of interesting background to go through on it.
Addicted To Love was the second single from Palmer’s late 1985 album Riptide. The album sold well but that isn’t radically important in comparison to the massive success of this song, which was the driving force behind the album sales. This was a US number one hit and would be Palmer’s only actual chart topping single, though he got very close a few other times. It also hit number one in Australia and charted highly in several other countries.
If you think the band was Robert Palmer with a handful of extremely attractive women dressed as mannequins, well, you would be wrong. A bunch of people worked on the album with Palmer, but he would have some assistance from old bandmates in a group called Power Station. From there on this song are Tony Thompson, Bernard Edwards and Andy Taylor, yes that Andy Taylor from Duran Duran.
And this song was originally conceived as something extra – it was supposed to be a duet with Chaka Khan and was recorded as such. Khan’s management demanded that her parts be removed from the song because she had a few big hits around that time and they didn’t want her being overexposed.
It’s true that Khan had a lot going on at the time, she’d lit the charts up with her own songs as well as a guest shot on Steve Winwood’s hit single Higher Love. But I’d say her management dropped the ball here, as I don’t see the problem with having yet another number one hit to your name.
Addicted To Love is pretty simple to figure out, the song’s theme is spelled out in the title. Being hooked on love is a real thing and songs about love are what move a lot of people to listen to music so it all comes together pretty well. “Love as a drug” is something I guess is established by science but I don’t know much about science so I’ll leave it at that. Coupled with the smooth pop rock of the music, this is a winning formula right out of the gate.
The song did fantastically but many remember the music video. Palmer appeared on stage with a group of models who are acting as his backing band. This got everyone’s attention and Palmer would use the “girls in black” for his next few videos. Also, everyone and their mother either spoofed or copied the gimmick for their own videos over the course of the next several years. This remains one of the most iconic videos of the 1980’s and was nominated for the MTV Video of the Year, but it lost out – that was the same year Dire Straits did the Money For Nothing video and there’s no beating that.
This would be the peak of Robert Palmer’s success, though he’d still be lingering toward the top of the singles charts for awhile. His 1988 song Simply Irresistible was another massive tune but was kept out of the number one slot by some song called Sweet Child O’ Mine. Palmer would go on touring, recording and reuniting briefly with his Power Station bandmates until 2003 when he died of a heart attack at 54.
This song was everywhere just as I was growing up and really starting to pay attention to music. Though to be honest one didn’t have to venture far to find this on a radio or TV. This is truly one of the definitive cuts of the ’80’s and a magnificent time capsule of that period.
Time to go all the way back into ancient history for the debut of one of rock’s most titanic bands. There’s plenty of blues, a bit of heavy metal and a whole lot of rock.
Led Zeppelin – self-titled
Released January 12, 1969 via Atlantic Records
My Favorite Tracks – Communication Breakdown, Good Times Bad Times, Dazed And Confused
I’ll sum this up as quickly as Page and company recorded the record – Jimmy Page had an obligation to tour with the Yardbirds but needed a band. He brought in Robert Plant, John Paul Jones and John Bonham to do it. After the tour the band self-financed a record and recorded this debut album in 36 hours of studio time. Page was the producer as well as guitarist. The band changed their name from The New Yardbirds to Led Zeppelin and got a major label deal with Atlantic Records that included creative freedom without even being heard.
Today’s album is 9 tracks with a 44 minute runtime. The album is a mix of originals and covers, and Jimmy Page’s long history with music copyright battles would begin on this very debut record.
Good Times Bad Times
The opener is a great introduction to Led Zeppelin – a noisy rocker that showcases bits of each band member at their strengths. Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones both leave some great embellishments through the song, pretty slick bass work from Jones especially. This is a general summation of the good and bad of relationships and it’s a pretty accurate look at things.
Babe I’m Gonna Leave You
This was originally written by Anne Bredon, Page and Plant were inspired to do the song based on a recording by Joan Baez. Zeppelin would not ply their trade in folk however, they doubled the length of the song and kicked up the ferocity several thousand times over. It shows that Zeppelin had more atmosphere to them and weren’t going to be a hard rock one-trick pony.
This one has an odd bit of trivia to it in regards to Anne Bredon’s proper royalties – Page was unaware of who originally wrote the song and Bredon was unaware of Zeppelin’s version for many years. Eventually she was properly credited and paid. This was more an honest mistake and a lot less messy than other “Who wrote this Zeppelin song?” fiascos.
You Shook Me
This is an early ’60’s blues tune written by Willie Dixon and originally performed by Muddy Waters. Again, Zeppelin take the original song and double its length and also run it through their own Zeppelin filter to distinguish it quite a bit from the original. It’s a pretty fun jam and Robert Plant really gets up to some vocal gymnastics here.
Dazed And Confused
This trippy jam was something Page did with the Yardbirds and wanted to bring to Zeppelin. Call it psychedelic, maybe, or perhaps acid rock, this song is a total journey. It keeps a fairly standard and slow pace for a bit, then starts jumping off the rails with crazy riffs and drum fills, and also Robert Plant sounding like he’s having an orgasm. This was a sterling showcase from Zeppelin and a song they would extend to a massive jam live, it also marks the band’s most-played live song.
This one has a contentious writing history – it was originally written by folk artist Jake Holmes, who opened for the Yardbirds in New York. Holmes would eventually have to sue Page in 2010 to get proper attribution. The case was settled out of court, so no specifics on how it played out.
Your Time Is Gonna Come
This is a bit of folk hard rock here with a jamming organ and acoustic guitar. The song has an uplifting and almost spiritual chorus, but is also admonishing a two-timing woman. It’s a study in contrasts to a degree. This song never got busted out much by the group but it’s a track I like quite a bit.
Black Mountain Side
This is a short instrumental piece that has the prior song bleeding into it. It’s a pretty standard acoustic thing up until a bit of Jimmy Page magic in a brief spot. It’s worth a listen.
Communication Breakdown
Here we get a very early example of an outright heavy metal song. Zeppelin’s blues-based rock would be a foundation on which heavy metal was built, but here they actually recorded the next step in the process. This brief song could also be considered a precursor to punk with its fast, static riffing along with all the damn noise Bonham is making. This song was an inspiration for future metal and punk bands, Iron Maiden and The Ramones among many others.
I Can’t Quit You Baby
This is another blues tune and another written by Willie Dixon. It was first performed by Otis Rush and Zeppelin’s interpretation is pretty faithful to the original. It does add a few minutes of space for Jimmy Page to get up to a few things on guitar but it’s otherwise a standard blues rendition.
How Many More Times
The album closes with a blues-based rocker that is an original band composition. This song is pretty jam packed with action for its 8 minutes. It gets a pretty long interlude before picking up the jam back into a whole other space and then revisiting the song’s beginning structure to close out on. The guitar tone here and song structure are a pretty good showcase of what Led Zeppelin would get up to on future albums.
Led Zeppelin was a pretty hot ticket right out of the gate. The album would hit number 10 on the US Billboard 200 and get number 6 on the UK Albums chart. It did pick up number 1 in Australia and Spain. Zeppelin would have a very successful US tour that kicked off just as the album launched and their interest in America and abroad grew quickly. All told the debut would be certified platinum 8 times in the US, 2 times in the UK and get a diamond certification in Canada. Nothing from Zeppelin has really stopped selling since they hit the scene, though of course exact sales figures from this era in music are difficult to track.
This one has always been one of my favorite Zeppelin albums. There’s something a bit different about this one before they really nailed down their winning formula. They’re credited with recording the perfect rock album, but there’s a charm to this one with its meandering through styles and clash of sounds.
I don’t see much point in getting into the legacy of Led Zeppelin – they’re one of rock’s most important bands. This was the start of their decade of domination and circumstances came together to make quite a debut.
The song pick this week is one of the more iconic audio and video clips from the early ’90’s. The song is fantastic and the video is totally unforgettable.
Sabotage was the first singe from the Beasties’ fourth album Ill Communication. The single was released in January of 1994, while the album was a few months behind in May. The single had a rather light performance conventionally, landing at 18 on the US Alternative Airplay chart and 19 on the UK Singles chart. The album was a smash success, claiming a Billboard number 1 and hitting 3 times platinum in the US.
The Beastie Boys were always a genre-bending outfit, combining elements of hip-hop, rock, metal, punk and whatever else around the house wasn’t bolted down. In the music environment of 1994, Sabotage simply qualified as a rap-rock song, nothing unusual to find on the radio or MTV at the time. Of course, the Beastie Boys were also one of the primary influences on the fusion of rap and rock, so no great surprise that another single of theirs would be right at home among a host of music they helped influence.
Lyrically, Sabotage is a venomous rant against the music industry and specifically a producer that had screwed the band over – except that nothing of the sort really happened. Adam “Ad-Rock” Horovitz relayed in the 2020 Beastie Boys Story documentary that they were simply spewing a fictional rant at Mario Caldato, the song and album’s producer. Caldato was not truly doing anything untoward, it was just a way that the Beasties came up with lyric ideas.
Sabotage is inseparable from its music video, which was what truly launched the song into immortality. The clip was helmed by director Spike Jonze and was styled as the opening credits to a 1970’s-era cop show. Each member of the band played a member of the police force, with Adam “MCA” Yauch getting two roles in the video.
The video is simply amazing. It does truly look like a cop show from the time period it represents and could easily be mistaken for a trailer to a real show. Just ask Beavis, who is probably still wondering where the real Sabotage show is. All of the Beasties look the part and the high-flying action is captured perfectly. MTV did originally censor portions of the video, including the parts with bodies flying out of a car and off of a bridge, though it was abundantly clear that dummies were used in the “stunts.” The YouTube clip above features the full uncensored video.
The video was in constant rotation on MTV and was the catalyst to the song being played over and over again for anyone tuning in throughout 1994. The video was nominated for five awards at the 1994 VMA’s but was infamously shut out, mostly losing to Aerosmith’s Cryin’ video. That should be considered a crime, honesty. In 2009 MTV created a new award centering around videos that should have previously won awards and Sabotage was the winner.
Sabotage and Ill Communication would help turn the Beastie Boys into total household names, something they had been well on their way toward anyway, but the ever-present MTV video and success of the album would be the point of no return. No doubt that Sabotage is one of the defining songs and videos of the time period.
Summer seems to be slipping away, both on the calendar and weather-wise, so it’s a good time to look back on the big Don Henley hit from 1984.
The Boys Of Summer is probably Henley’s most recognizable solo song, though not his biggest hit – that was Dirty Laundry. Today’s song was the lead single from Henley’s second solo album Building The Perfect Beast, which is a weird title since the album cover is just Don Henley. Not entirely sure what he’s getting at there but I was 7 at the time so it’s probably not for me to figure.
The song has quite a history involving a few music luminaries, the tale I’m telling today can be found in this 2022 article on loudersound.com.
This song was brought to Henley by Mike Campbell, known for his day job as the guitarist for Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Campbell had written up the music and offered the song to Tom. Petty turned it down because he didn’t feel it fit the mood of the album they were making, which was Southern Accents. That’s a fair assessment, though Petty would later regret not cutting the track after he heard Henley’s finished version.
Campbell was in luck though, as Southern Accents producer Jimmy Iovine knew Henley was recording a new record, so Iovine suggested Campbell pitch the song to Henley. Campbell and Henley hadn’t met before, but Henley was receptive to the track and cut it after writing lyrics and changing the song’s key. Fellow Heartbreakers Benmont Tench and Stan Lynch would contribute other songs to the Henley album as well.
The Boys Of Summer is a total ’80’s tune, far removed from the country-rock of Henley’s beloved Eagles. This song doesn’t even have real drums on it, Campbell programmed a machine to play those. There is guitar on this and also a generous helping of synthesizer. This is a nice, soft and atmospheric song that flows without issue and adds a moody air to the lyrical fare.
The theme of the song is very simple, it’s all about looking back at the past and longing for lost people and moments. The song and video make it all about a girl, and it’s often past lovers who bring out that longing the most. It’s fairly relatable stuff to anyone who’s at or around middle age, though the degree to which it’s relatable would vary from person to person. The third verse really brings the whole point home, it’s one that gets me nearly every time I hear the song even though I’ve heard it hundreds of times by now.
There’s also a bit to the title itself – the “boys of summer” was originally a phrase coined by Welsh poet Dylan Thomas. I have no clue what Thomas was on about in the poem and I don’t like poetry so I won’t dig for an answer. In 1972, author Roger Kahn used the phrase for the title of his book about the Brooklyn Dodgers, and since then “boys of summer” has usually been taken to mean a reference to baseball. It wasn’t the case for this song but the song and the sport have been intertwined at times.
The Boys Of Summer would go on to number 5 on the Billboard Hot 100 and chart significantly in many other countries. It is just off the number 3 high set by Henley with Dirty Laundry a few years prior. The video won huge accolades, taking home Video of the Year from the 1985 MTV VMA’s. As Henley quipped, he won the award for riding around in the back of a pickup.
The song would pop up again in conversation years later, as rock band The Ataris did a cover in 2003. This version was a hit, getting number 2 on the Billboard Modern Rock chart and 20 on the Hot 100. While it was a career moment for The Ataris, Henley was not really amused by their version, pretty much calling them out years later as a flash in the pan. Mike Campbell was far more complimentary of The Ataris and their cover effort.
Don Henley’s solo career would go on into the early 1990’s where he was derailed by lawsuits between he and his label Geffen Records. This would cause Henley to become very involved in issues concerning musicians and their rights, as well as an Eagles reunion. But he truly struck gold with this 1980’s hit, both in music and theme.
This week I’m on to one I’ve meant to talk about for a while – what today remains the most recent studio album from Mötley Crüe. This album occupies a weird spot in the catalog – it was a long-awaited comeback after 8 years of no albums and also released in the same year as 3 other long-awaited comeback albums from legacy rock acts. This one is equal parts gushed over and glossed over and divides fan opinion sharply at times.
Mötley Crüe – Saints Of Los Angeles
Released June 24, 2008 via Mötley Records
My Favorite Tracks – Saints Of Los Angeles, White Trash Circus, Goin’ Out Swingin’
Crüe had not released a full album since 2000’s New Tattoo, a record that did not feature drummer Tommy Lee. SOLA was the first full band action since 1997’s Generation Swine. The band had been on ice for a bit in the early 00’s but then were able to pull off a highly-publicized “reunion” despite only being gone for a few years. The tours with the original four were big hits and the band eventually got together to record this new album.
When I say “the band” got together, what I mean to say is that Nikki Sixx got together with Sixx AM guitarist DJ Ashba, Sixx AM singer James Michael and longtime Aerosmith collaborator Marti Frederiksen to make the new Mötley Crüe album. This grouping is credited with writing every song on the album, while Mick Mars has credits on 7 of the tracks. Neither Vince Neil or Tommy Lee appear in any songwriting capacity. I do presume that a few of the names in the songwriting list might also appear in audio form on the album to a degree, but again I don’t know.
As for who actually played on the record, well, there’s no telling. Recent news and gossip involving the ugly Mick Mars split indicates that a lot of people who aren’t on the Crüe roster have played on the albums. I don’t know who, when or where and I’m not going to bother guessing since the whole affair is pretty gross and hard to track the accuracy of.
The album has a lot of songs, with 13 tracks coming in at 44 minutes. The album has been reissued a handful of times since 2008 but there are no bonus tracks or deluxe versions to concern one’s self with, at least to my knowledge.
L.A.M.F.
This is an intro piece that sets the stage for the music to come. This is a pretty cool little deal, it highlights the issue of Los Angeles with scores of people flocking there to hit it big in acting or whatever, but 4 out of 100,000 actually making it. This sets a gritty tone early, Mötley Crüe will not simply be writing love letters to their beloved City of Angels.
Face Down In The Dirt
The first song proper is a simple yet very hard-hitting banger that covers the theme of not wanting to be a worker drone in society. It might seem a bit odd for a band who’d been successful for 27 years or so to write a song like this but the song works 100%, so there’s nothing really to argue with here.
What’s It Gonna Take
This one goes back to the band’s early days before they were successful, talking about living with girls and being rejected by record labels. It’s a pretty cool song and it’s nice to look back for a minute on those early days before Crüe broke out and helped set the table for 1980’s music.
Down At The Whiskey
This one is also an early nostalgia trip, obviously being about days at the famed Whiskey club in L.A. At this point the album is solid, though these sorts of “glory days” tracks are setting the table for an ok but unspectacular album. It could use a real kick in the ass to get it to the next level.
Saints Of Los Angeles
It didn’t take long, welcome to the next level.
The title track is a gritty, sleazy look at Los Angeles and the scene. This doesn’t “tell a story” so much as set the table for an experience in the seedier side of L.A. This song nails the feel of that and is just a massive, ass-kicking track. Gang vocals on the chorus are provided by a number of guests, including Jacoby Shaddix from Papa Roach, Josh Todd from Buckcherry, the aforementioned James Michael, and Chris Brown from Trapt. (Yes, the dude from Trapt is the same guy who turned Trapt’s social media account into his personal litter box a few years back)
Mutherfucker Of The Year
It’s a great song and also a new award at work. This one is all attitude, Mötley Crüe have been one of the bands with an actual reputation big and, at times vile enough to live up to the moniker. It is almost like a true theme song for them.
The Animal In Me
This one kicks the pace down a notch, it’s not a true ballad but it dances on that line a little bit. It’s a song about rough sex, kinky stuff, whatever. This one is pretty run of the mill, not my favorite by any stretch.
Welcome To The Machine
Here the pace ramps back up for a tune presumably about being a part of the record industry. It’s a bit ironic from Mötley Crüe, since they were one of a very few bands who were able to take control of their old album masters and gain rights almost no other artist has. But this song isn’t that deep, it’s just venting about the disposable nature of artists once they’re done, all just to make some shareholders rich.
Just Another Psycho
This one is a mid-paced affair that is simply about being nuts. This feels like a bit of a filler track but it’s listenable.
Chicks = Trouble
The fun factor ramps up big time here with this crazy song about a gold-digging woman spending the guy’s money. I’ve never had to deal with this problem because I’ve never really had money, but this song is really fun to play.
This Ain’t A Love Song
Another one that’s a whole lot of sleazy fun, it’s all about hooking up with a good time gal. This is the kind of song Crüe probably would have liked to write back in the ’80’s but it might not have gone over that well. 20 years later the climate was far more indifferent to this stuff so here it is, warts and all.
White Trash Circus
Heading toward the end and the hits keep coming. This is another sleazy song simply about how messed up the band has been over the years, and these guys have quite the stack of tales to tell about their misgivings and transgressions. One line mentions how they’ll never go away and that has held true, even when they themselves said they were going away.
Goin’ Out Swingin’
The closer is a total banger of a song. This hits hard and fast and doesn’t let up and is a great finale for the album. This one sets the band’s attitude of keeping at it until the bitter end, whenever that end might actually be.
Saints Of Los Angeles was an initial success for Mötley Crüe. The album hit the US Billboard charts at number 4 and sold 100,000 copies in its first week. It also charted in several other countries, pulling down a gold certification in Canada. Sales did not continue long after that first week, leading several in the band to become disillusioned by what they considered flat sales. Someone maybe should have briefed them on how album sales were going in general in 2008, I don’t know.
The album had a good reception from fans, though there is certainly divided opinion on it. Many did crow about the involvement of the Sixx AM members, feeling that this Mötley Crüe record is just a Sixx AM album. My take on it is this – if this is what the Crüe sounds like with DJ Ashba and James Michael involved, then write more Crüe albums with Ashba and Michael.
In the end this one holds its own pretty well in the Mötley Crüe catalog. I ranked it number 4 back when I did the Crüe album ranking. I feel like SOLA is the band truly realized with the darker and uncensored themes which they probably couldn’t have gotten away with in the ’80’s.
2008 was a year when rock heavyweights Guns N’ Roses, Metallica and AC/DC all released long-awaited “comeback” albums and it’s possible Mötley Crüe got a bit lost in the shuffle, but it’s also possible that this one did a better job. (Except for AC/DC, that album was excellent) We don’t know if there will actually be another Crüe album, they apparently don’t have a full album’s worth of material yet with new guitarist John 5. If this is the last actual full-length, well I feel like they got it right in the finale. If there is more material to come, I think there is a hard road to traverse to equal or better this one.
When Britpop gets brought up, it’s almost always a focus on the “Battle of Britpop” and the rivalry between Oasis and Blur. But when a “best songs of Britpop” list springs up, there’s often a whole other song at the top of it. If you are even halfway decent at guessing, you could probably figure that the song is Common People by the band Pulp.
Common People was the lead single from Pulp’s fifth album Different Class, which released toward the end of 1995 in the height of the Britpop phenomenon. The single was released 5 months in advance of the full-length.
While Pulp benefited from the wave of British alt-rock, they themselves were not newcomers to the scene – Pulp were formed in 1978 and were on the indie circuit until the 1990’s brought their form of music more into style. This was a case of a scene finding a band, rather than a band finding a scene. Nor was the success sudden – Pulp were a rising star already through the early part of the decade as alt-rock became the new dominant form of rock.
Common People is an upbeat, keyboard-driven tune, which has been the general territory of Pulp through the years. Its dance-ability differentiates it from the more rock-oriented “Britpop,” though Blur did have moments of electro-tourism in their music. Pulp’s simpler, “retro disco” themed take on songs worked extremely well here and caught the attention of music fans the world over.
The song’s theme is a big one – it addresses the issue of “slum tourism,” where people of means want to live in squalid conditions as some kind of thrill seeking thing. And while the song was dramatized a fair bit for effect, there is truth behind the opening lines. Common People was inspired by when singer Jarvis Cocker attended St. Martin’s College in 1988. He ran into a girl who was Greek and was studying art, and the girl indicated an interest in living “like common people.”
Cocker did add a bit to the song, chiefly that the girl was pursuing him, while in reality Cocker was pursuing the girl and she was not at all interested. There have also been attempts to nail down who the woman was and a few interesting possibilities came up, though nothing has definitely been said about the matter.
Common People does accomplish its mission in railing against the idea of class tourism. For a well-off person to “slum it” for a bit is really nothing – all that person has to do is pick up the phone and call, as in the case of the girl in the song, she can call her father and he can stop it all. For the common person, there is no one to call to get a lift out of the despair of being broke and having no prospects for a better future beyond a winning lottery ticket that never comes.
This song became a huge hit in the Britpop era of 1995, the single hit number 2 in the UK and sold over a million copies, it also propelled the album Different Class to also move a million each in the UK and on the continent. Common People has endured as a top shelf tune since its release, it is often found at or near the top of most “Best of Britpop” lists and NME magazine even voted it the best song of the 1990’s. Many bands from all across music have covered the song, one very notable rendition came from 2004 and the tandem of William Shatner and Ben Folds. The pair were joined by Joe Jackson for a pretty unique and crazy version of the song that got a lot of attention and did a lot to kick off Shatner’s quirky music career.
For Pulp, Common People would be their magnum opus, though the band held serve through the 1990’s as their sound was more diverse and proved able to navigate the sudden closure of the Britpop shop. Pulp have split and reconvened a few times through the 2000’s, including having just been on a reunion run this year. But no matter what they do now, their crown jewel of a song will remain immortal and speak to the lives of many all over who know all too well what’s it like to live like common people.
The Crooked Wanderer 