Part one is only brief. Later editions will contain 10-50 reviews at a time.
#460.
Don McLean, 'Crying'
1984.
The least-known of Canadian crooner McLean's 'big three' is a cover of the timeless large-spectacled one known as Roy Orbison. For half of its duration it is doggedly faithful to the original, a forlorn lament in which the song's protagonist leaks discharge from his eyes without cessation. McLean later goes off-piste a little with swelling strings and a goofily-overblown falsetto remniscent of the excellent and goofily-overblown songs of Robin Gibb, whom I always felt was held back by his be-bearded siblings in the Brothers Gibb, or 'Bee Gees'. There is simply not enough palpable vocal quivering in music.
(6)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpQmrUxwiF8
#1009.
Tony Christie ft. Peter Kay, '(Is This The Way To) Amarillo?'
2005.
This is a joyful and sweet song. Christie was an excellent pop tenor of his era, which was much before the 2005 revival of this song for the UK charity Comic Relief. What it is not, however, is a comedy or 'novelty' song. This is the Peter Kay effect. His face, mugging along with various British celebrities, in accompaniment with this song has ensured an enduring legacy as novelty. Britain is now a visual culture, so the opening bars recall Kay (who does not perform on the record, only its promotional clip) and his gurning more than it does any anticipation of Christie's versatile performace. It seems churlish to quibble when this simple equation has raised money to aid domestic and internation charity projects though.
(4)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqLLDZvbG-U
#1180.
Olly Murs, 'Dance With Me Tonight'
2011.
This desequencing of the chronology does not allow me to talk about The Mark Ronson Effect with adequate recourse to its creeping malignancy over prior years. Essentially it is a re-tooling of the signifiers of Motown and soul music: energetic mid-tempos, sharp suits, tight structures, & universal-sounding lyrics – but with none of the substance: the history of societal oppression and the performers who spent years paying dues. The digitisation of this music led to it becoming ersatz and reduceable to a mere pop trope that is audio shorthand 'party time'.
Mr. Murs appeared on the UK star-search format 'X Factor'. His 'thing' was that he was a local everyman with a winning smile and cheerily awful dance. His role in this song is practically incidental.
(3)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3EG4olrFjY&ob
#1154
Bruno Mars, 'Grenade'
2011.
This song is about a man with the biggest martyr complex possible. In the opening verse he establishes that the dramatic subject, an errant female companion, has left. The signs were there from the start. The first time they kissed, her eyes were open. "Why were they open?!" asks Mars, not unreasonably, though perhaps not establishing why obstructed ocular organisms equate with a more sincere kiss. From this low start, Mars establishes a lengthy list of things that he would do for this girl: e.g. catch the titular grenade, take a bullet through the brain, jump in front of a train - and in a chilling denouement to this chorus - she will NOT do the same.
Well, Bruno, I am guessing that is because she is a fairly reasonable person. It seems that she simply was not that into you in the first instance. It wouldn't be remiss to presume that from your desire to pursue high levels of risk that you were probably a bit high pressure to begin with, so she strung you along a bit, hoping that you would go on tour so she could move on with her life. Mars' piety is accompanied by a very generic formulaic hi-gloss pop gronk and his superlative proclaimations are made in a shrill and unappealing whinny.
(3)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SR6iYWJxHqs&ob
#72
Vic Damone, 'On The Street Where You Live'
1958
Who among us has not had that stomach full of butterflies in the knowledge that the object of our affections is even only POSSIBLY nearby? It is a strange and abstract feeling and often its representation in art falls short. "And oh! The towering feeling / just to know somehow you are near / the overpowering feeling / that any second you may suddenly appear!" The temptation to read this as a stalker's manifesto must be resisted as Damone manages to simultaneously convey the sense of wonder and sensational overload at the THOUGHT of this love and the clumsy dry-mouthed reality of the love's appearance. This is a daffy little number that calls to mind a young Scott Walker somehow transplanted into the fantasy segment of Mary Poppins.
(7)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNwlc8F7wOQ
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