"Alice's Restaurant" ("Shrink, I want to kill.")And let me add that back in the 60s I saw one -- and only one -- of these songs performed by the original artist. See if you can guess which.
"The Year 2525" ("Everything you think, do, or say/Is in the pill you took today")
"MacArthur Park" ("In love's hot, fevered iron/Like a striped pair of pants")
"In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida" ("In-a-gadda-da-vida, honey,/Don’t you know that I love you?")
Which is the most fun to hear again today? Oh, they all were deliciously fun!
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29 comments:
Will you please write a 500-word essay on the meaning of MacArthur Park's lyrics? Is it really about divorce, or merely bad pastry caretaking?
I'm thinking Butterfly.
Loved 2525!
It's tough to beat satellite radio and the oldies. I have Sirius and find myself listening to the 60's Vibrations channel quite often. The channel should only get better with the addition of Cousin Brucie at the end of this month!
I'm gonna guess Arlo.
Iron Butterfly, of course. Not to be bragging or anything, but I saw Tina Turner in her prime doing Proud Mary when she was with Ike, and I'm wagging my tongue at everyone daring them to beat that.
The Iron Butterfly song probably as the lyrics were irrelevant and you could take a girl to the conceert and maybe get lucky.
Our next hymn is "In the Garden of Eden," by I. Ron Butterfly.
Hmm. This sounds suspiciously like rock and/or roll!
For me, it was Iron Butterfly, at Mile High Stadium in Denver. Live, that song went on forever.
Scipio: That's soooooooooo heavy!
Shane,
By 1980, all the good music was over.
If only all the bad music from before 1980 would be over.
what about "Frankenstein" from Edgar and Johnny Winter?
or "Persecution Smith" or "Heavy Music" from Bob Seger?
how's about "We Love You" from the Rolling Stones (with backup vocals from John and Paul)?
or "They're coming to take me away?" from Napoleon XIV?
just suggestions...
"They're coming to take me away?" from Napoleon XIV?
Ahhh, memories. And the flip side of the 45 was the song in reverse.
The last three songs would have to be included in any collection of "The Worst of the 60s," especially "The Year 2525" and "MacArthur Park," which I loathed back then and still can't imagine listening to beyond the first three bars. (About as fast as I could switch stations.)
"Alice's Restaurant," which you're correct in saying was, like the other three entrants on your list, overdone in a way, was nonetheless fun, artful protest.
"In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida" was pretty much dope music. I always threaten our ensemble at church that we're going to include it in the worship celebration some Sunday, with me using the altar like a bongo on which I play the infamous drum solo.
I'm guessing you saw "The Year 2525" in concert.
I remember was in high school when it came out and a classmate said to me how much he liked it. "Are you kidding?" I asked him. "Those are the dumbest lyrics ever." "Yeah," he said, "but they make you think." "How," I asked, "can dumb lyrics make you think...oh, never mind." If I never hear that song again, it'll be fine with me.
To me, "In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida" is the kind of song a serial killer would listen to as he is doing his deeds. I have to thank the film "Manhunter" for that thought.
'"In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida" was pretty much dope music.'
I think that describes it pretty well. But at the time, it would have been pretty hard not to be stoned at one of their live concerts from the contact high from all the weed being smoked.
You are right though, that objectively, it is pretty stupid.
I concede to Jim Lindgren - I should probably wash and wax the car of anyone who saw Hendrix 3 times just to be in the vacinity of that person. As far as raw energy and sexuality goes, Tina still has 'em all beat though.....
LOL at Blues Magoos --- Ann didn't you know this was going to turn into a bunch of 50-somethings recounting their concert attendances?
If I knew where you were in the 60's I might guess differently, but I'm say Arlo (cuz you seem like you'd have been more of a "coffee house" type).
Wave Maker: Don't you know the whole vision of the Althouse blog is to make it seem incredibly cool to be in your 50s?
Hey, Lindgren is winning this comments section! I need to list my best concerts ever and try to beat him, but I never saw Hendrix even once, so I should give up.
Jefferson Airplane and the almost mystical voice of Grace Slick singing White Rabbit, drawing one back to the center, Haight-Ashbury, luring and powerful - oh God! reefer madness pulls at me again, I feel my hair down on the middle of my back, I want to just walk away from everything and hit the road again and not give a damn about taxes and war and inflation and the neighbor's damn barking dog, I want to be able to spit on my portfolio, corrupted with the greed of insecurity and self-doubts, to be able to accept everybody and everything on face value once more. I'm afraid to buy that tune and its been a good year or so since I've heard it, I can't be trusted around it, my wife got a very subtle but concerned look on her face the last time I listend to it - a woman's instincts, seldom wrong....
Dean: I heard "They're Coming to Take Me Away" on the 60s channel just this week.
- not only is it incredibly cool to be in the 50s age bracket, we have significant political and financial clout as well, and we don't have to abide any sass from youngsters - that counts for something, don't it?
Those in the '50's: Not officially Geezerized yet, but we don't get all Emo over Coldplay...
Ann, you are a market trailblazer...
Ahhh MacArthur Park!! That brings back some good memories...
One of the few things I ever enjoyed about high school was being in the band. From time to time we stood in for the UW Madison band at basketball and hockey games when they were playing out of town. Our Band Director ws one of Mike Leckrones' assistants so we got a lot of their music and Mac Park was one of the best arrangements.
The most fun episode was when we were playing at the Fieldhouse and About halfway thru the game the UW folks returned from their out of town gig and we all had a jam session during and after the game that about brought down the building. Talk about some phenominal jamming.
Those were the days...
I'm not a boomer, but I'm old enough to remember the song "One Tin Soldier." I think of it as pretty quintessentially 60s and overdone both. It's pretty fun, too. If making you want to projectile vomit is fun.
As far as seeing someone in their prime, I saw Elton John in 1976. I don't even recognize the lounge act he's had for the past decade.
But I think the most enjoyable acts I've seen over the past decade have been at The Bridge School Benefit that Neil Young puts on each year. The performances are (almost) all acoustic, which is fun to see someone totally out of their element and how they respond.
Performances that I can remember off the top of my head that I really enjoyed:
David Bowie, grinning like a kid in the candy store, loving the acoustic performance.
Patti Smith ad libbing verses to "Helpless" at the group performace at the end of a show.
Metallica acoustic. I still can't wrap my head around it.
Ditto Smashing Pumpkins, with Marilyn Manson.
Pete Townshend as a surprise guest, doing a small set solo (with interesting patter in between songs, talking about how he came to write several of them).
Lou Reed... damn, the list is getting longer the more I think about it...
As the resident jazz musician here, I guess I'm fortunate enough to be able to enjoy MacArthur Park without the lyrics; Maynard Ferguson does a fine instrumental version of it.
However, I have been known to attend rock shows every now and then, and many of my teenaged music students become quite jealous when they find out that I saw Nirvana live.
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