MORE CHRISTMAS SONGS

There are so many good Christmas songs that would make good podcasts that I thought I'd write about a few more.  One that I think would be interesting is White Christmas. I know I mentioned it briefly last week but what I didn't know until a few days ago is that Irving Berlin, who wrote the song, was beset with tragedies. For one, his first wife contracted pneumonia during their honeymoon and died as a result. Another horrible tragedy is that his infant son, Irving Berlin Jr, from his second wife, died on Christmas day. That was something that affected him the rest of his life.

Another song could come from the album A Christmas Gift For You from Phil Spector. It is now considered a classic Christmas album. Sleigh Ride by The Ronettes is probably the most popular of the songs. When the album first came out it was a flop. It had the misfortune of being released on November 22, 1963, which is the day John F Kennedy was shot. I doubt Phil Spector would do the interview, although you never know. 

One last song that I think would make a particularly good podcast is I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Clause written by Jimmy Boyd. I had never heard of Jimmy Boyd, but apparently he was some kind of a child prodigy. He also has a great story. He wrote the song when he was a month shy of thirteen years old. It became an instant hit that sold two and a half million records in its first week. That was a big deal in the early fifties.  The most interesting part of the story is that the Catholic Church in Boston banned the record because it mixed sex with Christmas. According to news stories, Jimmy Boyd went to the Archdiocese in Boston and explained what the song was all about. The Catholic Church lifted the ban the very next year. I guess it took them that long to figure it out.

Like I said last week, I could go on. I was hoping to say that I have to do some Christmas wrapping. No such luck. Still need to do some shopping. I think i'm going to start using the Ringo hello and goodbye. Peace and love.

CHRISTMAS SONGS

Christmas music is a cottage industry. Almost everyone who is anyone has at least a Christmas song out, or even a whole album. And even a lot of people who no one ever heard of, have Christmas songs that have become huge hits. The good thing about Christmas songs is that they can have a long shelf life. I am certain that many of these songs would make good podcasts. For instance, Elmo and Patsy recorded Grandma got run over by a Reindeer in 1979 for forty thousand dollars. It is still popular during the holidays and has made Elmo a multi millionaire. It would be nice to interview him but he might be tough to get, especially during the holidays. He does over a hundred radio interviews and countless TV programs as well.

According to CNN, the biggest selling Christmas album of all time is the Elvis Presley Christmas Album, with over nine million albums sold. One of the songs on the album is the Irving Berlin classic White Christmas, which happens to be the number one Christmas song of all time. Upon hearing the Elvis Presley version of his song, Irving Berlin called radio stations to have the song and the whole album banned from the radio. Fortunately, almost everyone ignored Irving. Blue Christmas is the most popular song on the album and is the number two Christmas song of all time. Elvis supposedly did not want to record “Blue Christmas.” He was forced to record it by the producer, so he tried to do a version that was so bad that nobody would like it. Boy, was he wrong. Someone at work, who shall remain nameless, had the song on for almost the whole day one year. I was sick of it that day. It is, however, a terrific Christmas song.

Another song that might make a good podcast is Little Drummer Boy, which has been around since 1941. I didn't even know what the song was about until I read the lyrics. I guess I must've kept my focus on the pa rum pum pum pum. It is about a little boy who goes to see Jesus in his manger. He is very poor and does not have any gifts to bring to the newborn King. So he asks the Virgin Mary if he can play the drums for Jesus. She said yes, so the little boy played the drums and Jesus smiled at him. One of the lyrics to the song is “The ox and the lamb kept time.” What was going on on that manger? And how were they keeping time? With their feet? It is, however, a terrific song and one of my favorite versions is the unlikely pairing of Bing Crosby and David Bowie. It was recorded on September 11, 1977. David supposedly did it because his mother liked Bing. David starts out the scene on the TV program "Bing Crosby's Merrie Olde Christmas" asking Bing as he opens the door. “Hello...are you the new butler?” Bing laughs and replies, “Well, it's been a long time since I've been the new anything.” Bing was right. He died a month after that. Bowie hated the song and did not want to play it, so Ian Frazier, Larry Grossman and Buzz Kohan wrote the Peace On Earth part for David to sing.

Anyway, I could go on and on about the stories of Christmas songs but I gotta do some shopping. I will leave you with some lyrics to the Peace On Earth part of the song.

“Peace on earth, can it be
Years from now, perhaps we'll see.”

Let's just hope it's sooner than that.

JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE AND "CRY ME A RIVER"

After doing a podcast on Justin Timberlake's Cry Me a River, I will admit something about him. And it's rather embarrassing, if you will. I'm starting to like the guy. His music blows, but he's a good guy. Just kidding, his music is fine. And granted, I didn't really hate him before. I knew of him and sort of dismissed him and all his boy band friends. I'm basically a Rock 'n' Roller.

Having said that, I still don't consider myself a "fan". The only songs I've bought from him are Cry Me a River and Bye Bye Bye from NSYNC cause I had to for the podcast. Even having to check out the book Justin: The Unauthorized Biography from the library to do research was embarrassing. I almost felt compelled to tell the librarian that it was for my son who was with me. But he's only four. And much more into Zack and Cody. It actually turned out to be a decent book and I learned a few things.

For one, he lost on Star Search when he was a kid and that actually turned out to be a good thing. Figure that one out. If anything, that's an excellent life lesson to learn. Losing just might turn out to be one of the best things that ever happens to you. In Justin Timberlake's case, losing gave him the opportunity to go on the Mickey Mouse Club, where he met Christina Aguilera and JC, which he later recruited for NSYNC. He also met Britney Spears, who turned out to be his future girlfriend and the inspiration for his song "Cry Me A River." So in essence, losing a competition turned out to be a great career move.

Matt did the podcast and we interviewed Jessica, the self described greatest Justin fan. Her website is called World of Justin and is the number one Justin website. The good thing about the website is that, as far as I can tell, she updates almost every day. When I checked out the site to do this blog entry sometime ago, Jessica had written about Justin being snubbed again on People magazine's Sexiest Man issue. The entry was actually pretty funny and she wrote in her own voice, which is not an easy thing to do. I got to know her voice because I edited the podcast and had to hear the interview way to many times.

The thing that hooked me about doing a podcast for Cry Me a River was that before Justin could appear on the Grammy Awards, where he was nominated, he had to apologize for exposing Janet Jackson's breast during the Super Bowl half-time show. So he apologized while accepting his Best Male Pop Vocal Performance for "Cry Me a River." That was pretty amazing to me. Apologizing while receiving an award is something you don't see very often. That's gotta be a first.

One other thing that made me do the podcast is that the song is about Britney. As Jessica put it when Matt asked her what the song was about. I wasn't paying too much attention when Justin and Britney were an item, but they must've been a cute couple. It's too bad Britney hooked up with Kevin Federline sometime later because things started to deteriorate at that point.

Cry me a River is a pretty good song which is well produced by the renown record producer Timbaland. I wouldn't be surprised if Justin Timberlake has a long and successful recording career.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

We at Story of Songs wish everyone a safe and Happy Thanksgiving.

ARLO GUTHRIE, ALICE'S RESTAURANT AND THANKSGIVING DAY

There aren't too many Thanksgiving Day songs. In fact, I can't think of any. I'm sure there are some out there, just no hits, I suppose. When I googled Thanksgiving Day songs, I found some sites. There is actually a Thanksgiving Day song by Adam Sandler which I had forgotten about and is, well, Adam Sandler. The site, Love to Learn Place had My Country Tis of Thee as one of their songs. It's a good song and I guess it could be considered a Thanksgiving Day song, if we knew what My Country Tis of Thee meant.

There is one song, however, that has become a Thanksgiving Day song by chance, and that is Arlo Guthrie's Alice's Restaurant Massacree. Supposedly, some radio stations play the whole thing on Thanksgiving Day. It's eighteen minutes long, so don't look for it on a Pop Contemporary Hit radio station. Maybe try the local public radio station.

It started out as a song opposed to the Vietnam War. It's basically a song about a guy who gets drafted into the Army but is found unfit to serve military duty because he got arrested for dumping trash on Thanksgiving Day when the dump was closed.

The song goes on to describe how our hero was sent to the Group W bench which is where the Army placed all the undesirables. When the undesirables found out that he was in Group W for littering, they all moved away from him. When he added "and creating a nuisance," they all moved back toward him. It's actually a pretty amusing song based on real events.

There really was an Alice who had a restaurant and there really was an Obie who arrested Arlo for littering. And Arlo really did not go to the Army because he was convicted of littering. The song also became the inspiration for a movie called by the same name and starred Arlo Guthrie as himself.

Arlo Guthrie is a singer-songwriter who played in the 60's Woodstock festival. He is also the son of another singer-songwriter. That would be the legendary folk artist Woody Guthrie, who is known for This Land is Your Land. Woody supposedly wrote it because he didn't like the song God Bless America. A movie was made about his life called Bound for Glory, which won two Oscars. That's actually pretty impressive that both the father and son had a movie made about their life.

Woody is also known as an inspiration to Bob Dylan. The story goes that Bob Dylan was in awe of Woody Guthrie and went to see him on his death bed in 1961. Pretty good story except that Woody didn't die till 1967. It's sort of amusing until you find out that Woody spent a lot of his later years in a State hospital in Brooklyn where he was being treated for Huntington's disease.

NPR's All Things Considered did a story on Alice's Restaurant which I highly recommend. Better yet, check out the whole story on the link right here(try the second clip). It's well worth your time. Just put it on and go about your chores while you listen. Oh yeah, and the song is pretty good too.

STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN BY LED ZEPPELIN

Stairway To Heaven is a genuine masterpiece. It starts out with one of the most famous intros ever. It can even be argued that it's even more famous than Beethoven's Fifth. Although it is tough to beat a four note intro. After the intro the song builds slowly, then the bridge comes along. I think. I don't know what a bridge is, but I want to sound like I know something. Sometimes, though, even Led Zeppelin can't find that confounded bridge. The guitar solo eventually comes on, which brings on the crescendo. The song finally comes to a finish as slowly as it began.

I rarely listen to it when it comes on the radio. For one, you have to be in the mood for it. And two, you have to have the time for it as well. I don't think I will ever enjoy the song as much as when I first listened to it when I was young. Back then I actually had time to listen to it. I sat in front of the speakers and read along with the lyrics to the song. Who has time for that now. While doing the research for the podcast I found out it's eight minutes two seconds long. Eight minutes two seconds is a lot different now than it was back then. Time truly is relative.

I checked out the Led Zeppelin websites and came upon an interesting one. It is called enzepplopedia.com and Frank Reddon is the owner. He has been writing three Led Zeppelin books. He's been at it for over twelve years. Along with that, he plays a number of instruments and runs marathons. That's pretty amazing if you ask me. He was excited about being interviewed and thought that our idea for the website and podcast was a very good one. Frank was gracious enough to send me his book Sonic Boom: The Impact of Led Zeppelin Vol 1, which I appreciate immensely.

The podcast came out really well. It was my first international phone call. I wasn't even sure that Skype went to Canada without an international fee. Fortunately, it doesn't. Skype is great. It was tough editing the podcast, though, because Frank loves Led Zeppelin and he has a lot to say. The clips on the podcast are interesting as well. One of them is the infamous song played backwards that supposedly sings about the Devil. We capitalize Devil, right? I don't want to hurt his feelings. The other clip is about the guitar intro from the band Spirit that sounds a lot like the guitar intro to Stairway to Heaven. They supposedly toured together as well.

Another interesting fact I found is that people actually do covers of Stairway To Heaven. That makes no sense to me. Some songs don't need covers and Stairway to Heaven is one of them. The best thing you can say is that at least they are not on the list of worse cover songs ever. That honor goes to Bob Dylan playing the Van Morrison song And It Stoned Me. In actuality, Dolly Parton's version of Stairway To Heaven was named by people in the comments section of the list. So you be the judge.

Stairway To Heaven will be around for a long time. Just recall the excitement the band caused when they reunited for one concert in 2007 in London. ABC News reported that an amazing twenty million people got on the Internet lottery for 18,000 concert tickets. I suppose like Frank said in the interview, Led Zeppelin has achieved one of its goals, which is to create a lasting piece of work.

BORN IN THE USA AND CHARLES R CROSS

Once I felt that Dave Marsh might not do the interview, I tried to find someone else to do Born To Run. I had already written the questions, so I figured I might as well do it. Born to Run is the last interview I'll do where I write the questions before the interview has been booked. Won't be doing that again.

I found a Bruce Springsteen fan magazine called Backstreets. It's been around since 1980 and was started by a fan from Seattle who printed 10,000 four page leaflets and handed them out free at a Springsteen concert. Unfortunately, most of them winded up on the floor. Nowadays, that first issue is worth over a hundred dollars. From those meager beginnings, Charles R Cross and his staff, developed a fanzine widely regarded as one of the best fanzines around.

I emailed Charles from Backstreets about doing the interview and told him how I admired the work that had been done to elevate the magazine to what it is today. That is what I aspire to do on my project. I also said that I would like to interview him for the Bruce song Born in the USA. I backed out at the very last moment about asking him for Born to Run.

He emailed me back for more information, which I sent and then replied that Born in the USA does not have as interesting a story as other Bruce songs. I agreed and told him that I had already penciled in Dave Marsh for Born to Run. And that I was holding out for Dave to do the interview. Charles then replied that it might not be such a good idea to have another Springsteen podcast when I have so few podcasts to begin with. I felt that way but had emailed Charles anyway about the other Bruce song. I guess I was drawn to the Backstreets story. It turned out to be a good idea anyway because Charles has also written books on Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain. They both have a connection to Seattle.

He told me about writing those books so I mentioned that a Jimi Hendrix song could make a good podcast and that I liked either Purple Haze or All Along the Watchtower. But that Watchtower seemed more interesting because of the Bob Dylan connection and the amazing transformation the song did at the hands of Jimi Hendrix.

Charles went on to say that there are some good stories in his book, Room Full of Mirrors about Jimi's obsession with Dylan. It made me feel good about the decision of which song to pick for podcasts and that I kind of know what I'm doing.

So all in all it was a good correspondence I had with Charles even though I never emailed him back. We left off with him letting me know that he was working on a new book and that we should resume our connection in April. I agreed and told him that hopefully our website would be up and running by then. It is not so I did not approach him again. I'm embarrassed because the website's not up yet.

Hopefully, I have not tarnished the interest Charles had for being interviewed by us. I will contact him again one of these days. Hopefully sooner rather than later.