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Playlist #178 – Jangly Electric 12 String

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Happy Monday and happy Autumn, folks! Last week, Clyde challenged me to come up with a whole playlist of songs that feature an electric 12-string. At first, I just thought I’d post a link to the Byrds’ greatest hits and leave it at that, but I decided that might be too much of a cop-out even for me. So instead, I sat down and came up with ten songs that feature electric 12!

  1. The Byrds, “Turn! Turn! Turn!”: Honestly, any Byrds song could fill this spot. All of their best stuff features an electric 12 played by Roger McGuinn. This is the single most obvious song on this entire list.
  2. The Beatles, “A Hard Day’s Night”: George Harrison occasionally rocked an electric 12 on some Beatles songs, including this one and the always-awesome “And Your Bird Can Sing.” It was a close call between those two songs, but I went ahead and put this one on the list because of the electric 12 guitar solo.
  3. Led Zeppelin, “The Song Remains the Same”: For a dude who carried around a double-necked Gibson an awful lot, I don’t feel like Jimmy Page played much electric 12. He does on this track, though, and it’s great.
  4. Tom Petty, “I’ll Feel A Whole Lot Better”: Tom Petty is often associated with twelve string guitars, though I feel like he mostly stuck to acoustics for that. Not for this one, though. Also, the “12 string” part of “American Girl?” Not actually a 12 string, but two six-string guitars played by Petty and Mike Campbell in such sync that it just sounds like a 12 string. Kinda amazing.
  5. XTC, “Mayor of Simpleton”: Just a fantastic song from a fantastic band with a fantastic electric 12-string guitar part in it.
  6. Pink Floyd, “Fearless”: Apparently David Gilmour occasionally deigns to use an electric 12 on some songs, including this Floyd number from Meddle. Such a damn good album.
  7. The Hollies, “Bus Stop”: Another band that frequently used an electric 12. “Bus Stop” is possibly the greatest love story song from the British Invasion era.
  8. The Decemberists, “Yankee Bayonet”: Apparently Chris Funk, guitarist for the Decemberists, frequently uses the electric 12 for his stuff. Very cool.
  9. REM, “So. Central Rain”: That 12-string riff that starts the song off? So damn good.
  10. Gin Blossoms, “Til I Hear It From You”: When I think of ’90s jangle-pop, the Gin Blossoms are what I’m thinking of. This song is a perfect example of why.

Playlist #136

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Happy Monday, folks! It’s time for a brand-spankin’-new playlist for your ears’ enjoyment!

  1. Silverchair, “Tomorrow”: I never really listened to these guys back in the day. They were still in high school when they got signed. High school! Back in high school, I was worried about pimples and whether or not my girlfriend would leave me, not signing record contracts and going out on tour.
  2. Peter Gabriel, “Olive Tree”: When an artist takes twenty years to record an album, then releases it with at leas three different mixes, it’s usually a bad sign. This album is an exception to that sort of thinking. Gabriel has put together a beautiful, thoughtful, and touching set of songs. “Olive Tree” is a standout, but honestly I could have put virtually any song from this album in this spot and said the same thing. It’s just so damn good.
  3. Gorillaz, “Tomorrow Comes Today”: Heard it as an interstitial on NPR this morning, and now it won’t stop playing in my head. So you get to hear it, too.
  4. Drive-By Truckers, “Used To Be A Cop”: These folks are such good storytellers. You almost manage to feel sorry for an ex-cop who got kicked off the force for…reasons.
  5. XTC, “The Ballad Of Peter Pumpkinhead”: I have an unabashed, non-ironic love for XTC. They just made such fun, joyful music. It’s fantastic. This song is fantastic. Andy Partridge and Colin Moulding deserve better.
  6. Michael Penn, “No Myth”: This dude just always amazes me with his way with a melody or a lyric. He’s great. This song is peak ’80s but also great.
  7. Sting, “All This Time”: One of my favorite lines of all time came from this song: “Men go crazy in congregations/They only get better one by one.”
  8. Norah Jones, “The Long Way Home”: Who doesn’t love a Tom Waits cover? No one. No one doesn’t love a Tom Waits cover.
  9. Mark Knopfler, “We Can Get Wild”: This man just struggles to write a bad song, y’know? Yeah, they’re out there, but they’re few and far between. He just crafts with such a high level of skill and thought that even his bad songs have something interesting going on in them.
  10. James McMurtry, “Just Us Kids”: This guy tells fun stories about losers and folks who think they’re winning, even if only in their surface thoughts.

Playlist #134

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Happy Thanksgiving Week, everyone! Well, to everyone except those of you who don’t have to go to work this week. You guys suck.

  1. Iron & Wine, “About A Bruise”: Started listening to the live album Who Can See Forever this morning, and it’s pretty damn solid. The version of “About A Bruise” from that one is excellent, but so is the the original studio recording from Beast Epic, which I’ve included here.
  2. Elvis Costello, “Blame It On Cain”: We seem to forget, because he just seems like an amiable old fart nowadays, but Costello was a firebrand and a troublemaker back in the day, and this song is a good reminder of that.
  3. Dolly Parton, “Long As I Can See The Light (Featuring John Fogerty)”: Dolly finally released her long-threatened rock’n’roll album, Rockstar. It’s alright. There are some great tracks on there (like this one and her rendition of “Purple Rain”), though most of it feels too slick and over-produced for my tastes.
  4. Them, “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue”: Who doesn’t love a Bob Dylan cover first thing in the morning? Nazis, that’s who.
  5. Thom Yorke, “And It Rained All Night”: Thom Yorke’s first solo album, The Eraser, is weird. It’s all electronic squiggles and squelches and super-processed drum loops and for some reason I can’t stop listening to this particular track from it.
  6. Townes Van Zandt, “Racing In The Streets”: I always like hearing Townes interpret someone else’s song. This Bruce Springsteen cover is a good example of why.
  7. XTC, “Senses Working Overtime”: I just love the transitions between verse and chorus on this song.
  8. Leo Sayer, “More Than I Can Say”: 70s soft rock called, and it said, “Whoa, whoa, yay, yay.”
  9. Kenny Wayne Shepherd, “Everything Is Broken”: Two Dylan covers on one playlist? Is he mad? Doesn’t he know what horrors that might unleash?
  10. Kendrick Lamar, “DNA.”: This one is just on here to throw you off at the end of the playlist and get you ready for your racist uncle at Thanksgiving Dinner telling you everything was better before they came to the US.

Playlist #99: Elvis Has Left the Building…

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No, don’t worry, I haven’t lost my mind and finally made an all-Elvis playlist. No, this is a playlist all about rooms and buildings. It goes rather like this:

  1. John Hartford, “In Tall Buildings”: A rumination on giving up the wild, carefree days of youth to go work in tall buildings downtown. It’s sad and thoughtful and a little bit rueful.
  2. Counting Crows, “Perfect Blue Buildings”: “I wanna get me a little oblivion,” Adam Duritz sings. I think we could all use a bit of oblivion. Or at least a nice nap in a perfect blue building.
  3. Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young, “Our House”: Why are the two cats out in the yard? They’ll decimate the bird population! Is that what you want, guys? Huh?
  4. The Wallflowers, “I Am A Building”: Being the son of Bob Dylan must be hard. I’m pretty sure that’s why Jakob Dylan tried being a building for a while in the early ’00s.
  5. The Commodores, “Brick House”: She is mighty mighty.
  6. XTC, “No Thugs In Our House”: This seems like a reasonable thing to expect. Little Graham better be on his best damn behavior, that’s all I’m saying.
  7. The White Stripes, “Hotel Yorba”: Did you know you can still write a song that’s just G, C, and D? Jack White knows!
  8. Traveling Wilburys, “Poor House”: If there’s a song that’s more fun to play in a pickin’ circle, I don’t know it.
  9. Tom Petty, “The Apartment Song”: I, too, used to live in a two-room apartment where the neighbors were knocking on my walls. Tom Petty is the Everyman.
  10. Bruce Springsteen, “Mansion On A Hill”: However, I never lived in a mansion, hill-based or otherwise. So much for this man of the people!

Tune in next week, when I’ll do something completely different for Playlist #100!

Playlist #88

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Happy New Year! In addition to the playlist this week, I have CD’s for sale! That’s right, I put together the EP that I released last January and the two singles I released over the course of the year. For $10, you can have a copy of it all for yourself! Email me at crookedhalo42 [at] gmail dot com and we can set it all up.

And now, on with the playlist!

  1. The English Beat, “Save It For Later”: Who doesn’t love some second-wave ska? I know I do.
  2. Loreena McKennitt, “The Mummer’s Dance”: Celtic electronica? In this economy?
  3. Jason Isbell & Elizabeth Cook, “Pancho & Lefty”: Gotta love a Jason Isbell cover of a Townes Van Zandt song.
  4. Fleetwood Mac, “Little Lies”: Only recently discovered that this song was a Fleetwood Mac song.
  5. America, “Ventura Highway”: I just want to drive along the coast with this song cranked way up.
  6. XTC, “Dear God”: A song that demands God explain why bad things happen to good people.
  7. Wilco, “Say You Miss Me”: The yearning and pleading in this song get me every time.
  8. Van Morrison, “I Love You”: I’ve had a difficult time listening to Van Morrison the past few years. His weird anti-vaccine views and his persecution complex have kinda gotten on my nerves. But this song is still tremendously sweet.
  9. Tom Waits, “Jockey Full Of Bourbon”: I’m not really sure what good a jockey full of bourbon would do, unless this is really a song about peeing ’cause you had too much bourbon.
  10. Semisonic, “Never You Mind”: I love this song for nothing else if not the reference to Spock’s brain.

Playlist #51

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Happy Tax Day, America! Happy regular ol’ Monday after Easter! Happy, um, April 18th, everyone else? Don’t forget to join my Patreon, where I’m making new music every month for your listening enjoyment (actual amount of enjoyment may vary. Please see your doctor if you receive too much enjoyment from listening to my music)! Anyway, here’s this week’s playlist.

  1. The Beatles, “Taxman”: Like I wasn’t gonna do this today. “My advice to those who die/Declare the pennies on your eyes.”
  2. Bruce Cockburn, “Lovers In A Dangerous Time”: Only started listening to him this morning, but the line, “Nothing worth having comes without some kind of fight/You gotta kick in the darkness till it bleeds daylight” is just one of the all-time best.
  3. The Ink Spots, “Java Jive”: Like most music from the first half of the 20th century, my exposure to this song was through a cartoon when I was a small child. Little Lulu, I think?
  4. Lizzo, “About Damn Time”: Here comes Lizzo with another summer jam. God, where did she find that bass player? That bassline slaps.
  5. Ten Years After, “I’d Love To Change The World”: With a chorus that literally says, “I’d love to change the world/But I don’t know what to do/So I’ll leave it up to you,” this is the quintessential Boomer song. “Eh, I’d love to do something about it, but I’m not gonna. Tough luck, future!”
  6. XTC, “Across This Antheap”: Another song with so many good lines just tossed off all casual-like. And that trumpet? So good.
  7. The Wallflowers, “Bleeders”: Included simply because of the way that organ sounds at the very beginning of the song.
  8. Ben E. King, “Stand By Me”: You know what always aggravates me about the John Lennon cover of this song? It adds absolutely nothing to it. You might as well just go back and listen to the Ben E. King version instead. Which is why this version is on the playlist.
  9. Otis Redding, “That’s How Strong My Love Is”: Listening to this song, I’m reminded of how very much in-touch with that ’60s R&B Stax sound CCR (or really, John Fogerty) was. This coulda been a CCR song. Or any CCR song coulda been an Otis Redding song.
  10. Josh Ritter, “Old Black Magic”: This song just chugs along and gets downright fiery towards the end.

Playlist #43: Presidents’ Day

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Happy Presidents’ Day, ‘Murica! Here’s some executive branch love in aural form. And hey, don’t forget I’ve got a Patreon, where February’s song is about to drop!

  1. They Might Be Giants, “James K. Polk”: Educational, entertaining, and a banger. Yup, it’s a TMBG song, alright.
  2. The Presidents of the United States of America, “Lump”: I get exhausted just typing out the name of the band. Thank goodness the song title is so short.
  3. Hamilton, “History Has Its Eyes On You”: The only song from the show I can play on the guitar, and a great vocal delivery from Christopher Jackson.
  4. Mark Knopfler, “Don’t Crash The Ambulance”: A changing of the guard. A handing over of the keys to the kingdom. And a brief explanation of just how things work around here.
  5. The National, “Mr. November”: “I was carried in the arms of cheerleaders.”
  6. Billy Bragg & Wilco, “Jesus Christ For President”: We could do worse, honestly.
  7. Molly Lewis, “Our American Cousin”: A three-part look at Mr. Lincoln’s infamous trip to the theatre. Funny and dark and heartbreaking.
  8. XTC, “Here Comes President Kill Again”: The ’80s? Subtle? No.
  9. Drive-By Truckers, “The President’s Penis Is Missing”: A damn tragedy, to be sure.
  10. Over The Rhine, “If A Song Could Be President”: Again, we could do worse. And I have a whole murderer’s row of talent in mind for the Cabinet.

Playlist #4

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The end of the school year is fast approaching. Here’s some songs to ride out this week:

1. The Pixies, “Where Is My Mind”: The Wife loves the Pixies. I’m pretty okay with them most of the time.

2. Toad the Wet Sprocket, “Inside”: Most ridiculous name for a band ever? It’s definitely in the top ten. Awesome song? Also definitely.

3. 2Pac, “Keep Ya Head Up”: Uplifting rap about respect for women. A good ‘un.

4. XTC, “Stupidly Happy”: It’s a goofy song that I just love to pieces.

5. William Elliott Whitmore, “Diggin’ My Grave”: This guy does more with a banjo and a stomp box than most bands do with a full ensemble. He also sounds like he’s had a few packs of cigarettes too many.

6. Traffic, “The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys”: If there’s a stinker on the list this week, it’s probably this song. It’s too long and pretty repetitive. The only reason I put it on is because I read that one of the Mussel Shoals Rhythm Section (who play on the album this is from) passed away this weekend.

7. Tom Waits,”Sixteen Shells from a Thirty-Ought Six”: If there’s a more sinister line than “I’m gonna whittle you into kindlin’,” I don’t think I’ve heard it.

8. Tom Lehrer, “Poisoning Pigeons in the Park”: First heard it many years ago on the Dr. Demento Show, and the tune holds up. Can’t help giggling every time I get to the line, “And maybe we’ll do in a squirrel or two.”

9. Tennessee Ernie Ford, “Sixteen Tons”: Sure, it’s predominantly about how awful the blue collar worker’s life is, but there’s also that verse about how you shouldn’t mess with him because he’ll kill you. And that’s pretty baller.

10. Filter, “Take a Picture”: For about two months during my freshman year of college, I was completely obsessed with this song. I even bought the CD that it was on (this is what we had to do back before you could just download whatever songs you wanted onto your phone, back in the distant 1990s). It was…not at all like the rest of the album.