Tracks
"On The Road To Find Out"
Cat Stevens
They’re doing construction on the 405. Widening it. Which I think is a mistake. I read a story in the "New York Times" saying that if you enlarge a highway it’ll just generate more traffic, people will live further away, figuring they can drive into town. But you can’t, traffic is that bad in L.A. What we need is public transportation.
So I’m jammed up and jelly tight with my brethren on the asphalt at midnight, listening to Deep Tracks on XM. And I hear this.
Terrestrial radio only plays the same hits. Over and over again. But hearing "On The Road To Find Out" was a revelation, brought me right back to the seventies, when the only context you needed for a record was it and yourself. Now music is social. "California Gurls" was not written for the individual, but the group…nothing inherently wrong with that, but I always preferred the more intimate tracks, like "On The Road To Find Out".
"Mary Jane’s Last Dance"
Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers
The last great thing this band did. Oh, I love "Crystal River" on the Mudcrutch album, but TP&THB have never equaled this. Great riff, great vocal, infectious…it’s both personal and social, good alone and with a group. Couldn’t turn this off when I heard it on the satellite after "On The Road To Find Out", even though I was already home.
"Time Loves A Hero"
Phish
This is actually better than the Little Feat studio original. I pulled up the seventies cut, caught up in the reverie of the cover. Yes, the live take off "Waiting For Columbus" trumps Phish’s version, but the boys from Vermont kill it here. The vocals are pretty damn good. And Phish can definitely play.
"Amsterdam"
Crowded House
I love the Internet. After writing about Neil Finn, I got e-mail from the gig, last night at the Bowery Ballroom, while it was still happening! In real time I found out that David Byrne hit the stage to join Crowded House on "Once In A Lifetime" and "Road To Nowhere"…and I got the MP3s…all before midnight on the west coast.
And my inbox has been filling up with testimonials by Split Enz/Crowded House/Finn fans. This is how you do it. Play to the core, who will come see you for $35 in an intimate venue. If you’re playing to the very last row in a hockey rink, you’re doing it wrong.
But that’s not why I’m writing this…
Since yesterday I’ve played this track, "Amsterdam", in excess of thirty times. I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t help myself.
A brain synapse went off, had the band’s new album been released yet? I searched in Napster on my Sonos system and started playing "Intriguer".
The opener, "Saturday Sun", was a disappointment. The follow-up, "Archer’s Arrows" didn’t reach me the first time through. And that’s just the point. The fourth or fifth time through it did. That’s what listening to albums is about. Finding one track you like so much that you go back through and discover others.
Although I’d be lying if I said I’m fully involved with "Archer’s Arrows" yet. But I do love "Falling Dove". Sounds like falling rain in the early morning light, walking alone on a road surrounded by greenery. It was "Falling Dove" and "Twice If You’re Lucky" that got me to playing the whole album.
Along with "Amsterdam", of course.
It’s such a thrill to find one great track. Find two others on an album and you continue to spin the long player, delving deeper.
But I could barely listen to anything else, because my brain kept wanting to hear "Amsterdam".
You know how a song lodges in your brain and there’s a change so good, aural heroin, that you can’t help but listen to it again and again? That’s what happened last night with "Amsterdam".
I spun the whole album on my midnight hike. But then when I hooked into "Amsterdam", I couldn’t get off it, as I walked in the dark, past the horses, conducting the band with my hands.
And when I got home, like a smoker unable to quit, I had to put on the headphones and listen to "Amsterdam".
And as soon as I woke up, my drug was there. I didn’t want to play it, but I had to. I needed music, this specific song, even though I was fearful of burning it out, having it lose its magic, its hold over me.
"Amsterdam" will never be on Top Forty radio. It’s not for the masses, but the fans. Who always want more. Instead of an album every three years, Crowded House should dribble out the tracks, keep us attached, and possibly the world will change enough that the masses can discover a cut like "Amsterdam", not homogenized by executives for radio consumption, but straight from the artist’s heart to the listener’s ear.
