Somewhere back there Rickie Lee Jones lost her way.<\/p>\n
I’ll vote for the second album.\u00c2\u00a0 Sure, the first was great, I loved "Weasel and the White Boys Cool", but the second, "Pirates", begins with a one-two punch that’s undeniable, it knocks you out cold, you wake up on the floor, staring at the ceiling.<\/p>\n
We belong together.<\/p>\n
Have you ever laid in bed, wondering about the distance between the two of you, deciding whether to break it off or try and continue and you suddenly decide "we belong together"?<\/p>\n
The operative word is "we".\u00c2\u00a0 That’s when relationships are on fire, when it’s no longer about you and her, but when you can’t imagine life without your other half, when you think the cosmos has determined you belong together.<\/p>\n
I actually called up a girl and told her this.\u00c2\u00a0 We’d had a hard time docking, we were unable to make it fit, frustrated, it looked like it was best to return to our respective corners, permanently.\u00c2\u00a0 But this night I determined we belonged together.<\/p>\n
She didn’t see it the same way.<\/p>\n
And, in retrospect, she was right.\u00c2\u00a0 We didn’t belong together.\u00c2\u00a0 But that doesn’t mean I don’t remember that feeling.\u00c2\u00a0 Just like Rickie Lee Jones sings it in this song.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s a private moment, not a diva onstage singing for everybody, but a private symphony playing in your own head.<\/p>\n
The follow-up, "Living It Up", has got a completely different vibe.\u00c2\u00a0 But it’s no less touching, no less meaningful.\u00c2\u00a0 You may think you’re living it up, you might put a sunny face on the situation, but is that the truth?<\/p>\n
Then Rickie lost the plot.\u00c2\u00a0 She stopped working with Lenny Waronker and Russ Titelman.\u00c2\u00a0 She did a great cover of "Walk Away Renee", but the albums no longer hit you in the same way.\u00c2\u00a0 She was Rickie Lee Jones once.\u00c2\u00a0 Now?<\/p>\n
It’s a beautiful day in L.A.<\/p>\n
And I’m driving west on Wilshire and I hear the new Rickie Lee Jones song for the second time, "Wild Girl".<\/p>\n
On Sirius XM’s Loft.\u00c2\u00a0 Meg Griffin was spinning it from her perch on the coast of Massachusetts.<\/p>\n
And the song speaks for itself.\u00c2\u00a0 But you can’t hear it.\u00c2\u00a0 I found it nowhere online.<\/p>\n
You can hear a snippet at http:\/\/www.rickieleejones.com\/\u00c2\u00a0 It’s not the first track, still the first track works too.<\/p>\n
How did Rickie Lee come back twenty years later?<\/p>\n
By finishing twenty year old songs.<\/p>\n
Her Website has too much Flash, you’d never go back.\u00c2\u00a0 But the TV-type images are fascinating.\u00c2\u00a0 They’ve got the feel of the music.\u00c2\u00a0 This is not some babe of the moment in a video clip, this is meaning.\u00c2\u00a0 We’re all lonely at heart, but we’re yearning to feel connected.\u00c2\u00a0 Music, when done right, brings us together.<\/p>\n
The second track on the Website player is "Wild Girl".\u00c2\u00a0 You’ll get a taste.\u00c2\u00a0 Longer than thirty seconds, but not long enough.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s snappy, yet not mindless.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s visceral, it opens your skin and tucks itself inside.<\/p>\n
But you can check out this live YouTube clip from last May.<\/p>\n
\n