the writing of joel d canfield
rambling—in more ways than one
[l1]I[/l1] love singing along with Kansas City Star. It’s one of those silly songs Roger wrote that leaves out all the struggle and heartache, and puts in everything that’s right with our hearts and heads.
Besides, how often do you get a trombone solo and scat vocals in a country song? Yeah, Roger had a hard time coloring inside the lines. Continue reading “Better a Kansas City Star Than an Omaha Nobody”
[l1]L[/l1]ove is, even in the best circumstances, a complex thing. Good songwriters find the words to sing about it.
Great songwriters know there are no words for it. Continue reading “Words by Roger Miller. Lyrics by Love.”
[l1]P[/l1]retty sure Roger never meant us to take this one seriously.
My friend and I went to the picture show in town
They called his name and said his house and just burned down
I took his hand and offered him my sympathy
When suddenly, I remembered that he lived with me Continue reading “Happy Heartbreak #2: It Takes All Kinds to Make a World”
[l1]S[/l1]ome songs are obviously made for headphones. Anything by Pink Floyd. Some classical and jazz.
Paul Simon’s Kodachrome isn’t so obvious, but I just heard a different song from the one I’ve been listening to for lo these many years. Continue reading “Mama Don’t Take My Kodachrome and Leave Your Boy So Far From Home”
[l1]A[/l1] hallmark of Roger Miller’s songwriting is what I call his happy heartbreaks: the saddest stories, told with wit to cheerful music.
Just as Hitchcock makes pokes us with the incongruity of life by making us laugh during a terrifying scene, Roger reminds you that life isn’t the events, but our reactions. Even the poor guy standing in a train station somewhere 110 miles from Baltimore sounds more resigned than heartbroken when he says “I don’t think she loves me any more.” Continue reading “Happy Heartbreak #1: Engine, Engine #9”
[l1]I[/l1] don’t even know his real name; he signs his emails res, but resonance is not just a brilliant songwriter, but a world-class performer. More than one of his songs sound like Styx got back together. Except maybe with even better lyrics. Continue reading “USSS: resonance”
[l1]T[/l1]he most highly trained FAWMer I know, Elaine DiMasi is also the only person I know who’s ever written a madrigal for a licorice advertisement.
[l1]E[/l1]ffervescent music and witty lyrics and young love—how can it miss? The Turtles’ Elenore never made it onto my radar when I was younger. Perhaps I wouldn’t have appreciated it.
Witty rhymes like
[l1]Y[/l1]ep, I was a teenager listening to Tom Jones and Anne Murray. What?! I laugh now thinking about it. So how did that happen?
Continue reading “My Teenage Years with Tom Jones and Anne Murray”
[az]B000EN0TIG[/az][l1]B[/l1]ack in 1992 I was introduced to Garth Brooks by a friend from Texas. I hadn’t really been a huge country fan before then. My friend was staying with me at the time and wanted to watch the Country Music Awards. I was hooked after hearing Garth Brooks perform. Today, though I don’t listen to even new country much, I still love to listen to Garth Brooks.
In the summer of 1992 Garth came to San Diego, California, where I was then living. Continue reading “Ropin’ the Wind with Garth Brooks”
[l1]D[/l1]uring February Album Writing Month, you’ll hear lots of ukulele songs. A couple years ago, it seemed everyone had one.
Everyone but me.
Continue reading “I Wish I Had a Ukulele”
[l1]R[/l1]ecently a friend reluctantly admitted (his words) that he doesn’t like Steely Dan.
Though I understand, I don’t get it.
Continue reading “You Can Not Like Steely Dan”
[l1]G[/l1] [az]B000007O5H[/az]erry Rafferty is gone.
63 is not old enough for anyone to die. No age is, but that’s another conversation.
There are a small handful of songs which get turned up, and turn up a smile on my face, every single time I hear them, whenever, wherever. Stuck in the Middle with You, one of Gerry’s songs with Joe Egan as Stealer’s Wheel, is one of them.
There are a small handful of songs which clutch tragically at my heart every single time I hear them. Whatever’s Written in Your Heart, from Gerry’s City to City, is one of them.
There are a small handful of albums which make me yearn and cry and shout and laugh and wish and dream. That same album, City to City, is one of them.
There is not enough time for all the music; not enough for all the musicians; not enough for what I wanted.
[l1]I[/l1][az]B0014KD46W[/az]f you’re my age you’ve read about the message ‘Clapton is God’ scrawled on subway walls (ostensibly right under ‘Frodo lives!’)
In an interview the the Cars’ Elliot Easton, they played word association with the names of guitarists. Easton’s response to ‘Clapton’ ? “Is not God.”
At the time, I thought he was wrong. Gutsy, but wrong.
A few nights ago, I changed my mind. Watching Clapton on stage (okay, on TV) with Steve Winwood, I was amazed at how inventive and unexpected Winwood’s solos were, while Clapton played the same solo in every song. Slower, faster, different keys, but essentially the same.
And yesterday, Best Beloved changed CDs in the van, and I realised that on Clapton’s Chronicles album, I only like one of the first six tracks.
No, I’m not tossing my copy of “From the Cradle” or “Disraeli Gears” but I’m also not saving up to see him next time he comes to town.
Unless, of course, he’s playing with Steve Winwood
[l1]M[/l1]usic tends to be visceral, skipping past our filters, needling its way to the real stuff inside. Continue reading “Standing in the Lonely Light of the Silver Moon”