accelerando /äkˌseləˈrändō/

The music of the great majority of cultures in the history of the world, during most eras, does – or did not – adhere to rules of timing. The modern church of the western world first introduced musical measure in their quest for control of all things.

Funny, that as I write this here in an open-air James Street café I am hearing Van Morrison’s tune Wild Night and I can’t help but feel that this song contains a caged wildness in its structure; that this song might be a masterpiece if freed from the bondage of its beat!

Neo’s earlier music did not fall under the hammer of the metronome; one of several elements I figured might alienate his music from masses of obedient commercial pop music devotees. But I have always felt that he is on a noble path and as such has the potential to attract followers. He has a very special song-writing talent and creative courage and he may well become the object of sizable acclaim and fandom at any time. But for now I suspect it healthy that he may be excused from dreams of super-stardom and the inherent distractions and compromises thereof.

accede /əkˈsēd/

On my best days, when I am on the ball, when joy and freedom are unquenchable, it doesn’t matter what happens. No matter what, it’s fine.

a cappella /ˌä kəˈpelə/

I was surprised when young Neo asked me about Hall & Oates, knowing, of course, that they were from my “era.” I couldn’t imagine anything from the realm of 80’s pop music falling on his rather sophisticated music radar, let alone this duo who were frankly kind of square; never regarded by anyone “hip” even in their day. I had little to offer other than a couple album titles worth looking into.

But I’ve always thought Hall & Oates worthy of greater regard, largely for their celebration of the human voice. It is always their voices driving the songs; their two primary instruments. And no, there is no Hall & Oates on my top 100.

academic ˌ/akəˈdemik/

One of my former writing students, Arrawyn, once said to me, in regards to her grade eight exams: “They’re not testing my skills or knowledge, you know. They’re only testing my memory.”

“Worse,” said I. “They’re only testing your short-term memory. You’ll soon forget most or all of it. But at least you’re exercising your brain, which is useful.”

#95: Frozen fire

My high school friend, and neighbor, Mark was often seen and heard roaring about the neighborhood in his peppy 1981 Toyota Tercel, always with one of two songs blasting from it: The Doors’ Break on Through (to the Other Side) or this following song by The Cars. Clearly he was trying hard to market a specific identity for himself. Later, I would buy my first car; coincidently the very same model. But I blasted no songs from it. Oh, I almost certainly would have but I couldn’t afford a powerful enough stereo system.

#95

LET’S GO

By Ric Ocasek (The Cars)

1979, USA

Astutely labelled “another [Cars] double-edged anthem” by famed music critic Brett Milano, it’s one of those songs with extra rocket sauce. You hear what should be the joyful hopping culmination of the chorus followed by – more joyful hopping chorus bits.

Walter Ruhlmann, in The All-Music Guide to Rock called Let's Go "one of the summer songs of the year."

Peak: #5, Canada RPM and #14, U.S. Billboard Top 100. It remains The Cars’ highest peaking song in Canada.  

There’s no question as to the originality of Ocasek’s creation but it is undoubtedly an intentional homage to the 1962 classic of the same name by The Routers:

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abyss /əˈbis/

In Revelations 20:3 an angel hurls Satan into a pit to be imprisoned 1000 years.

Poetic voices suggest that mankind is forever hurled into the pit. I can understand that perspective intimately: that we are forever oppressed by a superpower; under the thumb of Satan: all of our hard-fought evolution at the peril of complete retraction at any given moment.

The dull sleep-world constantly calls to us; seduces us and our instincts always desire to answer. To master a constant vigilance seems impossible, and yet, unless there is a possible transcendence, wherein we may close the door to animal-hood behind us, what else is there to do but fight the good fight? 

#96: Tremelo

Here’s a little segue for us:  Catch My Fall and the Rebel Yell album marked the start of Billy Idol’s superstar period which aligned with my high school period, culminating in 1987 with his cover of Mony Mony which reached #1 in the USA.

It was also notably covered by the Beach Boys and Alvin and the Chipmunks but presumably only the Idol version was widely banned from American high school dances. No such censorship at our school where we danced up and down screaming such custom alterations as “Get laid, get fucked!” in the two quarter notes. I have no idea where this widespread custom started or why. Nor can I think of another example of this odd phenomenon. Could Idol have added these extra lyrics at some live performance and it caught on?  

Mony Mony is a nonsense title. It stands for Mutual of New York. The initials were once prominently displayed atop their office building at 1740 Broadway, prominent on the NYC skyline at the time original songwriters Tommy James and Ritchie Cordell were looking for a catchy title for the new tune, destined to hit #1 in the U.K. in 1968. Like a divine beacon, they spied the sign from the balcony of James’ Manhattan apartment. Mony Mony will not appear in my top-100 list. However:

   

#96

CRIMSON AND CLOVER

By Tommy James (& the Shondells)

1968, USA

I love the dramatic opening of this song, and while I’m not generally a big fan of echoes or stutters, I do find the tremolo effects here, oddly captivating. It was the Shondells’ innovation to extend the effect to James’ closing vocals by running the mic through a guitar amp.

Apparently the title, which denotes James’ favourite colour and flower respectively, had been applied to a previous tune which was scrapped. He may or may not have known about the trifolium incarnatum (crimson clover plant).

Peaked: #1 in USA, Canada, Germany, Switzerland and New Zealand. Oddly, it did not chart in the U.K. At more than five million copies it remains their best-selling song.

It was prominently covered by Joan Jett and the Blackhearts:

#97: Fallin' down whiskey

In 1982 Mick Jagger and Keith Richards attended a party where folks were drinking Rebel Yell Bourbon. One of those folk was a blonded young musician who thought that Rebel Yell would make a great name for his upcoming album. The album would go double platinum (two million sales) with seventy weeks on the Billboard 200 album chart, peaking at #6.

The title song was a hit single and hit music video, as were three other tracks, including Eyes Without a Face and Flesh for Fantasy.

The fourth and final single from Rebel Yell was the only track on the album written entirely by – yes – Billy Idol; and without co-writer Steve Stevens, and that song, in my humble opinion, is the album’s real masterpiece:

#97

CATCH MY FALL

By Billy Idol

1983, UK

It was this song that sent me running to the Burlington Mall to pick up the Rebel Yell cassette and I immediately loved all nine tracks, and I still like them all. But still the highlight, by far, is this chorus where shouts of Catch my fall and If I should stumble alternate with Mars Williams’ spine-tingling saxophone.

Peak: #50, USA

Here’s the official music video. I promise, it’s not silly at all. And there’s a prize if you can correctly count the number of Billy Idol sneers he flashes:

#98: How's my rhythm?

#98

OYE COMO VA

By Tito Puente (Santana)

1963, USA

Featured in National Public Radio’s Top 100 important American musical works of the 20^th century, Puente’s jazzy Latin classic has been covered by notable artists more than a dozen times. Easily the most famous is Santana’s 1970 version (linked above), described as “driving” and “cranked up” with electric guitar, Hammond B-3 organ, rock drum kit and added rock and blues licks.

The opening lyrics, stranded in the title are interpreted, “Hey, how’s it going?” but the connotations change when united with the following line, “Mi ritmo.” In totality, the lyrics mean roughly: How do you like my rhythm? Good! Enjoy! Mulata!

Peak: #13, Billboard Hot 100

Seinfeld character Elaine Benes also lists this song among her favorites in episode seven of season eight, The Checks.

Here, the Coen Brothers employ it in a scene-opener in one of my favourite comedy films, The Big Lebowski:

abuzz /əˈbəz/

Everyone thinks of gossip as something that they don’t do; that the term is reserved for some particular level which they never sink to. Yet everyone does it. I suppose I catch myself at it still, on rare rueful occasions. We're so terrified of being in the dark, of losing an advantage; being disadvantaged. Why is so-and-so absent! Who has applied for the promotion! What did she say about me…! Hey, just between you and me – you can keep a secret, right?

I know I was once mired in this mania and yet I can’t remember what it was like. I just know that now it has become unbearable. It is a dreary unpleasantness to be gossiped at.

Please! Just let me mind my own business! I don't even want to know what people are saying about me! Because the "me" they think I am is not who I am, anyway! But to explain to people why it is folly to try to deal with affairs other than your own, is always a path to nonsense. How do I explain the beautiful peace; the beautiful freedom in simply minding your own business in terms of the social arena; in terms of all this vain recreation we label life instead. So few appear to me to have the potential to achieve this state. I will not waste my time and pat my ego trying to explain to my duller associates why they are being unwise. I will save my good advice for those special persons who are ready to hear it.

abutilon /əˈbyo͞odlˌän/

It was long ago reported that on one of the Galapagos islands, brimming with life, an Eden of flora and fauna, a great variety of flowering plants were present but all were yellow; every single flower on the island a shade of yellow. Even those species of plant which typically flowered in multiple varieties – only the yellow variety was present. This remained a mystery for years, except to some of devout faith who insisted it was not a mystery at all; that science could never provide an explanation and the only possible explanation was that God had chosen this place to be a yellow place. It was proof of God.

It turns out that there may indeed be a great variety of plant life on this island but there is only one breed of bee. And that breed of bee, by the tinkering of random mutation and evolution, only recognizes yellow flowers. Thus no other would be pollinated.

People have a hard time admitting what they don’t know. We leap swiftly to an answer that pleases us and forever fail to notice all the math we didn’t do.

Crop circle enthusiasts will call that phenomena proof of life on other planets because we can’t explain how they are created by any earthly explanation. But that is in no way proof of alien life. The explanation for crop circles may not have fallen into your little hands or mine, but an explanation exists, and whatever it is, it is massively more likely to come from a source, unknown to you and me, but of this planet rather than of one that is light-years away. We are each intimate with only a minuscule slice of the world of Earth, or Minerva, as I much prefer to call it, as much as it soothes our ego to presume otherwise.

#99: The hearts of the young

# 99

FOLLOW YOUR HEART

By Gil Moore, Mike Levine and Rik Emmett (Triumph)

1984, Canada

Here’s a straight-up celebration of rock and irresponsibility anthem if there ever was one. It sucked in the masses, myself included. This was my favourite song ever for about a year through early high school, which is the last place one should be when you’re following your heart (into the depths of despair). Love was unfathomably cruel at that age and none of the absurdities of high school culture were remotely a comfort. Where was Ferris Bueller when I needed him? Oh well! Live and not-really learn…

The lyrics extol the virtues of living for the moment and doing what you feel like. They propose to unify the concept of following your dreams with forgetting about tomorrow. Okay, so we’re talking about extremely short-term dreams I suppose. Look, I never cared about the lyrics, okay! I relished the soaring melody.

Peak: #35, Canada pop chart

The official music video was filmed at the Providence Civic Center in Rhode Island following a live concert where the audience was invited to stick around and participate: