Monthly Archives: November 2008

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Song of the Day #108: ‘Something to Me’ – Tift Merritt

tiftmerAh, Tift Merritt.

Here is one of those serendipitous finds you just have to chalk up to fate. I don’t know how or why I happened upon Merritt’s second album, Tambourine, a few years ago but it hit me like a freight train. Where had this woman been all my life?

Just a week or two later I got tickets to an Elvis Costello concert and who should be his opening act but… Tift Merritt. I was as excited to see her perform that night as the main act and she did not disappoint. She commanded the auditorium during her short set, jumping from keyboards to acoustic and electric guitar to the harmonica and showing off that wonderful voice — alternately gravelly soulful and crystalline pure.

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Song of the Day #107: ‘Umbrella’ – Rihanna

rihannaI have read and heard more about today’s song, Rihanna’s ‘Umbrella,’ than I have about any other modern song I can think of. When it was released a year or so ago, it was constantly mentioned in the magazines and Web sites I read. It’s been remixed a dozen times and covered by a host of professional and amateur artists. It is the most copiously analyzed and appreciated song of the past several years.

And I had never heard it all the way through until today.

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Song of the Day #106: ‘You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away’ – The Beatles

On their fifth album, The Beatles returned to the formula that served them so well on their third. Help! is a soundtrack album that’s split between songs from the film and new material. But, just as the movie Help! is no A Hard Day’s Night, neither does the album quite live up to its predecessor.

It’s still an amazing record, however, and it caps off the band’s “early” years before they entered their experimental phase and really began to change the landscape of popular music.

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Song of the Day #105: ‘What You’re Doing’ – The Beatles

Beatles For Sale feels like it should be the group’s third album — so much so that I have accidentally miscategorized it as such several times already in preparing this week’s blog posts. After the all-original material of A Hard Day’s Night, it returns to the pattern of the band’s first two releases, splitting the lineup between originals and covers.

I imagine it was a bit of a let-down when it came out. Following the phenomenal artistic success of A Hard Day’s Night it must have seemed like a step backward. For me, who discovered all of The Beatles’ albums nearly two decades after the group broke up, that wasn’t really an issue.

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Song of the Day #104: ‘I’ll Be Back’ – The Beatles

Most discussions of The Beatles’ best albums seem to center around Rubber Soul, Revolver and Abbey Road. And I have no argument with that, as they are all incredible, classic albums.

But my personal favorite may well be A Hard Day’s Night. Released as the soundtrack of the film of the same name, itself a classic, this album contains thirteen stellar songs, including such immortals as the title track, ‘If I Fell,’ ‘I Should Have Known Better,’ ‘And I Love Her,’ ‘Can’t Buy Me Love’ and ‘Things We Said Today.’ I’ll stop there rather than just post the whole tracklist.

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