Kicking off Week Five of the 30 Day Music Challenge, our task is to name ‘A Favorite Song With a Person’s Name in the Title.’
This challenge made me laugh, because it reminded me of my wife’s irrational aversion to songs written about (and titled after) specific women. Hall & Oates’ ‘Sara Smile,’ for example, which also makes her shit list for the opening line “baby hair, with a woman’s eyes.” What the hell does baby hair look like on a grown woman?
My wife’s position on such songs is that they are written for somebody else, so why should she bother listening? Like I said, irrational.
As for me, I considered two Elvis Costello tunes — ‘Alison,’ which I’ve featured before, and ‘Veronica,’ which I haven’t — before settling on my favorite song of 2013 and probably my favorite Vampire Weekend song, period: ‘Hannah Hunt.’
A gardener told me some plants move
But I could not believe it
Till me and Hannah Hunt
Saw crawling vines and weeping willows
As we made our way from Providence to Phoenix
[Verse 2]
A man of faith said hidden eyes
Could see what I was thinking
I just smiled and told him
That was only true of Hannah
And we glided on through Waverley and Lincoln
[Chorus]
Our days were long, our nights no longer
Count the seconds, watching hours
Though we live on the US dollar
You and me, we got our own sense of time
[Verse 3]
In Santa Barbara, Hannah cried
Amidst those freezing beaches
And I walked into town
To buy some kindling for the fire
Hannah tore the New York Times up into pieces
[Chorus]
If I can’t trust you then damn it, Hannah
There’s no future, there’s no answer
Though we live on the US dollar
You and me, we got our own sense of time
[Instrumental Break]
[Chorus]
If I can’t trust you then damn it, Hannah
There’s no future, there’s no answer
Though we live on the US dollar
You and me, we got our own sense of time
Meet Me In Montauk 
“Alison” came to mind for me as well. However, I’m going to go with an Elton John classic I loved years before we named our son after my father, which gave the name, and to a lesser extent the song, a much deeper emotional connection.
I like Bette Davis Eyes
So many great songs feature names, including one that features mine! 🙂 Still, I’m going to feature an early favorite – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LB-tkHD4uXU
This may have been my first conscious appreciation of a narrative form of song writing. I remember thinking about this couple and how much he wants to be the man she sees in him. “Rosalinda’s Eyes” is my pick.
Lots of great songs for this, but it’s time to bring Arctic Monkeys to the table with one of my favorite songs of theirs: