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Song of the Day #1,059: ‘Dragonfly on Bay Street’ – Ron Sexsmith

I featured ‘These Days’ yesterday to ease into the more involved production of Cobblestone Runway. Today’s song shows the extent to which Sexsmith fiddled around in the studio on this record.

‘Dragonfly On Bay Street’ features a disco backing track and synthesized robotic sound effects… it’s the closest Sexsmith will probably ever come to the dance floor. But this tale of a man lost in life who draws momentary inspiration from an insect trapped in the city still feels like a Sexsmith song, just in fancier clothing.

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Song of the Day #1,058: ‘These Days’ – Ron Sexsmith

In 2002, one year after Blue Boy, Ron Sexsmith released Cobblestone Runway, a disc that marked his most significant leap forward in production values, not to mention confidence.

It’s hard to imagine the Ron Sexsmith of his first few albums recording a duet with Coldplay’s Chris Martin, as he does here on ‘Gold in Them Hills.’

And this is the first album for which I could readily find music videos of the songs. Sexsmith will never be the sort of artist who shows up in the VH1 Top 20 Video Countdown, but the fact that he strapped on a guitar and played for the cameras in interesting in itself.

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Song of the Day #1,057: ‘Potholes’ – Randy Newman

I’m finishing up my second week of Randy Newman songs with another selection from his most recent album, 2008’s Harps and Angels. Last week I featured ‘Losing You,’ a very touching song about being unable to forget.

‘Potholes’ is that song’s opposite — a very funny song about being unable to remember.

Newman hasn’t written much about himself over the decades his career has spanned. He is more comfortable putting himself in the shoes of an often unlikable narrator. Even the songs that seem to be about him are really twisted versions of his reality.

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Song of the Day #1,056: ‘The World Isn’t Fair’ – Randy Newman

My second selection from Randy Newman’s Bad Love is a cousin to the song I featured yesterday. Again, Newman is singing about his own dumb luck, this time as tongue-in-cheek political commentary.

Newman starts off talking (and yes, he increasingly spends talks more than sings many of his songs) about Karl Marx, the “public-spirited boy” who imagined a world in which “no one could rise too high” and “no one could sink too low.” But as proof that such an idealistic worldview isn’t realistic, Newman provides Marx with a glimpse of his own blessed life.

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Song of the Day #1,055: ‘My Life is Good’ – Randy Newman

Today’s Randy Newman song is far less bleak than this week’s first two entries. It’s quite fun, actually.

Last week’s selection from Randy Newman’s 1983 album Trouble in Paradise was ‘Real Emotional Girl,’ a sensitive portrait of a fragile woman. The Randy Newman of ‘My Life Is Good’ would brush aside that emotional girl in pursuit of the next hedonistic notch on his belt.

Ostensibly playing himself in this track, Newman takes us on a tour of the pleasures of being rich and famous. Travel, drugs, women, celebrity… the good life.

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