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Song of the Day #3,379: ‘One Too Many Mornings’ – Johnny Cash & Bob Dylan

Day 17 of the 30 Day Music Challenge calls for a rather strange offering: ‘A Song That Features Your Favorite Artist.’

First of all, this requires me to have a favorite artist, which I think is an impossibility. My favorite artist at any given moment depends on what I’m listening to, my mood and a dozen other factors. Second, what exactly does “features” mean in this context? Is it the same as ‘A Song By Your Favorite Artist,’ in which case why not just say that? Or does my favorite artist have to be featured on somebody else’s track (in the now ubiquitous “feat.” sense)?

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Song of the Day #3,378: ‘No Reason To Cry’ – Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

Note: This Random Weekend SOTD was scheduled to run this Sunday. When I heard the awful news of his passing, I decided to move it up a week. I’ll give the man a proper remembrance at some point, but for now I’ll just run this blog entry untouched. I will say, this particular song selection is quite poignant in light of the news.

Here’s a lovely Random Weekend selection from Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers’ 2010 album Mojo. It’s a great album that I rarely revisit, but should.

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Song of the Day #3,377: ‘Magic (Live)’ – Olivia Newton-John

We’re halfway through the 30 Day Music Challenge as we kick off week four, and Day 16 is a good one: ‘One Of Your Favorite Songs From a Movie.’

As with so many of these categories, this one can be interpreted in several ways. Should I pick a song that appears in a movie but wasn’t originally written for the film? Some of my favorite filmmakers have worked wonders with the “drop the needle” approach of using popular songs as score. Wes Anderson, Paul Thomas Anderson, Quentin Tarantino and Martin Scorsese all come to mind among countless others.

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Song of the Day #3,376: ‘James’ – Josh Rouse

Nice work by the Random iTunes Fairy this weekend, serving up two of my favorite singer-songwriters with Ben Folds yesterday and Josh Rouse today.

‘James’ is a track from Rouse’s 2003 album 1972, one of his best efforts. Inspired by the sound and style of the decade it’s named after, 1972 is a sharp and satisfying listen and ‘James’ is one of its best songs.

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Song of the Day #3,375: ‘Long Way To Go’ – Ben Folds

Today’s Random iTunes Selection comes from Ben Folds’ 2015 album So There, a collaboration with chamber music ensemble yMusic. The album contains eight pop songs as well as Folds’ three-movement ‘Concerto for Piano and Orchestra’ (which I’ll admit, I listened to only once). The songs are mostly great, though.

‘Long Way To Go’ is an interesting track, in that it seems to be about itself. When Folds sings “we got just five minutes” there are exactly five minutes left in the song. Likewise with the “just three minutes” and “just one minute” verses. So is the whole song about getting to the end of the song? Or did Folds just time things out that way as an added challenge while writing about something more universal?

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