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Song of the Day #1,535: ‘Valentine’ – Fiona Apple

I’m approaching all of the artists in this musical genome series from the perspective of the categories I’ve defined, so in those terms it’s pretty clear that I’m a huge Fiona Apple fan because she’s a) a ‘Piano (Wo)man’ and b) ‘Melancholy.’

But if you were to ask me why I love Apple’s work apart from the context of this project, I wouldn’t mention either of those things. I would say I’m a Fiona Apple fan because of her voice, and because of the passion she pours into every lyric and melody she writes, every word and note she performs.

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Song of the Day #1,534: ‘Just Fine’ – Mary J. Blige

Here’s a song from one of the five or six albums in my CD collection that belong exclusively to my wife. I have never heard this song or this album before, and I listened to only about half of it just now before posting it.

R&B is definitely not in my musical genome. I have zero patience for this sort of music. I would crawl across broken glass to get within ten feet of Beyoncé, but I find only a few of her songs listenable. And Mary J. Blige? Not even on my radar.

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Song of the Day #1,533: ‘Seven Days’ – Bob Dylan

I had just listened to several songs from Tempest, Bob Dylan’s newest album (review to come), when I clicked the ‘shuffle’ button to choose my next Random Weekend selection.

And there was Bob again, 36 years earlier, performing a song that didn’t make it onto any of his 35 studio albums.

According to the Bootleg Series liner notes, Dylan performed ‘Seven Days’ only five times, during his celebrated Rolling Thunder tour. One of those is captured here in stirring fashion.

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Song of the Day #1,532: ‘Cleaning Out My Closet’ – Eminem

Eminem is perhaps the oddest of all the oddball artists in my musical genome discussion. He is very much a genre artist, but it’s a genre that’s almost entirely off my radar.

The easy claim is that I love Eminem’s music despite not liking rap music at all, but I don’t know if that’s true. I have owned maybe half a dozen rap albums (other than Eminem’s) over the past 20+ years and I don’t listen to any of them very often. But how many great ones have I never heard?

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Song of the Day #1,531: ‘Sweet Old World’ – Lucinda Williams

Lucinda Williams definitely puts the “plus” in ‘Country Plus.’

She got her start as a modest country-folk artist, kicking around New Orleans, Austin and Houston before testing the waters in New York and Los Angeles. Over 10 albums and 33 years, she has emerged as one of the most respected songwriters of her generation.

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