English rock band Manfred Mann held the #1 spot on Billboard’s Hot 100 the week of October 20, 1964, with ‘Do Wah Diddy Diddy,’ a song I think I first heard when Bill Murray marches to it in Stripes.
‘Do Wah Diddy Diddy’ started its life as ‘Do-Wah-Diddy,’ a 1963 release by the vocal group The Exciters. That version peaked at #78 before the white boys claimed it and took it to the top of the charts.
After writing about one too many lazy R&B jams, I’ve made the executive decision to narrow Throwback Weekends to the 50s through the 80s. I’m always excited to discover which songs were popular in those four decades, and seldom excited to relive the hits of the 90s and 00s, so why not make it official?
Part of the appeal of the earlier decades is that they all predate my adulthood. I was either a teenager, a kid, or not yet born when those songs came out. That makes for a more entertaining throwback than revisiting the hits of my 20s and 30s. Plus, popular music in the 90s and 00s frequently sucked.
Concluding my ranking of the songs on Miranda Lambert’s new album, Postcards from Texas…
#1. ‘Run’
This song was definitely written about Lambert’s split from Blake Shelton — in fact, it was written in the months following their split but remained unrecorded for nine years.
I chose ‘Run’ as the album’s best track because I’m blown away by its honesty. Lambert owns up to her restless nature, admitting that she deep down knew she would leave the relationship.
Continuing my ranking of the songs on Miranda Lambert’s new album, Postcards from Texas…
#2. ‘Way Too Good at Breaking My Heart’
Another song about chasing the wrong kind of love, and the inability to resist the one person you should be running from. I know I shouldn’t tie everything back to Lambert’s personal life — she’s a storyteller, after all — but I believe this whole album is about the breakup of her first marriage and the tumult of the years that immediately followed.
What I find fascinating is that she’s released four other albums since then and mostly stayed away from those topics. I wonder what prompted her to explore them now.
Continuing my ranking of the songs on Miranda Lambert’s new album, Postcards from Texas…
#3. ‘Wildfire’
Postcards from Texas‘ penultimate track is a sleepily sensual song about getting caught up in a passionate but unhealthy relationship. It’s a theme Lambert has explored often.
One of the reasons I love her music is how willingly she embraces her own messiness. In this song, with its dreamy guitars, she even romanticizes it.
Meet Me In Montauk 