Feb 142012
One of the details I believe I remember from the highly entertaining Led Zeppelin biography, Hammer of the Gods, is a story about drummer John Bonham‘s rationale that his constant cheating on his wife while he was on the road indicated how much he loved and missed her. I bet he was a fan of Stephen Stills‘ anthem of rationalized infidelity, “Love the One You’re With.”
What love songs of questionable intent would you like to celebrate this Valentine’s Day?
My contenders: “Alison” by Elvis Costello, “God Only Knows” by the Beach Boys, or ANYTHING off of Nick Cave’s “Murder Ballads.”
REM’s The One I Love (or whatever it’s called).
ZZ Top’s ode to a prostitute, “Mexican Blackbird.”
Emmylou and Gram Parsons covering “We’ll Sweep Out the Ashes in the Morning” comes to mind first. I also always get a kick out of Soul Asylum’s “bromance song” We Three — off “And The Horse They Rode in On” and on the Chasing Amy soundtrack.
http://youtu.be/QOzDUIpe65A
There’s a song Sinatra does, Don’cha Go Way Mad, where the protagonist cheats on his girl, tries to excuse it by saying it was just the once, and that he doesn’t care about the other girl and she’s just a dime a dozen, which sounds normal until he admits – it was her COUSIN.
Wow, the protagonist must have had a big family!
How about David Crosby’s ode to a threesome, “Triad”? It was sung both from a male point of view (CSN&Y) and from a female viewpoint (Grace Slick in Jefferson Airplane).
Right, that may not fly for every couple’s Valentine’s Day mix.
Me and You and a Dog Named Boo by Lobo
How about people using “Every Breath You Take” as their wedding song?
aloha
LD
And Bonzo’s Drummer Logic reminded me of Keith Moon’s posit (per “Full Moon”) that BJs didn’t constitute cheating.
aloha
LD
Steve Earle: Hurtin’ Me, Hurtin’ You. “I’m just hurting me when I’m hurting you”. Hmmm…
You’re not a beauty, but hey you’re alright…
I heard somewhere that Clapton’s “Wonderful Tonight” was a slightly sarcastic ode to Patti Boyd taking too long to getting dressed. As in “Yeah, yeah, you look wonderful. Can we go now?”.
And the Gin Blossom come right out with it on “Cheatin'”:
“You can’t call it cheatin’ / cause she reminds me of you”. Co-written by the suicide guy, so let that be a cautionary tale.
I wanna get with you (Only you girl)
And your sister
I think her name is Debra
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwXeCuhEch8&feature=related
I’ve brought this up before but I Just Wanna Be With You by the Raspberries has the unintentionally creepy lyrics “If you believe what we’re doing is right close your eyes and be still”
More seriously, Townsman Massimo once pointed out the inane, unintentional WTF-ness of the hit “love ballad” by General Hospital’s Jack Wagner, entitled “All I Need,” inwhich Jack says:
All I need is a little more time, to be sure what I feel isn’t all in my mind — ’cause it seems so hard to believe that you’re all I need.
… That’s a love song?!
Oh, right – I successfully forgot about that.
I always thought “Wild World” had a more-than-innocuous amount of infantilization in it.