Imagine John Lennon

 

I've heard the song a million times over and then more but I never really understood what John Lennon was saying until I watched Glee. I know what the song is all about and I know how wonderful the lyrics are but they just didn't sink deep enough for me to contemplate on the words until now, after I've read The Celestine Prophecy, Future Shock, Paulo Coelho's works, Being Happy and watched thought provoking movies and documentaries.

I guess back then when I was a staunch Christian I found the lyrics offensive because the opening line is Imagine there's no heaven. Lo and behold how can anyone can that, I remember the brief discussion we had regarding the song. The next line It's easy if you try is a suggestion which most people might find insignificant and yet the hardest thing to do. People with a strong and indisputable set of beliefs will not even want to budge an inch with new thoughts or ideas.

No hell below us follows and may sound just as ridiculous in the eyes and ears of religions because that's what faith is all about; that you will be saved from the damnation of hell. And then Above us only sky is the next line that describes the simplicity of life and existence. I wonder how many of us actually take our time to look at the sky and see its beauty than preconceiving the idea of paradise all the time.

Imagine all the people living for today is the message we all need to know so that we don't get carried away planning so far ahead that we forget to live the right here and now. Motivational books, songs, prose and poems have all done their part in reminding us about the importance of the present rather than the past or the future.

In today's madness and chaos to Imagine there's no country, and It isn't hard to do is so true. Everyone's tired and had enough of their government's double standards, corruptions and responsibilities toward its citizens. The concept of patriotism is losing its grip on nations and may soon be a thing of the past. Nothing to kill or die for is the one thing we still haven't learnt from our repeated mistakes. People are still so angry about so many things in life that the only way to solve a problem is to kill or be killed, or so the media is auto suggesting this to them. The series of awakening people are going through of late are helping them grasp the idea that And no religion to is all right. That one need not fear being struck by the right hand of God or be punished for the next 7 generations if they don't want to commit themselves to a sect or an institution.

Imagine all the people living life in peace is probably the hardest of all to imagine when the whole world is toppling over with massacres, demonstrations, wars and political upheavals. It is almost as though it is unsafe to be around any human beings.

You may say I'm a dreamer, But I'm not the only one is the most optimistic verse to remind you that even as idyllic as it may sound, you're not alone. And if there are only 5 of us we can still make a difference.

I hope someday you'll join us is an invitation to hope, And the world will be as one is the dream of a happy man. That is the basic truth. If we are happy we want to share it with our neighbors and friends with no ill will or suspicion.

This maxim I keep reading about 'rich people are not bad people' is sounding more like a justification than the truth. Of course we all know for a fact that being rich doesn't make you atrocious or evil but it can be a pretty nasty distraction in your life. When it is easy to dispose off money we tend to accumulate and think very little of the world we live in, especially the environment, the discrepancies of wealth and the idea of being independent and self sufficient. Imagine no possession, I wonder if you can says so much about how we claim everything for ourselves and become obsessed with them.

No need for greed, no hunger sums it all up about the ego we breed within ourselves. The animal that always wants more to survive when it is really not necessary. Of brotherhood of man is the beautiful concept of we are all the same wherever we go. And if everyone believes this to be true than we can all go so far we would be above the pettiness and aggravations of life.

My friends and I had a friendly game of Texas Poker last night and we used folded paper stars for betting. When one of us ran low or out of stars those with more contributed them back to the ones in need. This simple and yet profound understanding of sharing is in this line Imagine all the people sharing all the world. Is this even possible? If you can share a meal, share a shelter, share your friendliness, share your love, you can share anything.

You may say I'm a dreamer,
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one

This is the final curtain call for people of like-minded and like-hearted to find this amazing treasure call 'peace' that lives in us. It is not in the accumulation of things, not the beauty we measure with the yardstick of comparisons, not the perfection we seek in some tangible or non tangible perception but the forgiving, loving and everlasting energy inside us. When we are at peace with ourselves everything else will fall into place and by then we don't need to imagine any longer.

In These Times with Joan Armatrading

Before Tracy Chapman there was Joan Armatrading.

I've always remembered Armatrading for the bizarre name and song 'Love and Affection'. It was only recently that the song 'I'm Lucky' came sneaking back into my head that I recalled those days when I used to listen to her.

After digging up my good old collection I played her songs again and all the days of my past came flooding back. That's the wonder of songs, how they can bring back the times that marked the days of tears and laughter, youth and innocence.

When I hear The Weakness in Me I feel helpless just as I do when I hear Torn Between Two Lovers by Mary McGregor. She sings about being in love with two persons and the inability to choose. And then with Me, Myself, I, she makes being alone a wonderful experience instead of the usual melancholy associted with it. And who can forget the upbeat disco-ey Drop The Pilot that makes you want to dance and groove like the good old days.

And for such a great singer, songwriter and guitarist she was only nominated for the Grammy thrice and that was it. How can no one recognize such talent and overlook her? Is it because she is British? It's such a shame! And up until now she is still actively writing and performing.



www.joanarmatrading.com/

Na Na Na Nancy Nova

I only saw her once on TV performing No No No and that visual stuck to my head forever until now. With the help of technology I found her again on Youtube.



Her performance was so bizarre and the song was so catchy I couldn't help but love her style and song. She, to me, is in the same league as Kate Bush and Toyah Wilcox. Though not as popular as the other two she really made an impression on me when I was a kid looking for heroes. Her tongue-in-cheek song 'Made in Japan' is also another one of her signature tunes. They sure don't make them like they used to.

Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered all over again

The first time I heard this song was when I was a kid which meant nothing at all. And then Rod Stewart and Cher came along with a mischievous, rollicking rendition which made me fall in love with it. But it wasn't until I watched Pal Joey that drove the nail straight to my heart. Suddenly this song is all over my head every now and then it comes to bother me.

This witty song written by Lorenz Hart and Richard Rodgers in 1940 is an evergreen with quaint and memorable lyrics. There are some variations to the lyrics because of the sexual connotations depending on who is singing it. Not matter who's version it is it still sounds sensual, romantic and absolutely beautiful.


After one whole quart of brandy
Like a daisy, I'm awake
With no Bromo-Seltzer handy
I don't even shake

Men are not a new sensation
I've done pretty well I think
But this half-pint imitation
Put me on the blink

I'm wild again, beguiled again
A simpering, whimpering child again
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered - am I

Couldn't sleep and wouldn't sleep
When love came and told me, I shouldn't sleep (Until I could sleep where I shouldn't sleep)
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered - am I

Lost my heart, but what of it
He is cold I agree
He can laugh, but I love it
Although the laugh's on me

I'll sing to him, each spring to him
And long, for the day when I'll cling to him
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered - am I

He's a fool and don't I know it
But a fool can have his charms
I'm in love and don't I show it
Like a babe in arms

Love's the same old sad sensation
Lately I've not slept a wink
Since this half-pint imitation
Put me on the blink

I've sinned a lot, I'm mean a lot
But I'm like sweet seventeen a lot
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered - am I

I'll sing to him, each spring to him
And worship the trousers that cling to him
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered - am I

When he talks, he is seeking
Words to get off his chest
Horizontally speaking, he's at his very best

Vexed again, perplexed again
Thank God, I can be oversexed again
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered - am I

Wise at last, my eyes at last,
Are cutting you down to your size at last
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered - no more

Burned a lot, but learned a lot
And now you are broke, so you earned a lot
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered - no more

Couldn't eat, was dispeptic
Life was so hard to bear
Now my heart's antiseptic
Since you moved out of there

Romance, finis.
Your chance, finis.
Those ants that invaded my pants, finis.
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered - no more

I Dream of Susan Boyle

Ever since I saw her on Britain's Got Talent she instantly became one of my most inspirational icons. Everytime I watch her audition I am moved to tears with her simplicity and down to earth jocularity. Her powerful voice coupled with what little she has in physical appearnce made the song I Dreamed a Dream an anthem for anyone who has ever had a dream.

The overnight sensation of her magnificent voice left everyone who loved her hungering for more. This album marks her debut as a professional singer with songs that bring out the best of her voice but I wished they could have been a better selection.

Her rendiditon of the anthemic Les Miserables song is somehow lost in the latest album arrangement. It just doesn't have the heart it had when she sang it on the TV show. Now, it seems more like a recording which is too rigid and controlled.

I like her version of Daydream Believer, Wild Horses and You'll See. If only they had left her alone to sing with all her sincerity and natural ability I feel it would have been a better album. Too much perfection has been emphasized in this debut which makes her lose the authenticity of who she is. Still, it's a good album to have if you want to hear the voice of an angel.

A Whiter Shade of Sadness: A Whiter Shade of Pale

 

 

I heard this song like a millions times over but never really liked it until Annie Lennox gave her sexy, sultry rendition. I guess I didn't quite like it back then when Procol Harem sang it because it seemed so sad and depressing. And in the 60s and 70s when the songs were depressing they could bring you all the way down to the ground.

And then in the 90s Annie Lennox came up with a brilliant album Medusa where she did covers and this was one of the better ones. But it is just as wistful to listen to if you do it once too often. Now, there's another version by Paul Potts with his operatic tenor interpretation which is absolutely beautiful. I've never really sung to this song nor did I pay much attention to the lyrics. So after all these years since it was first released in 1967 I am just looking into the words that make it such a nostalgic and engaging song. The Hammond organ line was inspired by Johann Sebastian Bach's Sleeper's Awake and Air on a G string and it is written by Keith Reid.

As the song goes:

We skipped the light fandango
turned cartwheels 'cross the floor
I was feeling kinda seasick
but the crowd called out for more
The room was humming harder
as the ceiling flew away
When we called out for another drink
the waiter brought a tray

And so it was that later
as the miller told his tale
that her face, at first just ghostly,
turned a whiter shade of pale
She said, 'There is no reason
and the truth is plain to see.'
But I wandered through my playing cards
and would not let her be
one of sixteen vestal virgins
who were leaving for the coast
and although my eyes were open
they might have just as well've been closed

She said, 'I'm home on shore leave,'
though in truth we were at sea
so I took her by the looking glass
and forced her to agree
saying, 'You must be the mermaid
who took Neptune for a ride.'
But she smiled at me so sadly
that my anger straightway died

If music be the food of love
then laughter is its queen
and likewise if behind is in front
then dirt in truth is clean
My mouth by then like cardboard
seemed to slip straight through my head
So we crash-dived straightway quickly
and attacked the ocean bed 

The verses in green are not available in recordings but heard in concerts.

Jim Steinman: He's what it means to be Young

 

The first time I heard Tonight is what it means to be young was in the movie Streets of Fire. I was amazed with the epic sounding orchestral music score with poetically written lyrics that I just had to have more of the same. It was only years later that I discovered that the song was written and composed by Jim Steinman, the man behind Meatloaf's Bat Out of Hell albums. Never have I had the experience with songs that seem to cramp mouthful of words into a sentence with the rise and fall of varied verses, bridges and choruses.

I love the way Steinman play with words, puns, alliteration, onomatopoeia and paronomasia. The exceptionally extra long titles make it more memorable than most songs I can remember.

Making Love out of nothing at all was one of his earlier songs made popular by Air Supply and redone again by Bonnie Tyler with her operatic version. Of course who could forget the outrageously titled songs like Total Eclipse of the Heart to I would do anything for Love but I won’t do that and Loving you's a dirty job but somebody's got to do it. It's all coming back to me now made popular by Celine Dion and Meatloaf is inspired by Emily Bronte's novel Wuthering Heights.

Steinmen has been involved with musicals ranging from The Dream Engine to Whistle down the Wind to the unrealized Batman: The Musical, Tanz der Vampire and the soon to be seen Jim Steinman's Bat out of Hell. Anticipating Steinmen is like waiting for a spectacular event that has yet to happen.

There were times when we took our chances
There were times we were damn good dancers
There were times when we heard all the answers
In the beating of the drummer and the riches of the rock and the roll
- Loving you's a dirty job


Will you cater to every fantasy I've got?
Will you hose me down with holy water, if I get too hot? Hot!
Will you take me places I've never known?

Now I can do that! Oh oh now, I can do that!

After awhile you'll forget everything.
It was a brief interlude
And a midsummer night's fling,
And you'll see that it's time to move on.

I won't do that. I won't do that.
- I would do anything for love