This week the post is coming from South Africa. Wonderful fresh spring weather, good food and wine accompanying me in beautiful Cape Town. I am keeping the bla bla part short this week cause I still have to discover if the water goes down the drain in the opposite direction in the southern hemisphere :)...
As Roy Ayers once said;
"The true beauty of music is that it connects people.
It carries a message, and we, the musicians, are the messengers."
And now here are the 5 songs for this weekend directly from South Africa;
Dollar Brand (Abdullah Ibrahim) - "African Marketplace"
Jonathan Butler - "Lies"
Miriam Makeba - "Pata Pata"
Hugh Masekela - "Don't Go Lose It Baby"
Zahara - "Mgodi"
Hope you have a great weekend.
nb. You can open the actual youtube page by clicking the name on the upper left side of each video.
I am happy to see that you are listening to the cover songs I am choosing for you and posting your comments on different platforms. Keep up the good work please. This week I am picking a song that I really like very much and the 3 covers below are quite different than one another, so I guess it will be a fun list.
Our song for today is:
"Heart of Glass"
Blondie members Debbie Harry and Chris Stein (who were a couple) wrote the first version of this song in early 1974, shortly after they first met. They didn't have a proper title for the song, and would refer to it as "The Disco Song." Harry explained on the show Words and Music: "Lyrically, it was about a stalker who was pursuing me, and Chris saved me from him."
It wasn't until they recorded this song in 1978 that Stein came up with the title "Heart Of Glass." He didn't know that it was also the title of a 1976 German movie directed by Werner Herzog.
Featured on the band's third studio album, Parallel Lines (1978), it was released as the album's third single in January 1979 and reached number one on the charts in several countries, including the United States and the United Kingdom.
In December 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the song number 255 on its list of the 500 greatest songs of all time. It was ranked at number 259 when the list was updated in April 2010. Slant Magazine placed it at number 42 on their list of the greatest dance songs of all time and Pitchfork named it the 18th best song of the 1970s.
In 2018, "Heart of Glass" ranked at number 66 in the UK's official list of biggest selling singles of all-time with sales of 1.32 million copies.
A funny anecdote on the lyrics;
Finding words to rhyme to "glass" that fit in a song can be... a pain in the ass.
In the last chorus, following "Once I had a love and it was a gas," Debbie Harry takes a different tack, singing "Soon turned out to be a pain in the ass." This is a key line in the song, since the singer has now realized that this relationship is more trouble than it's worth, and that her heart of glass might be more durable than she thought.
Unfortunately, American radio was generally ass-free at this time, so to ensure airplay stations were sent an edited version with the offending line replaced with "soon turned out I had a heart of glass."
The beats were made with a Roland drum machine (a CR78) and you may watch the details of the production in the bonus video at the end of the post.
Here are the 3 versions I chose for you;
Nouvelle Vague - "Heart Of Glass"
The Bad Plus - "Heart Of Glass"
Gisele & Bob Sinclar - "Heart of Glass"
One small note to the male followers, it is imperative that you concentrate on the music while making your choices and comments 😅...
And here is the bonus video about the production of the original song.
Now the floor is yours, go ahead and make your comments (here, Instagram, Facebook wherever you feel like...).
nb. Please note that I intentionally do not include the original versions of the songs as it would be a little unfair to the artists covering the songs, and I am sure that sometimes you will be surprised to see that the songs you thought were the originals are just covers...
Almost everyone seems a bit depressed due to the fact that summer is ending. But I can propose something that might cheer you up during these autumn days and that is to check the winter season program announcements of the venues, concert halls, jazz clubs , theater halls and art galleries that you like to visit. Believe me , wherever you are, you will find many nice concerts, shows and exhibitions and they will keep you warm till next summer...
As Berthold Auerbach once said;
"Music washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life."
And now here is our list for this weekend;
Daniel Johnston - "True Love Will Find You In The End" - [RIP Daniel]
Brazzos & O.K. JAZZ - "Cha Cha Cha del Zombo"
Terry Riley & Kronos Quartet - "Planet Elf Sindoori"
Balthazar - "Fever"
Ziggy Marley- "True To Myself"
Hope you have a great weekend.
nb. You can open the actual youtube page by clicking the name on the upper left side of each video.
Already a month passed since I started the new series on the blog. I am grateful to you as I am receiving comments under the posts meaning that I am not the only one on the blog... Keep up the good work about comments and keep me motivated...
Our song for today is:
"All Along the Watchtower"
This is a song written and recorded by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan. The song initially appeared on his 1967 album John Wesley Harding, and it has been included on most of Dylan's subsequent greatest hits compilations. Since the late 1970s, he has performed it in concert more than any of his other songs.
Dylan recorded "All Along the Watchtower" on November 6, 1967, at Columbia Studio A in Nashville, Tennessee, the same studio where he had completed Blonde on Blonde in the spring of the previous year. Accompanying Dylan, who played acoustic guitar and harmonica, were two Nashville veterans from the Blonde on Blonde sessions, Charlie McCoy on bass guitar and Kenneth Buttrey on drums. The producer was Bob Johnston, who produced Dylan's two previous albums, Highway 61 Revisited in 1965 and Blonde on Blonde in 1966.
Here are the 3 versions I chose for you;
The Jimi Hendrix Experience - "All Along The Watchtower"
Bryan Ferry - "All Along the Watchtower"
Dave Matthews Band - "All Along The Watchtower"
Now the floor is yours, go ahead and make your comments (here, Instagram, Facebook wherever you feel like...).
But before that here is a bonus for my generation that is out of the competition...
U2 - "All Along The Watchtower"
nb. Please note that I intentionally do not include the original versions of the songs as it would be a little unfair to the artists covering the songs, and I am sure that sometimes you will be surprised to see that the songs you thought were the originals are just covers...
Welcome to the 44th post of "Five Songs for the Weekend". I have shared more than 200 songs with you under this title and I really hope you have found a song that you like so far. As you have already noticed by now, I am trying to pick the songs from various genres that could be amazing for a larger musical taste, well of course mine at the top :).
As Alphonse de Lamartine once said;
"Music is the literature of the heart;
it commences where speech ends."
So here is the list for this weekend;
Lana Del Rey - "Doin' Time"
Pixies - "On Graveyard Hill"
Blondie - "Heart Of Glass"
Moby - "Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?"
Philip Glass - "Einstein on the Beach"
Hope you have a great weekend.
nb. You can open the actual youtube page by clicking the name on the upper left side of each video.
