SLS ~ Canadian

Our musical host Jim Adams gives us the theme of Canadian this week. So many of the singers I love are Canadian it was hard to choose. I finally went with Jann Arden and her smash hit “Insensitive.” This song was written by Anne Loree and recorded by Jann in 1994 for her album Living Under June. The song did well, reaching No. 12 in the US and No. 1 in Canada and Australia. Anne says she wrote the song in a half hour while feeling broken-hearted from a romance.

Jann was born in Calgary in 1962. She was discovered by a talent agent and worked with him for 13 years. She’s been an actor as well as a singer and has written 4 memoirs, including one about taking care of her mom through Alzheimer’s. In 2018, Jann released an album, These Are The Days, with songs about difficult times. She also has a podcast and a TV show fictionalizing her life. [Wiki]

Insensitive

How do you cool your lips after a summer’s kiss?
How do you rid the sweat after the body bliss?
How do you turn your eyes from the romantic glare?
How do you block the sound
Of a voice you’d know anywhere?
Oh, I really should have known
By the time you drove me home
By the vagueness in your eyes, your casual goodbyes
By the chill in your embrace
The expression on your face, told me
Maybe, you might have some advice to give
On how to be insensitive, insensitive, ooh, insensitive
How do you numb your skin after the warmest touch?
How do you slow your blood after the body rush?
How do you free your soul after you’ve found a friend?
How do you teach your heart
It’s a crime to fall in love again?
Oh, you probably won’t remember me
It’s probably ancient history
I’m one of the chosen few
Who went ahead and fell for you
I’m out of vogue, I’m out of touch
I fell too fast I feel too much
I thought that you might have some advice to give
On how to be insensitive
Oh, I really should have known
By the time you drove me home
By the vagueness in your eyes, your casual goodbyes
By the chill in your embrace
The expression on your face that told me
Maybe, you might have some advice to give
On how to be insensitive (how to be)
Insensitive (how to be)
Insensitive (how to be)

~*~

©️2020 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted. Please check out Paula’s books for sale on Amazon.

Image Credit ~ Jim Adams

SLS ~ Contrasts

Thanks once again to our musical host Jim Adams for providing another great Song Lyric Sunday prompt. Today’s theme is contrasts and a tune that perfectly illustrates this concept is the funny theme song from Green Acres. This TV show featured a lawyer (played by Eddie Albert) who wanted to give up city life to become a rural farmer, and his glamorous wife (played by Eva Gabor) who missed the city.

Green Acres

Green Acres is the place to be.
Farm livin’ is the life for me.
Land spreadin’ out so far and wide.
Keep Manhattan, just give me that countryside.
New York is where I’d rather stay.
I get allergic smelling hay.
I just adore a penthouse view.
Dah-ling I love you but give me Park Avenue.
…The chores.
…The stores.
…Fresh air.
…Times Square.
You are my wife.
Good bye, city life.
Green Acres we are there.

source: http://www.lyricsondemand.com/tvthemes/greenacreslyrics.html

This song was written for the show in 1965 by Vic Mizzy. Green Acres ran for 6 seasons when it was dumped in the “rural purge.”

~*~

©️2020 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted. Please check out Paula’s books for sale on Amazon.

Image credit to Jim Adams

SLS ~ Song from a Musical

Thanks once again to our tuneful host Jim Adams for providing this week’s prompt. It’s a good one… perhaps too good. I kept going back and forth about which song to use, since there are so many musicals I love. Chicago, Fiddler, Sound of Music, My Fair Lady, Grease, Mamma Mia (1 & 2), Walk the Line, Footloose, etc. But I’m gonna go with Hair and one of my favorite songs from that show is “Easy To Be Hard.” The lyrics are evergreen, imo, targeting people who devote themselves to causes and neglect their own families.

This song came out in 1967 with the musical. It was written by Gail MacDermot, James Rado and Gerome Ragni, and it was sung by Lynn Kellogg in the role of Sheila on stage. In the movie version, it was sung by Cheryl Barnes (see vid). Three Dog Night covered it in their 1969 album Suitable for Framing. TDN’s version reached #4 on Billboard Hot 100 and was ranked 33 for that year (1969).

Easy To Be Hard

How can people be so heartless
How can people be so cruel
Easy to be hard
Easy to be cold

How can people have no feelings
How can they ignore their friends
Easy to be proud
Easy to say no

Especially people who care about strangers
Who care about evil and social injustice
Do you only care about being proud
How about I need a friend, I need a friend

How can people be so heartless
You know I’m hung up on you
Easy to be proud
Easy to say no […]

~*~

©️2020 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted. Please check out Paula’s books for sale on Amazon.

Image credit to Jim Adams

SLS ~ Cruel Evil Horrible Monster Wicked

Thanks go out to our musical host Jim Adams for continuing SLS each week. Today I chose “Ways to be Wicked” by Lone Justice. This is the title track from their 1985 debut album and the lyrics were written by Tom Petty and Mike Campbell. The album didn’t do very well, possibly due to overhype (according to Wikipedia). The song is interesting though…

Ways to be Wicked

Honey, why you always smile
When you see me hurt so bad
Tell me what I did to you, babe
That could make you act like that

Well, I’ve been your fool before, honey
Yeah and I probably will again
‘Cause you ain’t afraid to let me have it
No, you ain’t afraid to stick it in

Well, you know so many
Ways to be wicked
Oh, but you don’t know one little thing about love

I can take a little pain
Yeah, I can hold it pretty well
I can watch your little eyes light up
While you’re walking me through hell

Well, I’ve been your fool before, honey
Yeah, I probably will again
‘Cause you ain’t afraid to let me have it
No, you ain’t afraid to stick it in

Well you know so many
Ways to be wicked
But you don’t know one little thing about love

Those cobra eyes
Light with a smile
Baby, you take pride
In the devil down inside

Well, I can take a little pain
Yeah, I can hold it pretty well
I can watch your little eyes light up
While you’re walking me through hell

Well, I’ve been your fool before, honey
Yeah, and I probably will again
You ain’t afraid to let me have it
No, you ain’t afraid to stick it in

Well, you know so many
Ways to be wicked
Oh, but you don’t know one little thing about love

Well, you know so many
Ways to be wicked
Yeah, but you don’t know one little, one little thing about love

Yeah, you know so many
Ways to be wicked
But you don’t know one little thing about love

~*~

©️2020 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted. Please check out Paula’s books for sale on Amazon.

Image credit ~ Jim Adams

SLS ~ Above/Below/Between

Thanks go out to our host Jim Adams for continuing this fun musical prompt. Today I choose 1999’s “She’s So High” by Tal Bachman, a song that includes the line “she’s so high above me,” repeatedly.

Talmage Charles Robert “Tal” Bachman, 52 years old, lives in Victoria, BC, and he is the son of Canadian rocker Randy Bachman of The Guess Who and Bachman-Turner Overdrive. Some good musical genes going on there. Wikipedia has various interesting nuggets about Tal’s life, but the one that appeals to me the most is that he is a huge fan of key lime pie. When his favorite place for the dessert dumped KLP from the menu, Tal began a successful public campaign for the pie’s return. Now this is the kind of activism I can fully support!

“She’s So High” is from Tal’s debut album and the song reached number one in Canada. It was also a top 10 hit in the U.S. BMI gave Tal the song of the year award for this gem. His second album didn’t do as well and he put out a new one in 2019 under the ‘nym Ian Starglow. Here are the lyrics to today’s selection.

She’s So High

She’s blood, flesh, and bone
No tucks or silicone
She’s touch, smell, sight, taste, and soundBut somehow I can’t believe
That anything should happen
I know where I belong
And nothing’s gonna happen
Yeah, yeah’Cause she’s so high
High above me, she’s so lovely
She’s so high
Like Cleopatra, Joan of Arc, or Aphrodite
Doo, doo, doo, doo, doo
She’s so high, high above meFirst class and fancy free
She’s high society
She’s got the best of everythingWhat could a guy like me
Ever really offer?
She’s perfect as she can be
Why should I even bother?’Cause she’s so high
High above me, she’s so lovely
She’s so high
Like Cleopatra, Joan of Arc, or Aphrodite
Doo, doo, doo, doo, doo
She’s so high, high above meShe comes to speak to me
I freeze immediately
‘Cause what she says sounds so unreal’Cause somehow I can’t believe
That anything should happen
I know where I belong
And nothing’s gonna happen
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah’Cause she’s so high
High above me, she’s so lovely
She’s so high
Like Cleopatra, Joan of Arc, or Aphrodite, oh yeah
She’s so high, high above me

~*~

©️2020 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted. Please check out Paula’s books for sale on Amazon.

Image credit to Jim Adams

SLS ~ Clear/Dark/Light

Thanks once again to our host Jim Adams for a great set of prompts. I’m going to the dark side with Leonard Cohen’s “Darkness.” He wrote the lyrics. This is a track from his 2012 album Old Ideas and the entire album is wonderful.

Darkness

I caught the darkness, it was drinking from your cup
I caught the darkness drinking from your cup
I said is this contagious?
You said just drink it up.
I got no future,
I know my days are few
The present’s not that pleasant
Just a lot of things to do
I thought the past would last me
But the darkness got that too
I shoulda seen it coming
It was right behind your eyes
You were young and it was summer
I just had to take a dive
When I knew was easy, the darkness was the price.
I don’t smoke no cigarette, I don’t drink no alcohol
I ain’t had much loving yet
But that’s always been your call
Hey I don’t miss it baby
I got no taste for anything at all
I used to love the rainbow
And I used to love the view
Another early morning, I’d pretend that it was you
But I caught the darkness baby
And I got it worse than you
I caught the darkness, it was drinking from your cup
I caught the darkness, drinking from your cup
I said is this contagious?
You said just drink it up

~*~

©️2020 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted. Please check out Paula’s books for sale on Amazon.

Image credit ~ Jim Adams

SLS ~ Harmonica in Song

It’s another great prompt from our Song Lyric Sunday host Jim Adams! There are so many wonderful songs with a harmonica, but I think it’s been a while since I’ve featured something from the Boss.

“Promised Land” is the song I chose. Bruce Springsteen wrote it and it’s on his 1978 album Darkness at the Edge of Town. Bruce wrote the song during a trip to Utah and Nevada after Elvis Presley died. Elvis was one of Bruce’s heroes. Bruce suggested that the message of the song is the need to lose one’s illusions of a life without limitations while still holding onto a sense of the possibilities. [Wikipedia]

The Promised Land

On a rattlesnake speedway in the Utah desert
I pick up my money and head back into town
Driving cross the Waynesboro county line
I got the radio on and I’m just killing time
Working all day in my daddy’s garage
Driving all night, chasing some mirage
Pretty soon little girl I’m gonna take charge

The dogs on main street howl
‘Cause they understand
If I could take one moment into my hands
Mister, I ain’t a boy, no, I’m a man
And I believe in a promised land

I’ve done my best to live the right way
I get up every morning and go to work each day
But your eyes go blind and your blood runs cold
Sometimes I feel so weak I just want to explode
Explode and tear this old town apart
Take a knife and cut this pain from my heart
Find somebody itching for something to start

The dogs on main street howl
‘Cause they understand
If I could reach one moment into my hands
Mister, I ain’t a boy, no, I’m a man
And I believe in a promised land

Well there’s a dark cloud rising from the desert floor
I packed my bags and I’m heading straight into the storm
Gonna be a twister to blow everything down
That ain’t got the faith to stand its ground
Blow away the dreams that tear you apart
Blow away the dreams that break your heart
Blow away the lies that leave you nothing but lost and brokenhearted

The dogs on main street howl
‘Cause they understand
If I could take one moment into my hands
Mister, I ain’t a boy, no, I’m a man
And I believe in a promised land
And I believe in a promised land
And I believe in a promised land

~*~

©️2020 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted. Please check out Paula’s books for sale on Amazon.

Photo credit ~ Jim Adams

SLS ~ Acquire/Collect/Gather/Secure

Thanks again to Jim Adams, our Song Lyric Sunday host. Today’s prompts were tough for me, but then I asked my daughters for help. They came up with “Jar of Hearts,” which is perfect and contains “collecting.”

This is the 2010 debut sing from American singer Christina Perri. It was first played on So You Think You Can Dance and appears on her first album Lovestrong. Perri wrote the song, along with co-writers Drew Lawrence and Barrett Yeretsian. It’s based on a real-life experience of Perri’s. The song sold 47,500 in its first week on iTunes. It peaked in the US at 17 and went to 4 in the UK.

Jar of Hearts

I know I can’t take one more step towards you
‘Cause all that’s waiting is regret
Don’t you know I’m not your ghost anymore
You lost the love I loved the most
I learned to live, half alive
And now you want me one more time
And who do you think you are?
Runnin’ ’round leaving scars
Collecting your jar of hearts
And tearing love apart
You’re gonna catch a cold
From the ice inside your soul
Don’t come back for me
Who do you think you are?
I hear you’re asking all around
If I am anywhere to be found
But I have grown too strong
To ever fall back in your arms
I’ve learned to live, half alive
And now you want me one more time
And who do you think you are?
Runnin’ ’round leaving scars
Collecting your jar of hearts
And tearing love apart
You’re gonna catch a cold
From the ice inside your soul
Don’t come back for me
Who do you think you are?
Did take so long just to feel alright
Remember how to put back the light in my eyes
I wish I had missed the first time that we kissed
‘Cause you broke all your promises
And now you’re back
You don’t get to get me back
And who do you think you are?
Runnin’ ’round leaving scars
Collecting your jar of hearts
And tearing love apart
You’re gonna catch a cold
From the ice inside your soul
Don’t come back for me
Don’t come back at all

~*~

©️2020 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted. Please check out Paula’s books for sale on Amazon.

Image credits ~ Jim Adams

SLS ~ Different/Same

Happy Sunday! It’s going to be a great day because I’m going up to Los Angeles to visit MY NEWBORN GRANDSON! Oh, and I will be seeing his sister, his mommy, and his daddy too. Want to hear an amazing coinkydink? Don Henley was born on July 22 just like this adorable little boy I’m going to meet today. Don turned 73 last week and sadly I’ve never met him. Next best thing though ~ a song to celebrate! Jim Adams, our wonderful SLS host, gave us “same/different” and luckily Don has one that fits this theme.

As everyone knows, Don is a founding member of the Eagles, but he also has some wonderful solo stuff too. The song for today “Everything Is Different Now” is from Don’s fourth solo album Inside Job released in 2000. The album reached #7 on the charts, but none of the songs did that well. Regardless, I like this one… it’s happy/sad, as things sometimes are when they change dramatically…

Everything Is Different Now

I hate to tell you this, but I’m very, very happy
And I know that’s not what you’d expect from me at all
I’m not the kind to smile and bow out gracefully
I always wanted to take it to the wall

But I found somebody with a heart as big as Texas
I found an angel with the golden wings
She saw me down here in the dark somehow
And everything is different now

Yeah, I miss the old crowd sometimes
And the wild, wild nights of running
You know, a starving soul can’t live like that for long
You go around in circles that just keep getting smaller
You wake up one morning and half your life is gone

I got so tired of that, I got so lonely
I dropped down and I called out to Heaven
“Send me someone to love.”
And Heaven shot back, “You get the love that you allow.”
And everything is different now

Oh, and it’s sweet to know
The wisdom that living brings
Since I got a telegram from the god of simple things

She said “I don’t care what you do for a living.”
She said “I don’t care what kind of car you drive.”
“All I want to know right now is what you believe in
And what it means to you to be alive
Will you stand here in this fire with me?
Are you ready for another life?”
So I bit that bullet, and took that vow
And everything is different now
Everything is different now

~*~

©️2020 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted. Please check out Paula’s books for sale on Amazon.

Image credit ~ Jim Adams

SLS ~ Baking/Bread/Cake/Pie/Picnic

Thanks go out to our tuneful host Jim Adams for giving us another great set of prompts (via Caramel). There were so many songs to choose from! I decided to reach waaay back into the archives for this fabulously fun song from Eileen Barton. Nope, I never heard of her either, but please give the video a whirl cuz I bet you will enjoy it. 😀

The song is titled “If I knew You Were Comin’, I’d’ve Baked a Cake,” and it’s not snarky but absolutely delightful. The writers are Al Hoffman, Bob Merrill, and Clem Watts. This song was first recorded by Eileen in 1950 and has had many covers. It was also in an episode of M*A*S*H. “If I Knew…” spent 15 weeks on the Billboard charts, hitting #1. (More info.)

Well, well, well, look who’s here.
I haven’t seen you in many a year.
If I knew you were comin’ I’d ‘ve baked a cake,
baked a cake, baked a cake.
If I knew you were comin’ I’d ‘ve baked a cake.
How-ja do. How-ja do, How-ja do.
Had you dropped me a letter I’d ‘ve hired a band,
grandest band in the land.
Had you dropped me a letter I’d ‘ve hired a band
and spread the welcome mat for you.
Now I don’t know where you came from
’cause I don’t know where you’ve been.
But it really doesn’t matter
grab a chair and fill your platter
and dig dig dig right in.
If I knew you were comin’ I’d ‘ve baked a cake,
hired a band, goodness sake.
If I knew you were comin’ I’d ‘ve baked a cake.
How-ja do. How-ja do. How-ja do.
If I knew you were comin’ I’d ‘ve baked a cake,
baked a cake, baked a cake.
If I knew you were comin’ I’d ‘ve baked a cake.
How-ja do. How-ja do, How-ja do. […]

https://youtu.be/G1wEVPqFFCg

~*~

©️2020 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted. Please check out Paula’s books for sale on Amazon.

Image credit – Jim Adams