Acoustic Love Songs... Without or with Leonard

tomsakic · Post by **tomsakic** » Tue Dec 13, 2005 1:40 pm

Now, here's a CD I felt Leonard would be appropriate to its title. Bu nothing... or did it? Not Madeleine... It's not Bob neither... Nor Damien Rice... Ah, that Jeff-boy again!

It's released from Warner Music, and pretty well-sold these days in this part of Europe(I guess, nice Christmas gift), although it seems it's Australian product (Warner Australasia), and it's not available in US or UK.

Disc: 1
1. James Blunt - You're Beautiful
2. David Gray - Sail Away
3. Maroon 5 - She Will Be Loved
4. Madeleine Peyroux - Always A Use
5. Stephen Fretwell - Emily
6. Joseph Arthur - A Smile That Explodes
7. Joan Armatrading - Love And Affection
8. Paul Weller - Wild Wood
9. John Legend - Ordinary People
10. Sixpence None The Richer - Kiss Me Acoustic Version
11. Extreme - More Than Words
12. Eva Cassidy - Over The Rainbow
13. Wilco - Someone Else's Song
14. Everything But The Girl - I Don't Want To Talk About It
15. Morcheeba - Otherwise
16. Edwina Hayes - I Want Your Love
17. Beth Nielsen Chapman - Sand And Water
18. Bob Dylan - Love Minus Zero
19. Jeff Buckley - Hallelujah

Disc: 2
1. Daniel Powter - Bad Day
2. Damien Rice - Cannonball
3. Dido - Thank You
4. Jack Johnson - Good People
5. Natalie Imbruglia - Wishing I Was Here
6. R.E.M. - Nightswimming
7. Madeleine Peyroux - Hey Sweet Man
8. Gordon Haskell - How Wonderful You Are
9. Aqualung - Strange & Beautiful
10. Muse - Unintended
11. Magnet - Lay Lady Lay
12. The Connells - 74-75
13. Keisha White - The Weakness In Me
14. Labi Siffre - Something Inside So Strong
15. Harry Chapin - Cats In The Cradle
16. Tim Buckley - Song To A Siren
17. Jackson Browne - Sky Blue And Black
18. Jewel - You Were Meant For Me
19. Lou Reed - Perfect Day Live

tomsakic · Post by **tomsakic** » Tue Dec 13, 2005 1:56 pm

This label "No 1 UK Album" led me to deeper searching - for the matter of fact, it is released in UK under title Acoustic Love and with different cover:

Ghoti · Post by **Ghoti** » Wed Dec 14, 2005 1:43 pm

Not a compilitaion I'll be running out to buy too quick. Some decent songs but on the whole not a great selection; for one thing Perfect day is certinly no love song!

jerry · Post by **jerry** » Thu Dec 15, 2005 9:37 pm

This isn't a love song?

Perfect Day

Just a perfect day
drink Sangria in the park
And then later
when it gets dark, we go home

Just a perfect day
feed animals in the zoo
Then later
a movie, too, and then home

Oh, it's such a perfect day
I'm glad I spend it with you
Oh, such a perfect day
You just keep me hanging on
You just keep me hanging on

Just a perfect day
problems all left alone
Weekenders on our own
it's such fun

Just a perfect day
you made me forget myself
I thought I was
someone else, someone good

Oh, it's such a perfect day
I'm glad I spent it with you
Oh, such a perfect day
You just keep me hanging on
You just keep me hanging on

You're going to reap just what you sow

Diane · Post by **Diane** » Thu Dec 15, 2005 11:15 pm

"it's such a perfect day
I'm glad I spent it with you"

Sounds like a love song to me, too, Jerry

Speaking of perfect, Eva Cassidy (who features on the album above) has a wonderful voice and is, I think, pitch perfect, something achieved by few other singers. Barbra Streisand was another I think.

I just looked up and found a list of pitch perfect musicians:

Absolute pitch, widely referred to as perfect pitch, refers to the ability to identify a note by name without the benefit of a reference note, or to be able to produce a note (as in singing) that is the correct pitch without reference.

Julie Andrews
Lera Auerbach
Johann Sebastian Bach
Béla Bartók
Ludwig van Beethoven
Leonard Bernstein
Michelle Branch
Bumblefoot
Mariah Carey
Frédéric Chopin
Nat King Cole
Bing Crosby
Chevy Chase
Miles Davis
Mia Farrow
Charly García
Glenn Gould
George Frideric Handel
Jascha Heifetz
Jimi Hendrix
Erich Wolfgang Korngold
Phil Lesh
Yo-Yo Ma
Yngwie Malmsteen
Spike Milligan
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Jay Nordlinger
Niccolò Paganini
André Previn
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
Camille Saint-Saëns
Yair Shachak
Arnold Schönberg
Paul Shaffer
Frank Sinatra
Phil Spector
Barbra Streisand
Brian Wilson
Yanni

tomsakic · Post by **tomsakic** » Fri Dec 16, 2005 12:52 pm

I think that common belief is that "Perfeft Day" is song about suicide. In ay case it is the most depressing song I ever heard.

Ghoti · Post by **Ghoti** » Fri Dec 16, 2005 6:41 pm

I have to agree with tom. I hadn't heard about suicide but it is certainly about heroin addiction. It's also a lot about dependance (on anything) - you only reap what you sow, it's really quite sad; he says "You just keep me hanging on" with such anguish and it's laced with bitterness when you realise what it is he's talking about.

Tchocolatl · Post by **Tchocolatl** » Fri Dec 16, 2005 7:48 pm

Nobody said "happy love songs" to begin with. Love songs are often sad.

I do not say I have the truth, but really, for me Perfect Day seems just a song to someone not to something. Maybe this heroin thing is because he was addict and because he wrote other songs with double meaning.

See there :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_Day
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lou_Reed

Or in this case the double meaning is more foggy than in Leonard Cohen's Famous Blue Raincoat.

I say this because I cannot figure out how one can do something with and addiction while I see very well how an addiction can make you do things.

Like in this example :

It is not like for Elliot Smith's between the bars

drink up, baby, stay up all night
the things you could do, you won't but you might
the potential you'll be that you'll never see
the promises you'll only make
drink up with me now and forget all about the pressure of days
do what i say and i'll make you okay and drive them away
the images stuck in your head
people you've been before that you don't want around anymore
that push and shove and won't bend to your will
i'll keep them still
drink up, baby, look at the stars, i'll kiss you again
between the bars where i'm seeing you
there with your hands in the air waiting to finally be caught
drink up one more time and i'll make you mine
keep you apart deep in my heart separate from the rest
where i like you the best
and keep the things you forgot
the people you've been before that you don't want around anymore
that push and shove and won't bend to your will
i'll keep them still

***
But I'm not Lou Reed of course. It may have been different for him.

Tchocolatl · Post by **Tchocolatl** » Fri Dec 16, 2005 10:10 pm

It struck me how the two above songs are childish. If one does not know the music and the context, if one removes the word "Sangria" also, one could think it is written by a child expressing how much he needs to be taken care of by nurturing parental figures.

And how lonely they are and how they are suffering.

It brakes my heart.

It seems to me that Leonard Cohen's songs are more mature. Or less helpless? Maybe this is why I never feel desperate when I listen to them.

***

They say that addictions covered only other deep unconscious emotional problems.

It is a mean for people who suffer to escape their suffering. At the beginning it works. But because (and/or if) the problem is not solved but covered, the addictive behavior adds only to the pain, in the long run.

***

It is so very different than the energy (soothing the pain) I feel when I listen to my favourite Leonard Cohen's songs.

Diane · Post by **Diane** » Sat Dec 17, 2005 2:22 am

'Perfect Day' was played a lot around the time I spent an exceptionally memorable day horseriding and boating in Dorset with friends, and it will always remind me of that day. I had no idea it might be about addiction.

(Tchoc, what you say about those lyrics and about the difference to LC songs is interesting, I will come back to that.)

Diane

Tchocolatl · Post by **Tchocolatl** » Sun Dec 18, 2005 2:06 am

Diane,

"It brakes my heart. "

I guess I meant that it did stop me in my track, or something like that.

There is no "proof" it is about heroin addiction. For me, I can't see any trace of this in the song, sincerely. It seems so naturally speaking about a perfect day between lovers.

Maybe people who saw this addiction thing never really been in love of their entire life? I don't know, as I never been and heroin addict, so I guess they could say the same about me. But anyway, usually, metaphors about addiction always disclose the dark side of the situation. There is any here. The final "You're going to reap just what you sow" seems to me that he will do the same for his lover, caring etc.