Ooh Baby Wanna Love

(Post contains naughty words you may consider NSFW. Edited since first posted.)

A few weeks back I wrote about the subject matter of country song lyrics. Country was once a personal music, albeit focused on love and loss. Today’s country, while vastly more interesting musically, is stylized lyrically around a handful of tropes. The vulgarity of hip-hop and rap has been frequently discussed since the rise of those genres 25 years ago. The blues has always had its own language, and soul music expressed a particular take on the world as well. Yet even within their differences, we can guess that the various genres have a lot in common. Love songs, after all, are universal.

So we understand that genres differ, but we’ve never been able to see it graphically—at least not until now. Over at Last.FM, a researcher analyzed the lyrics of 240,000 songs from various genres and generated word clouds based on the words that occur most frequently. The words are sorted a couple of different ways. One way finds the words that occur most often within each genre (not including words that don’t carry significant meaning, such as and, for, I, and you). By this analysis, love and time occur most frequently across all genres, except in hip-hop and rap, where the biggest word in both clouds is nigga, which is the sort of fact that comments on itself.

The research also includes a set of clouds that shows which words are characteristic of each genre. These words are intended to be analogous to search terms. According to the researcher, they are ” the words which, if used as search terms for example, would be best at selecting songs from that genre correctly (true positives), while minimizing the number of songs retrieved from other genres (false positives).” It’s these clouds that are the most revealing about the intentions and preoccupations of each genre’s songwriters.

For country, the word country itself appears frequently, as baby, woman, lonely, guitar, heart, night, memories, road, good, and dream. Compare that to the broad genre of rock: time, love, things, world, heart, walk, wait, friend. In the blues we see woman, baby, babe, honey, darlin’, mama, lord, guitar, and trouble. In soul music, a remarkably small number of words jumps out of the cloud: love, baby, wanna, and ooh. And in the hip-hop cloud, it’s nigga, niggaz, shit, bitch, ass, and rhyme. Metal is equally predictable (and equally unattractive): fuck, dead, death, bleed, scream, hate, fear, and god.

The research also includes a chart showing the commonalities between the words, which shows (as you can probably guess) that hip-hop and rap are extreme outliers in terms of subject matter—but they have less in common than you might expect. They share about the same  number of words as do indie and country, which you probably wouldn’t have guessed. Another surprise: electronic music, thanks to its roots in house music, is more closely related to soul and the blues than country, which was born from some of the same ancestors as soul and the blues.

Examining word clouds is a fascinating way to look at music, really, and I recommend you spend some time doing so in the next several days, as posts will continue to be light around these parts during our ongoing hiatus. The next one is scheduled for Monday, although I will try to get one together for earlier in the holiday weekend.

One Day in Your Life: June 25, 1976

(With this post, we begin another hiatus. Posting will be lighter than usual here for the next couple of weeks. Watch for some more One Day in Your Life posts and the usual stuff at WNEW.com )

June 25, 1976, is a Friday. It is the 100th anniversary of Custer’s Last Stand at the Little Big Horn in Montana. In Wisconsin, it’s a cool day, although warmer than yesterday, when the temperature didn’t get out of the 60s. Looking ahead to the fall, Wisconsin Governor Patrick Lucey signs a bill appropriating $800,000 for a swine flu vaccination program. The United States Supreme Court rules that private schools may not discriminate against students by race, and that whites as well as blacks are protected against racial discrimination in private employment. Songwriter Johnny Mercer, who collaborated on such American standards as “Hooray for Hollywood,” “You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby,” and “That Old Black Magic,” dies at age 66.

The Omen opens in theaters around the country. On TV tonight, CBS airs Macho Callahan, a 1970 theatrical western starring David Janssen; ABC has two made-for-TV films back-to-back: The Desperate Miles and Panic on the 5:22. At midnight in Madison, Wisconsin, the long-running horror showcase Lenny’s Inferno features Vincent Price in four tales by Edgar Allan Poe. 

Former heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali faces wrestler Antonio Inoki tonight (US time) in Tokyo in a hybrid boxing/wrestling match that is being billed as the World Martial Arts Championship. Their bout, televised in the States on closed circuit in theaters, will end in a draw and leave fans feeling shafted. Female players at Wimbledon threaten to boycott the tournament next year if the women’s prize money isn’t increased to equal the amount male players receive. In the majors, shortstop Mike Phillips of the New York Mets hits for the cycle in a 7-4 win over the Chicago Cubs. In church league softball, the Monroe United Methodist team loses again, 8-6 to the Assembly of God.

Leonard Cohen plays Montreal, the Grateful Dead plays Chicago, and Elvis Presley plays Buffalo. Fleetwood Mac played in Milwaukee last night and is in Peoria, Illinois, tonight. ZZ Top takes the Worldwide Texas Tour to Cape Cod, and Aerosmith plays San Antonio. At WLS in Chicago, “Silly Love Songs” will be knocked out of the Number-One spot on the new survey that comes out tomorrow, replaced by the Captain and Tennille’s “Shop Around.” Once again, the hottest record on WLS is “The Boys Are Back in Town” by Thin Lizzy, which explodes from 13 to 5. “Sara Smile” by Hall and Oates is also new in the Top Ten. “Got to Get You Into My Life,” the single released from the Beatles’ Rock and Roll Music compilation album, vaults from 29 to 19, chased closely by “Let Her In,” the first single by TV heartthrob John Travolta, which moves from 32 to 20. The single biggest move on the chart belongs to Heart, whose debut single, “Crazy on You,” jumps from 36 to 22. On the album chart, Wings at the Speed of Sound continues to hold the top spot, while Aerosmith’s Rocks, Fleetwood Mac, Frampton Comes Alive!, and Presence by Led Zeppelin continue to slug it out in the top five.

Perspective From the Present: The Church League still plays in my hometown, although I don’t know if the games are still on Fridays. (Games started as late as 10:00 back then, which seems hard to believe now.) Although the league ostensibly existed to promote Christian sportsmanship, it was in fact the most bloodthirsty league I ever played in. Games were minimally officiated (sometimes by agreement between both teams), and both physical play and un-Christian language were frequent. Our team wasn’t all that good and neither was I, but there was still something delicious about being on the field as night fell and the ballpark lights took hold (and the bugs rose up from the creek nearby). It was the feeling of being precisely where I wanted to be and doing precisely what I wanted to be doing. I would learn in years to come that we are not always, or even usually, so fortunate as to feel that way.

The Province of Geeks

In over eight years of blogging in various places, hundreds of thousands of words and a larger number of half-baked ideas considered and discarded, I have never had as much trouble with a post as I’ve had with this one. I’ve chased an idea around for a week and expended nearly 900 words on it, and it’s still not right. Even the title is wrong, lifted from a sentence I later took out. But because I am exhausted with the whole process of fixing this bastard, and because I owe you something today, here it is.

The Chicago Tribune ran a piece last week pondering what makes a record an oldie, and since then, I’ve been pondering it, too. Reporter Mark Caro gets at the nub of it early on: “You might look at ‘oldies’ as a genre, certain music from a certain time with a certain aesthetic. Or perhaps you think ‘oldie’ merely connotes something that’s a certain amount of old.”

The latter definition seems to be holding sway in the radio biz these days, as Caro notes. You’ll hear late 70s hits by the Cars and John Mellencamp on “oldies” stations now. While they’re definitely “a certain amount of old,” how well they fit alongside “Lady Madonna” or “Summer in the City” is in the ear of the beholder. For some stations, juxtaposing the Cars with the Lovin’ Spoonful isn’t a problem, because they aren’t playing the Spoonful much anymore. The average year of release for the average record at the average oldies station today is 1970 or 1971. Older records get played less as newer records get played more.

But what about that “certain aesthetic”? The radio music of the period from the mid 50s to Watergate (parameters suggested by a friend) comes with a whole constellation of images and associations—which exist even for people who weren’t alive in that period. Thanks to movies, TV, and advertising, people who can’t remember the 60s have images of the 60s in their heads, inspired by the songs and how they have been used and/or remembered since the 1960s.

As we creep past the time of Nixon’s resignation and into the last half of the 780s and into 80s, songs still have specific associations, but they quickly become qualitatively different from those that accompany the songs of the 50s and 60s. Which is why some radio listeners can find a juxtaposition of, say, Mellencamp’s “I Need a Lover” with “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On” to be jarring.

Further thoughts along this line are on the flipside.

So Nice

Many mornings, I wake up with a song running through my head. I am never sure where the song comes from. Something I have been dreaming about, I guess, or perhaps something that pops into my head during those moments between sleep and wakefulness, when the brain looses all sorts of odd imagery. I have, on more than one occasion, written a song in a dream, only to be unable to remember any of it upon waking. Blog posts, too.

The other morning I woke up with “Summer Samba (So Nice)” by Walter Wanderley playing on the cranial radio. Don’t know it? Click here.

I suspect that “Summer Samba” is one of the earliest records I can remember hearing on the terrestrial radio when it was a hit. It first appears on a survey at ARSA in late August, and it peaked at Number 26 in Billboard during the week of October 15, 1966. The next week it fell to Number 39 and then off the Hot 100 entirely, although it continues to appear on radio surveys at ARSA for a couple of weeks after that. But I suspect that if “Summer Samba” couldn’t outperform the likes of “Cherish,” “Cherry Cherry,” “Yellow Submarine,” or “Eleanor Rigby” on the pop charts, it was far more popular on radio stations catering to adults, as our hometown radio station did.

“Summer Samba” was an offshoot of the popularity of the Brazilian bossa-nova style. Guitarist Charlie Byrd is the genre’s forgotten pioneer—it was Byrd who released the first bossa-nova album made by American musicians, Jazz Samba, in 1962. It contains the hit single “Desafinado,” a collaboration with saxophonist Stan Getz, and a song you will most likely recognize. Getz often receives credit for pioneering bossa-nova thanks to his 1964 album with Astrid Gilberto, Joao Gilberto, and Antonio-Carlos Jobim, Getz/Gilberto, featuring “The Girl From Ipanema,” but Byrd was there first.

The marketplace was flooded with bossa-nova records after that. Unlike a lot of bossa-nova wannabes, Walter Wanderley was the real thing—a Brazilian musician who studied music theory as a student and played the clubs of Sao Paolo starting in the late 50s. He recorded, arranged, and/or produced dozens of albums in Brazil for himself and others before jazz singer Tony Bennett heard him perform and brought him to the attention of an American label. “Summer Samba” was the very first thing he cut for the label in 1966, and it would be his only charting single. Wanderley continued to record and perform until his death in 1986 at age 54, although he was always a bigger deal in his home country than anywhere else.

The bossa-nova craze hung on longer than we remember now. Sergio Mendes and Brasil 66 would score iconic, Latin-tinged hits as late as 1968 and would chart into 1970; Frank Sinatra released a collaboration with Jobim in 1969. And if it feels as though the stuff hasn’t aged well, we’re more to blame than the artists are. A close listen to Wanderley’s music (and there is a ton of it at YouTube) reveals him as a guy who could swing the Hammond organ with the romantic and playful touch the bossa-nova was famed for. Over the last 25 years or so, we’ve often associated his bright-n-bubbly sound with bachelor pads and tiki-bar kitsch, but that’s not the way Wanderley would have thought of himself. Neither is it way adult radio listeners heard him in the 60s, when “Summer Samba” was on the radio over and over and over again.

One Day in Your Life: June 20, 1976

June 20, 1976, is a Sunday.  An Associated Press story appearing in papers around the country discusses the potential development of an electronic mail system by the Postal Service. The system could involve either computer printouts delivered by the mailman or electronic messages delivered directly to a user’s computer, possibly for about as much as a current first-class stamp, which is 15 cents. President Ford, National Security Advisor Scowcroft, and other top officials meet in the Oval Office from about 2AM until dawn to monitor the situation in the Middle East. American ambassador to Lebanon Francis Meloy, another diplomat, and their driver were assassinated in Beirut just days before; later today, Ford orders the evacuation of Americans from Lebanon, goes to church, and plays a round of golf. It is Father’s Day, but Ford’s daughter is not at home; Susan Ford is in Florida for the opening of Disney’s River Country, the world’s first water-centric theme park. Caril Fugate, accomplice of serial killer Charles Starkweather, is paroled from prison in Nebraska after serving 17 years. Future major-league baseball player Carlos Lee is born.

For the light-hitting outfielder and team statistician of the Monroe United Methodist softball team, the weekend did not get off to a very good start; after winning their first two games, the team lost to Juda 11-5 in the Friday-night church league. The outfielder spends part of his Sunday watching his beloved Chicago Cubs lose to the Atlanta Braves 5-0. Elsewhere, the Detroit Tigers beat the Minnesota Twins 7-3. Rookie pitching sensation Mark Fidrych gets the win to extend his record to 6-and-1.

In Pennsylvania, Warren Zevon plays Bryn Mawr and the New Riders of the Purple Sage play Reading. Fleetwood Mac plays the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines, and the Electric Light Orchestra plays London. AC/DC, Bob Marley, and ZZ Top continue their ongoing tours. Jerry Samuels, better known as Napoleon XIV, is the guest on this weekend’s edition of The Dr. Demento Show, where Abbott and Costello’s “Who’s on First” routine tops the weekly Funny Five countdown. “Silly Love Songs” is still Number One on the latest survey at WLS, for the fourth week in a row. New in the Top 10 is “Love in the Shadows” by Neil Sedaka. The biggest mover on the WLS survey is the Beach Boys’ “Rock and Roll Music,” up to 16 from 31; oddly enough, their great 60s rivals, the Beatles, are also hot, as “Got to Get You Into My Life,” their first single to chart since 1970, moves from 39 to 29. The highest-debuting song on the survey this week (at Number 40) is by an unknown group, the Starland Vocal Band. It’s called “Afternoon Delight.”

Perspective From the Present: I have my doubts about whether Fleetwood Mac really played the Iowa State Fair on this date, mostly because another source mentions that the Eagles headlined the 1976 fair. Fleetwood Mac and the Eagles played at least one show together that summer, so perhaps both of them played the fair. But if they did, why doesn’t my second source mention the Mac?

And finally: “Love in the Shadows” remains surprisingly evocative of the early summer of 1976. Every time I hear it, I’m transported to one of those first warm, humid evenings in June. As the sun sinks in the west, sounds from the barn are audible across the driveway and the dooryard. I will not be sticking around to listen to them long, however. I slide behind the wheel of the Hornet, start her up, turn on the radio, and fly off to seek adventure, somewhere. Probably not on Sunday, June 20th, but surely within a day or two of it.

Be My Dream Tonight

When the Beatles landed in America 47 years ago, it was widely assumed that they were a kiddie rage and would soon be discarded in favor of the next flavor of the month. Ringo Starr once said he would be happy if the band lasted two or three years. But by 1980, John Lennon said that although he didn’t know what the future would hold, he thought that his work would continue throughout his entire life.

I wonder when Paul McCartney first realized that he could be a working musician for the rest of his life—and whether he imagined that his working life would continue long past the point when other people aspire to retire. McCartney’s 70th year on the planet, which begins with his 69th birthday tomorrow, looks to be busier than even he, the most ambitious of musicians, might ever have expected. His plans for 2011 include an American concert tour.

As a younger man, McCartney was an infrequent visitor to the States, last touring with the Beatles in 1966 and not again for a decade until 1976, and the fabled Wings Over America tour. Thirteen years would pass before Paul played America again. The 1989-90 Paul McCartney World Tour was a killer: a month-and-a-half in Europe in the fall of ’89 before three weeks in the States just before Christmas; January in Birmingham and London including 11 shows at Wembley Arena; then back to the States for a string of two-night stands mostly in the Midwest and South during February, followed by six shows in 10 days in Tokyo. In April 1990, McCartney came back to the States, playing mostly in the West and South, before flying down to Rio for a couple of shows. After a two-month break and three quick shows in the UK, McCartney returned to the States to play four weeks of East Coast and Midwest football stadiums to wrap it up.

Paul would be back in the States in 1993, and has returned frequently in the new millennium for full-blown tours in 2002, 2005, 2009, and 2010, as well as some scattered one-shot shows, such as his 2009 appearance at the Coachella festival. As of right now,  the 2011 Paul McCartney tour of the States is to be relatively brief, although it’s been expanding. It will visit several baseball stadiums, including Yankee Stadium in New York on July 15 and 16 and Wrigley Field in Chicago on July 31.

McCartney is also re-releasing his vintage solo albums in deluxe configurations. In the wake of last year’s Band on the Run reissue, his 1970 solo album has gotten the deluxe CD/DVD treatment this month, as has the 1980 album McCartney II.

It was during the final leg of the 1990 tour, on July 18, 1990, that The Mrs. and I saw Paul perform at Cyclone Stadium in Ames, Iowa. We’ll never forget McCartney’s performance of “Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight/The End,” which closed the main part of the show. Here’s a clip from the 1991 film Get Back, directed by Richard Lester. I’m not sure precisely where this performance was recorded, but it’s the way it was on a hot night in central Iowa.