New Songs

To keep the gigs interesting (to me at least, if not to the audiences), I'm constantly learning new songs. In the last few weeks, I've added Hal Ketchum's "Past the Point of Rescue" -- a great, if not well known, up-tempo tune to the book, though not The List, yet. I've also been working on James Taylor's "Country Road" (for what, 30 years?), and may have finally cracked the amazing right-hand technique he uses to get "that sound". It's (apparently) a variation on Travis picking that I'd never thought of: pick with two fingers at the same time, but still within the pattern. Seems stupifyingly obvious now, but it eluded me for a long, long time. I wonder what other songs it might come in handy for...

After several requests from my buddy Dave, and its coincident appearance on the new James Taylor CD, I've learned "Wichita Lineman". As stolen from James' version (but transposed down a bit), it's got one of the most amazing chord progressions of any song I've ever learned. It doesn't really sound like anything magical is going on back behind that melody, but there is. That Jimmy Webb could really write 'em. I mean to make Dave come up and sing it, next time he comes out, but until then I guess I'll have to do it myself.

About 6 weeks ago, we went to the Golden Horseshoe in Disneyland and saw their comedy-hick act, "Billy Hill and the Hillbillies". They're masterful musicians, of course, beneath the hick routine, and they did a terrific bluegrass version of "The Letter", by The Boxtops. I went home and built a version for myself, not so hick, but not quite rock, either. I kind of like it, and having another up-tempo tune doesn't hurt.

Lately, I've noticed a really good reaction whenever I do Beatles songs. The older folks love it, of course, but there's a whole new generation of kids that are into the Beatles, too. I get good reactions from older teens and 20-somethings (possibly due to the recent Beatles-music movie "Across the Universe"), and a surprisingly lot of recognition from 10 to 13-year-olds, too.

We have several Beatle songs already, and I worked up and have been closing with "Golden Slumbers" for the last couple of months, which seems to really "work" -- at least I love playing/singing it. So I've been trying to add even more Beatles, starting with my new slightly soft version of "Hey, Jude", which I was reticent to try because the original is so deeply ingrained. But, it seems to work OK with people, and it's fun to kind of imitate the style of Paul's piano playing on the guitar. And occasionally I can even see people singing along with the "Na, Na" part at the end. I also recently worked up an acoustic version of "I Should Have Known Better", which seems strangely OK even without the prominent harmonica breaks in the original. Haven't tried it out in public yet, but I intend to this weekend.

I've worked up "Dear Prudence", and when I say "worked", I mean it. It's a finger-buster. But it's Acacia's favorite Beatles song, so I thought I ought to know it. Problem is, it's actually pretty repetitive and boring, without all the extra magic that the Beatles pour on top in the recording -- instrumentation changes, lots of vocal harmony -- all stuff I can't really bring to it. So it may have to fall out, sadly. Luckily, Daleen and Acacia showed up at my last gig, and I pulled it out (with limited guitar success), so at least Acacia got to hear me do it once.

But I've decided to go ahead and add "Blackbird" to the list. I've been able to play it for years -- the incredible guitar part is a kind of Holy Grail of guitar players -- but singing along while playing it makes it even more of a challenge. But, it's nothing a few jillion hours of practicing can't fix, and I think I've got it down. People ask for it sometimes, and who am I to deny being able to play it? And when I have, it's been a pretty good crowd-pleaser, so I'll just have to keep it practiced-up. The only real issue is that it's un-transpose-able, because of the magic guitar part, and that "Into the light..." line is way too high for me. I'm just kind of shooting at it, though, and something comes out that's over with before it gets too embarrassing.

All this last week, I've been playing nothing but Paul Simon's "Graceland", after being inspired to try it out by Alison Kraus' sweet and slow(er) version as seen on TV (though I'm not able to keep it as slow as she managed to -- nor do I especially want/need to). I'm not sure how audiences will react to it, though -- it's a big favorite if you're into Paul Simon at all, but I'm not sure how much of the general public has heard it. We'll see.