I want to live,
I want to give
I’ve been a miner
for a heart of gold.
It’s these expressions
I never give
That keep me searching
for a heart of gold
And I’m getting old.
Keeps me searching
for a heart of gold
And I’m getting old.
Live 1971:
–
2 Down By The River – Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, (1969)
Be on my side, I’ll be on your side, baby
There is no reason for you to hide
It’s so hard for me staying here all alone
When you could be taking me for a ride, yeah
She could drag me over the rainbow
And send me away
Down by the river I shot my baby
Down by the river, dead, shot her dead
“If I Can Dream” is a song made famous by Elvis Presley, written by Walter Earl Brown and notable for its direct quotations of Martin Luther King, Jr. It was recorded by Presley in June 1968, two months after King’s assassination. The recording was first released to the public as the finale of Presley’s ’68 Comeback Special.
Although the song is not technically gospel music, Presley performed the song with the intensity and intonations of southern gospel. It has since appeared on various Presley gospel and/or inspirational compilations
Music, for me is all about feelings, about emotions. I Like Elvis but I never thought he could give me chills up my spine, literally. I’ve never, ever heard a better interpretation of a song. It is unbelievable!
Elvis is often regarded as a joke, yes, really. It is so fuckin’ frustrating, when you “have seen the light”, there have never been a better interpreter of songs. He is “black” to the soul, he has the Appalachian white trash country in his spine. He combines his experiences into a way of delivering songs that are out of this world!
Never bettered, ever!
It’s astonishing seeing him after the take, just stopping and asking for another take. It looks so rehearsed, so rigid, until we see that its really a live take, a live moment! It’s incredible, and it’s art on the highest level.
Leather clad performance:
This is just as valuable to me as Munch’s Scream, Picasso’s Guernica or Bob Dylan’s Simple twist of faith.
“The lyric was all to do with the dual combination of drugs and girls. This song was a very instant thing, a definite high point.”
– Mick Jagger
“I’ve got a new one myself. No words yet, but a few words in my head – called Brown Sugar – about a woman who screws one of her black servants. I started to call it Black Pussy but I decided that was too direct, too nitty-gritty.” – Mick Jagger (1969, The True Adventures of Rolling Stones by Stanley Booth)
Brown Sugar is the opening track and lead single from their 1971 album Sticky Fingers. Rolling Stone magazine ranked it #495 on their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time and at #5 on their list of the 100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time.
The group sings the lyric with all the enthusiasm of tongue-wagging dogs swooping onto a prime rib, leading up to one of the band’s strongest shout-along choruses. As on other Stones classics of the period like “Honky Tonk Women” and “Bitch,” beefy horns start to duel with the buzzing electric guitars in the instrumental break; few if any other groups have used guitars and horns as deftly in unison. The crowning embellishment is the final choruses, which vary the melody and tempo so that the group sings and make a high-pitched exclamation in a rhythm that very much resembles that of a sexual climax.
It is credited, like most of their songs, to Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, but the song was primarily the work of Jagger, who wrote it sometime during the filming of Ned Kelly in 1969.
Brown Sugar from the fantastic concert film Ladies and Gentlemen (1972):
This version of the song features Mick Jagger on vocals, Keith Richards and Mick Taylor on guitar, Charlie Watts on drums, Bill Wyman on bass, Nick Hopkins on piano, Bobby Keys on saxophone, and Jim Price on horns.
Brown Sugar, Lyrics:
Gold coast slave ship bound for cotton fields,
Sold in a market down in new orleans.
Scarred old slaver know he’s doin alright.
Hear him whip the women just around midnight.
Ah brown sugar how come you taste so good
(a-ha) brown sugar, just like a young girl should
A-huh.
Drums beating, cold english blood runs hot,
Lady of the house wondrin where it’s gonna stop.
House boy knows that he’s doin alright.
You should a heard him just around midnight.
Ah brown sugar how come you taste so good
(a-ha) brown sugar, just like a black girl should
A-huh.
I bet your mama was a tent show queen, and all her boy
Friends were sweet sixteen.
Im no schoolboy but I know what I like,
You should have heard me just around midnight.
Ah brown sugar how come you taste so good
(a-ha) brown sugar, just like a young girl should.
I said yeah, I said yeah, I said yeah, I said
Oh just like a, just like a black girl should.
“Heartbreak Hotel” is a song recorded by Elvis Presley. It was released as a single on January 27, 1956, Presley’s first on his new record label RCA Victor. His first number-one pop record, “Heartbreak Hotel” topped Billboard‘s Top 100 chart, became his first million-seller, and was the best-selling single of 1956. It was written by Tommy Durden and Mae Boren Axton.
Well, Since my baby left me
These opening words set the tone, this is not a happy-song…
I got this record from my aunt when I was about 7 or 8 years old (1973/1974), I couldn’t comprehend the heartache and suffering in the lyrics. I just thought it was the coolest thing I had ever heard. I still got that record. It is worn and scratched and it’s still the coolest record in the world.
Heartbreak Hotel (audio):
Heartbreak Hotel credits
Heartbreak Hotel is written by Thomas Durden and Mae Axton in 1955. It was written after Durden read about a suicide in the Miami Herald. A man, who had jumped out the window, had destroyed his identity papers and left a note saying: “I walk a lonely street.”
It was written very quickly, varying sources states that it was done from a few hours down to 22 minutes.
From Wikipedia:
“Axton and Durden give different accounts of how the song was written. Durden’s account is that he had already written the song and performed it with his band the Swing Billys before he presented it to Axton. Axton’s account is that Durden had only penned a few lines of the song, and asked her to help him finish it. She says that the report of the suicide “stunned” her, and she told Durden, “Everybody in the world has someone who cares. Let’s put a Heartbreak Hotel at the end of this lonely street”. They were interrupted by the arrival of Glen Reeves, a local performer who had previously worked with Axton. The duo asked Reeves to help with the song, but after hearing the title he remarked that it was “the silliest thing I’ve ever heard”, and left them to finish it themselves.The song was written within an hour, and Durden recorded it onto Axton’s tape recorder.”
The song was offered to several artists before Elvis, many of them declined and described the song as strange and morbid . Durden and Axton offered Presley a third of the writers’ credits if he would make it a single, Elvis agreed. Presley recorded the song Jan. 10, 1956. It was his second song recorded on his new label RCA, following “I Got A Woman”. It was released 27th of January 1956.
Heartbreak Hotel, Milton Berle Show:
From the british newspaper The Independent:
“Heartbreak Hotel” started with Elvis, accompanied by a walking bass from Bill Black, reminiscent of Willie Dixon’s work with Muddy Waters. Scotty Moore played assertively and Cramer’s piano pattered like rain. Elvis broke down in each verse, effectively method acting like James Dean. The song was nailed on take seven, but sadly, most of the tapes were wiped. The influence of Johnnie Ray’s “Cry” is self-evident and the song could be a parody. Presley’s dirt-seeking bio-grapher, Albert Goldman, opined, “‘Heartbreak Hotel’, which is an extravagant and highly-exaggerated account of the blues, was more a psychodrama than a musical performance. As such, however, it was an extraordinary novelty and it moved rock music into another imaginative space.”
“Heartbreak Hotel” became Elvis’ first gold record, staying the top of the pop charts for seven weeks in the spring of 1956.
Seen the arrow on the doorpost
Saying, “This land is condemned
All the way from New Orleans
To Jerusalem”
I traveled through East Texas
Where many martyrs fell
And I know no one can sing the blues
Like Blind Willie McTell
Well, I heard that hoot owl singing
As they were taking down the tents
The stars above the barren trees
Were his only audience
Them charcoal gypsy maidens
Can strut their feathers well
But nobody can sing the blues
Like Blind Willie McTell
See them big plantations burning
Hear the cracking of the whips
Smell that sweet magnolia blooming
See the ghosts of slavery ships
I can hear them tribes a-moaning
Hear that undertaker’s bell
Nobody can sing the blues
Like Blind Willie McTell
There’s a woman by the river
With some fine young handsome man
He’s dressed up like a squire
Bootlegged whiskey in his hand
There’s a chain gang on the highway
I can hear them rebels yell
And I know no one can sing the blues
Like Blind Willie McTell
Well, God is in His heaven
And we all want what’s His
But power and greed and corruptible seed
Seem to be all that there is
I’m gazing out the window
Of the St. James Hotel
And I know no one can sing the blues
Like Blind Willie McTell
