One Of These Days - Emmylou Harris

One Of These Days - Emmylou Harris

3:03

Elite Hotel, 1975

Written by Earl Montgomery, 1972

This song was first recorded by George Jones, but Emmylou Harris made it a hit, taking it to number three on the country charts.  Her version embodies quiet resilience rendered in luminous sound. The song is an unhurried meditation on endurance and the passage of time, and Harris approaches it with characteristic restraint, her voice soft but unflinching.  The arrangement, anchored by pedal steel and brushed percussion, moves with the patient inevitability of sunrise. Glen Hardin's piano and James Burton's guitar weave around her vocal, never crowding it, just coloring in the emotional contours.  Harris has always had a gift for transforming simple songs into small revelations. Here she finds the spiritual ache beneath the plainspoken lines ("One of these days, and it won’t be long / You'll look for me, and I'll be gone") and delivers them with the bittersweet clarity of someone who's known loss but refuses cynicism.   There's no Nashville gloss or formula here, just a catchy blend of traditional country instrumentation and California folk-rock warmth.

One of These Mornings - Ricky Nelson

One of These Mornings - Ricky Nelson

1:54

Ricky Sings Again, 1959

Written by Dorsey Burnette

More 1950s rock 'n' roll than rockabilly — a sort of pop-abilly maybe — this song starts off with the narrator averring that one day he'll go find a gal who'll love him.  They'll have a great time under the moon and all that.  But then, suddenly he's talking about leaving again!  "I done told my gal what I'm gonna do / I'm gonna leave on a one way track / Yes one of these mornings and I can't be comin' back."  Well, I call that pretty fickle, Ricky Nelson!

One Hand Loose - Charlie Feathers

One Hand Loose - Charlie Feathers

2:24

single, 1956

Written by Charlie Feathers, Jerry Huffman, and Jody Chastain

A rollicking, hiccuping early rockabilly track, raw and unpolished, with elements of honky-tonk still discernible in both the music and vocals.  It's unclear to me what it may be all about.  Possibly nothing?  Or dancing?  "If there's rhythm in your bones then you know how I feel / But don't you crowd me close baby, this time is for real / Get ready for some rockin', pick 'em up and put 'em down / Give me one hand loose and I'll be satisfied."  One hand loose to do what, Mr. Feathers?!

One Of These Things First - Nick Drake

One Of These Things First - Nick Drake 

3:46
Bryter Layter, 1971
Written by Nick Drake

In this intricate, melodic pop song, Drake starts by playfully exploring some imaginative hypotheticals: he could have been a sailor, a cook, even a whistle or a boot or a flute.  But in the center of the song, the surreal "could haves" start to reveal some deceptively weighty regrets.  "I could have been your pillar, could have been your door / Could have stayed beside you / Could have stayed for more."  Suddenly we're snapped back to reality, lost love, and self-recrimination as baroque pop melody continues to bubble along.  It's a perfect Nick Drake song, quiet and understated, a blend of whimsy and melancholy.

One Hundred Years From Now - The Byrds

One Hundred Years From Now - The Byrds 
2:34
Sweetheart Of the Rodeo, 1968
Written by Gram Parsons

This song captures Parsons' vision of country rock (if by rock you mean softer 1970s rock) at its purest crossroads, where twang meets jangle, and Bakersfield meets Laurel Canyon. Lloyd Green's pedal steel provides the track's keening hook, while Clarence White adds clean, understated guitar lines that dance around the melody without ever intruding. The result feels like the missing link between The Everly Brothers and Hank Williams, music that belongs equally to country and rock, proof those genres twine their roots in the same soil.  Equally, its sound could just as easily be heard drifting from a crackling, century-old shellac 78 as from modern headphones..  The song's message is enough to give one pause: nearly sixty years later, we're nowhere near to any answers to the questions it poses.  "Nobody knows what kind of trouble we're in / Nobody seems to think it all might happen again."  It keeps on happening.

Full Moon And Empty Arms - Bob Dylan

Full Moon And Empty Arms - Bob Dylan

3:22

Shadows In the Night, 2015

Written by Buddy Kaye, Ted Mossman, Sergei Rachmaninoff, 1945

So first off, why does Rachmaninoff, who dies in 1943, gets a composer credit here?  Because Kaye and based on Sergei Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2, according to a contemporary article in Time magazine.  Apparently, he based the song "Ever and Forever" from the Rachmaninoff's movement, and "Full Moon and Empty Arms" from the third. In the song, the narrator years for his absent love, and declares he'll wish on the moon.  "And next full moon / If my one wish comes true / My empty arms will be filled with you."  Dylan sings it with a restrained yet highly emotionally charged raspy croon, against a sparse backing of pedal steel. 

Beechwood 4-5789 - The Marvelettes

Beechwood 4-5789 - The Marvelettes

2:14

Playboy, 1962

Written by Marvin Gaye, William "Mickey" Stevenson, and George Gordy

There could be a whole album of songs whose titles are telephone numbers, but this one would be one of the top three, easily.  The narrator tells this guy not to be shy; she's waiting patiently to get to know him!  "And my number is Beechwood 4-5789 / You can call me up and have a date any old time."  Rather forward for 1962, eh what?  Fun fact: Marvin Gaye played drums on this track!  Terrific girl-group vocals and a powerhouse Funk Brothers band make this song a keeper.

Beauty Of the Pool Hall - Rancid

Beauty Of the Pool Hall - Rancid

2:16

Trouble Maker, 2017

Written by Tim Armstrong

A paean to a lady named Angel, a rough beauty whom the narrator pined for, or was involved with.  He would always see her around the workin-class gin joint, before she left abruptly one day.  "Kindness, a language that she always spoke / Lord, the way she could communicate."  It's got all of Rancid's trademark bits: breakneck solos, singalong choruses, Armstrong's mumbled raspy rap-singing, fragmented lyrics.  Not their greatest  song but a fair representative.

007 (Shanty Town) - Desmond Dekker & the Aces

007 (Shanty Town) - Desmond Dekker & the Aces

2:34

007 (Shanty Town), 1967

Written by Desmond Dekker

A now-typical rocksteady tale of rudeboys and their violent ways. "And rudeboy get a probation / A shanty town / And rudeboy bomb up the town / A shanty town."  Desmond wrote the song after watching news reports on a student demonstration that turned into a riot.  This song cemented Dekker's popularity among rude boys in Jamaica, apparently since his earlier music had preached parental respect and the importance of education.

The Fool On the Hill - Bobbie Gentry

The Fool On the Hill - Bobbie Gentry

3:49

Local Gentry, 1968

Written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney

My first impression is this is not on the whole a successful cover.  At times, Gentry's voice seems over-taxed and rough, and the production overall is a thin tinny sound, with off-beat and distracting instrumentation (is that a mouth harp making that quacking sound?).  Luckily, it's such a great song that even this occasionally desultory performance still has something to offer.