Nearly perfect songs, vol. 1

I am grateful for many modern conveniences. Indoor plumbing. Education and economic opportunity for women. Electricity. Among them, I count the opportunity to listen to so many amazing musicians as a tremendous blessing. In addition to the genius of the ages--the Bachs and Handels and Chopins--modern technology has introduced me to many a songwriter I never would have known in another time and place. So I thought I'd start a series of blog posts highlighting some of the songs that delight my ear and my spirit. Tonight, a few from a long-time favorite of mine, the inimitable Ray LaMontagne.

LaMontagne is a poet--his songs work musically, but his lyrics often could stand alone. They are rich in imagery, lush with emotion. A favorite of mine, Winter Birds:



"a many-petaled kiss I place upon her brow"
"it's green to gold, and gold to brown, the leaves will fall to feed the ground"
"the kettle sings its tortured songs"

Exquisite. He juxtaposes beauty and suffering, life and decay.

Oh, and he does all right with that guitar, too.

Here's another, Empty:



"she lifts her skirt up to her knees, walks through the garden rows in her bare feet laughing." Geez, where do I sign up to be that girl? Such a lovely, peaceful image, followed up by "Never learned to count my blessings, I choose instead to dwell in my disasters."

"If through my cracked and dusty dime store lips I spoke these words out loud would no one hear me?" is followed by this tender line--"lay your blouse across the chair, let fall the flowers from your hair and kiss me with that country mouth so plain. Outside the rain is tapping on the leaves. To me it sounds like they're applauding us, the quiet love we've made."

This song demonstrates something central, I think, to both LaMontagne's music and my own life. Joy and pain are inseperable in this sphere. You love and you hurt. You will lose what is most precious, after all, even if only temporarily. "I've been to hell and back so many times I must admit you kind of bore me...It's the hurt I hide that fuels the fire inside me." Joy and pain, life and loss, growth and decay. You hear it in his voice, in the melancholy wail of the pedal steel, even in the most upbeat of his songs.

Trouble, or at least the memory of it, stalks the shadows, but never overcomes. I never get tired of Ray LaMontagne