Music Extra: Summer Songs...

As I wrote here the other day, spring fever has set in around here in a big way. Only, it isn't quite spring yet even though the temperatures we've seen here locally have seemed more like summer. Well, early summer, since in the middle of summer it isn't unusual for this region to see temperatures past 100 degrees F. The last couple of days it has been in the mid-80s F, which can on occasion be the low temperature at the height of summer. But, when it's been in the 50s F for highs as recently as a couple of weeks ago, mid-80s feel like summer. We've even been running the air conditioner.

Now, it would be nice if I could give in to my spring fever, but with volunteer work, looking for a real job, and working on writing a book, I've been more than busy - as my sporadic posting here this week has indicated. So, I've been resisting the lure of sitting outside in the warmth with a good book and a glass of lemonade and getting on with the things I need to do. This hasn't been as difficult as it might seem, though, since the warm weather also means that things are blooming - with a vengeance - and that means the onset of allergy season. Since I'm allergic to multiple things that grow around here, every time I stepped outside yesterday I started either coughing or sneezing or both.

At any rate, I thought that before I have to go back out into the warmth and the allergens later today to go to a meeting at CVP, I would share a few songs that resonate with the apparent season around here.

First of all, here is George Harrison singing "Here Comes the Sun" at the Concert for Bangladesh in 1971. It seems an appropriate song since even though it hasn't rained as much as it should here locally over the winter, it has been cloudy a lot, and it is nice to see the sun:



This kind of weather is baseball weather, and the season is coming soon. So there's this song, "Swing", by Trace Adkins, which is about baseball, and also about striking out or not in that other spring pastime - love, lust, and romance:



That isn't exactly a traditional baseball song. For that, there's John Fogerty's "Centerfield":



There are a lot of songs about summer. Some of them are just about summer, and some of them are about, well, more. One of these is "The Boys of Summer", by Don Henley. It's too nice a day to engage in serious analysis, however, and so I'll just leave this here for you:



An older summer song, "Summer in the City" (1966), by The Lovin' Spoonful, contrasts summer days and summer nights:



It's possible that where you are reading this from, summer weather hasn't arrived yet, or is just going away if you happen to be in the Southern Hemisphere. But, is there really a bad time for a summer song? As far as I'm concerned, summer is a state of mind as much as it is a season. Then again, I grew up in Southern California, where you can have summer-like weather on any given day of the year, so my perceptions on the subject might be slightly skewed.

Music Sunday: The Trace Adkins Birthday Edition

It's Music Sunday once again, and for the first time, the post I had planned on doing is not going to happen because I couldn't find appropriate videos on YouTube to share with you all. I'll keep looking, and that might happen sometime in the future, but for today I'm going to do a quick change of direction, and venture off into country music, which I haven't delved into to much here in the past.

It actually took me years to get over my aversion to country music, and I'm still picky about the country I listen to (a statement which you may well laugh at after this post), but I like it, or some of it, much more than I used to. But, since a quick look around the Interwebs showed me that today is Trace Adkins' 50th birthday, I thought I'd share a few of his songs that I like a lot.

First off is "Just Fishin'", which I suppose I like so much because it reminds me of my childhood and my relationship with my father. The fishing was off the pier at the beach rather than on a riverbank, but it took me a long time, into adulthood, to realize that our fishing expeditions more than just fishing trips, but a bonding experience that shaped my life and my attitudes in many ways:



"You're Gonna Miss This" is another song that speaks to me, not in specific terms but in the general sense that I can identify with looking back and wishing that I had paid attention more, been in the moment more, and not been so damned anxious to grow up:



Adkins' songs are not all introspective, however. Thank goodness. There's this one, which I love in spite of myself, "Ladies Love Country Boys", which is just a fun song and a fun video:



And then there's "I Got My Game On", which is over-the-top silly, probably politically incorrect, but also very funny. My theory is that what makes this video a gem is the fact that the poor guy does everything wrong and still ends up with the girl, which is more true-to-life than the path to success with women that the "Dr. Love" character that Adkins plays in the video is selling.



Now, from some of the interviews I've seen with Adkins, I suspect that he and I would not see eye-to-eye on a lot of topics. But I've always made it a practice not to throw an artist's work out with the bathwater of their personal shortcomings or political or social beliefs. It would be a boring world if everyone held the same beliefs, and I'm not interested in limiting my viewing and listening to artists I know I would agree with all the time. I mean, I thought it was stupid back in the 60s when people wouldn't go see Jane Fonda movies because they didn't agree with her political stances, or wouldn't go to John Wayne movies because they didn't like his attitudes. I would be a hypocrite if I took the attitude that I wouldn't listen to and enjoy someone's music just because I'm not sure I would like their politics.

It really shouldn't even be a question.

Music Sunday: "Sunday Morning Coming Down" Edition

I don't like Sundays any more.

I used to like Sundays when I was a child. Sunday was outing day. My family went on some kind of outing nearly every Sunday, even on days when my father had to work. Many times, we would just go for a ride somewhere, to see what we could see. Other Sundays, we would go to a museum, or to Griffith Park Observatory, or to Disneyland (back in the days when it didn't cost an arm and both legs to get in).

Gasoline costs too much to do that now, and I miss those outings a lot. With my arthritis, it is even difficult for me to get out and take a long walk on a Sunday. That was something we used to do as a family on Sundays, as well, sometimes just walking around town for two or three or four hours.

Not being able to have those Sunday outings any more puts me out of sorts sometimes. This is one of those Sundays, and so it has been difficult for me to get into the mood to write the usual Music Sunday blog post. There just wasn't any music that I wanted to hear. I even asked for recommendations from friends. And I got some good recommendations. Just nothing that moved me enough to share with you all.

And then I remembered "Sunday Morning Coming Down". Written by Kris Kristofferson, it was first recorded in 1969 by Ray Stevens. Kristofferson has also recorded it, as did Johnny Cash. I like this cover, which I just discovered, by Trace Adkins:



And here is Kristofferson and Cash singing the song, in 1978:



Not an upbeat song, to be sure, but it made my Sunday a little more bearable. I hope your Sunday was better, wherever you are.

Just a note: I've seen this song identified both as "Sunday Morning Coming Down" and "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down". I have no idea which is correct.