So posting by moi will more than likely be sporadic for a little while.
But in the meantime, here's another little project for us all:
Most Memorable Post-Elvis Record Referencing Hair in Either Its Title or Lyric!!!
And my totally top of my head Top Seven is:
7. Nazareth -- Hair of the Dog
I've had a soft spot for these guys ever since they turned Joni Mitchell's "This Flight Tonight" into a thoroughly convincing piece of pop-metal (I've always wondered what Joni thought about it, come to think). This one, of course, deserves a special wing in the cowbell hall of fame.
6. CSNY -- Almost Cut My Hair
Very silly stuff, thank you Mr. Crosby, but the Stills/Young guitar interplay is awesome, no?
5. The dBs -- Never Before and Never Again
A duet between dB Peter Holsapple and the great Syd Straw, and for my money the most heart-rendingly sad and funny song about the aftermath of the breakup of a long-term relationship in rock history. More to the point, both the guy and the girl in the song grow their hair out, which improves their looks if not necessarily their moods.
4. Daddy Cool -- Teenage Blues
"I've been thinking a lot about getting a job, but I'm paranoid about my hair" has to be one of the greatest opening lines not just in pop music but in the entire history of literary endeavor going back to the Greeks. Or so I thought this morning; I could be wrong.
3. The Morells -- Growin' A Beard
An ode to the uses and cultivation of whiskers by the greatest party band of them all (The Skeletons in an earlier incarnation). Seriously -- I've said this before, but if I had an unlimited budget for a shindig and could hire any rockers in the world as the featured entertainment, these are the guys I would get, and that includes even NRBQ.
2. Smashing Pumpkins -- Terrapin
"Well, oh baby, my hair's on end about you." Proving yet again that there's no Listomania theme, no matter how ridiculous, that we can't shoehorn Billy Corgan's pretentious cueball noggin into, even if it's just on a Syd Barrett cover. Nice level of irony, of course.
And the numero uno follicularly fabulous tune of them all is obviously...
1. The Lovin' Spoonful -- BaldHeaded Lena
And speaking of cueball noggins, heh heh. That's the late great Zal Yanovsky on lead vocals and "electric gorgle" (or so it says on the liner notes) BTW.
Alrighty, then -- and what would your choices be?
[Shameless Blogwhore: My parallel Cinema Listomania -- theme: best Issue picture (fiction film or documentary) -- is now up over at Box Office. As always, if you could see your way to going over there and leaving some little snarky comment, it would put me in good with management and help me to get an advance before I head off to Paris with a certain shady dame in a few weeks. Thanks!]
45 comments:
No "Hair"? And not the Cowsills version - from the original Broadway cast album, with the following inspirational verse:
"They'll go ga-ga at the go-go
When they see me in my toga
When they see me in my toga
Made of long beautiful hair,
My hair like Jesus wore it
Hallelujah! I adore it
Hallelujah, Mary loved her son -
Why don't my mother love me???"
Can't imagine why the Cowsills left that out...
And while it's not a fave, I'll throw in "She's Goin' Bald" from the Beach Boys' "Smiley Smile"...
That dBs song is wonderful.
I don't have much, but I think it is a contender - Come Together
Here come old flattop he come grooving up slowly
He got joo-joo eyeball he one holy roller
He got hair down to his knee
Got to be a joker he just do what he please
One of my favorite songs, and the finale of my favorite album, and, one of my favorite first lines in lyric history:
"Where did your long hair go?"
(Caroline No by the Beach Boys or Brian Wilson, depending on whether you bought the album or the 45).
Here are three, fairly obvious ones, I suppose:
The Who - "Cut My Hair" from Quadrophenia. The eternal question: "Why should I care...?"
Beck - "Devil's Haircut" from Odelay
R.E.M. - "Hairshirt" - IMHO, one of the better tunes off of Green. Sure, maybe not technically a hair reference - close enough?
Just FYI: The Cowsills have sung that verse live for years. Chances are, at the point when Bill Cowsill arranged the song (probably 1967-8), the lyrical reference to Jesus was a radio no-no.
Thanks for the nice words about "Never Before and Never Again".
"Never Before and Never Again" deserves nice words, as does most of Herr Halfpear's work.
My nomination: "Sodium Laureth Sulfate" by The Loud Family.
"I grow my hair just to scare the teachers"
Mott the Hoople's "One of the Boys".
One of my favorite guitar rave-ups.
Speaking of the dB's, "My Baby Does Her Hairdo Long" by Kimberly Rew with the dBs, from the obscure gem The Bible of Bop is absolutely killer. Steve, got it?
Hair: Willie Alexander & the Boom Boom Band (Willie, who took Lou's place briefly in the VU, had some big shoes to fill)
Cut Your Hair: Pavement (they took some beatdowns in last week's contest, but here's the closest thing they ever got to a hit)
Looka No Hair: Professor Longhair (that's 2 hair mentions!)
Sister Golden Hair: America (sorry, couldn't resist)
and finally, MBowen, good call on Sodium Laureth, which some folks might not know is the active ingredient in shampoo.
David:
The dBs/Rew track is indeed killer.
Bruce in "Prove It All Night" ---
Baby, tie your hair back in a long white bow,
Meet me in the fields out behind the dynamo
And Bruce in "Born To Run" ---
The girls comb their hair in rearview mirrors
And the boys try to look so hard
Procol Harum in "One More Time" from their terrific album "Prodigal Stranger" ---
A friend of mine told me
That you've changed your hair
They say you're really different now
I remember how you were
I can add a few...
Beatles - When I'm 64
Charlie Daniels Band - Long Haired Country Boy & Uneasy Rider (too bad he went wingnut)
Jimi Hendrix - If 6 Was 9
Joni Mitchell - Blonde in the Bleachers
Joe Jackson - Is She Really Going Out With Him?
I'm surprised Smashing Pumpkins don't have a dog in this fight; one would think this subject is very close to Billy Corgan's heart.
In any event, I'll add one more Beatles tune, "Don't Pass Me By" ("You were in car crash and you lost your hair.")
and a couple from Dylan:
Every Grain of Sand: "...every hair is numbered, like every grain of sand."
Shelter from the Storm: "...with silver bracelets on her wrist and flowers in her hair")
and one from the Stones:
Dance Little Sister: "On Thursday night she looked a fright
her pricky hair all curled, oh Lord, what a sight!"
"I'm a little fag with my hair gassed back"....Frank Zappa
Blondie - Atomic
Blondie - Rip her to shreds
Joe Jackson, Pretty Girls - "long legs and blonde hair"
And it's not a song, but a band name: Haircut 100, one of the most underappreciated bands to come out of the early '80s.
Best hair-related title: the Susan Tedeschi instrumental "You're On My Hair." Runner up: "You Can't Hide A Redneck (Underneath That Hippy Hair)" by Doug Sahm.
The Morells' "Shake and Push" is my Holy Grail album search. I keep picking up pieces of it here and there...
The Sonics!
Cinderella:
She's got a pretty long hair
And she's five-foot-two
When she ran away
I found her glass shoe
Won't somebody tell me
What I am gonna do
The Witch:
She got a long black hair
And a big black car
I know what you're thinking
But you won't get far
She gonna make you itch
'cause she's the witch.
J.Loslo:
E-mail me your home addy and I'll be happy to burn you a copy of Shake and Push.
Well, I'll be damned. Neil Young really is God.
"People ask me everywhere, they say is that really all of your hair?"
Hair - Graham Central Station
Cars. "Let them brush your rock n' roll hair," from "Good Times Roll." STILL think a local salon could do quite well with that name...
"Long-Haired Guys From England" - Too Much Joy
"And the sign said 'long-haired freaky people need not apply...' :)
-bill buckner
And how could we forget ... from 1965, the Barbarians' "Are You A Boy Or Are You A Girl?"
Are you a boy? Or are you a girl?
With your long blond hair you look like a girl
Yeah, you look like a girl
You may be a boy, hey, you look like a girl
You're either a girl or you come from Liverpool
Yeah, Liverpool
You can dog like a female monkey, but you swim like a stone
Yeah, a rolling stone
You may be a boy, hey, you look like a girl
Hey! Aw!
Note the not so subtle digs at the British Invasion ...
My favorite: "She had hair like Jeannie Shrimpton back in 1965." Smithereens
What about, "Her hair so brilliant that it hurt my eyes" from "Pretty Ballerina." Never really understood that.
Though the song doesn't really have much to do with hair, "Hyacinth Girl" by Winter Hours has the great line -- "Comb out your long blond hair/We'll ride the waves till someone wakes us," which gets extra props for being an Eliot reference.
Replacements, "Shooting Dirty Pool" -- "Why don't you get a haircut, sistah!"
And of course, "Werewolves of London" -- "His hair was perfect."
Where all all the Stones fans today?
"She comes in colors evrywhere;
She combs her hair
Shes like a rainbow"
and What's Going On - Marvin Gaye
"who are they to judge us
just because our hair is long..."
also.
See my beard? Ain't it weird?
Don't be sceered...it's just a beard.
-George Carlin
Ron Sexsmith - Strawberry Blonde
Baby And The Band - Imperial Teen ("The Hair, the TV, the baby and the band...")
Hairy - The Vaselines ("I don't want to look like you, greasy hair and ugly too, I just want to read in peace, to lie in bed and stay asleep.")
Funky Side Of Town - James Brown ("The long-haired hippies and the afro blacks, all get together over 'cross the tracks, and they party all night long!")
John said...
My favorite: "She had hair like Jeannie Shrimpton back in 1965." Smithereens
Swoon. I love that one too.
:-)
Lady Godiva (Peter and Gordon, not the VU):
Her long blonde hair
Hangin' down around her knees
All the cats who dig striptease
Prayin' for a little breeze
Her long blonde hair
Falling down across her arms
Hiding all the lady's charms
Lady Godiva
Elvis Costello: "Baby's Got A Brand New Hairdo"
Talking Heads "Life During Wartime":
Changed my hairstyle so many times
I don't know what I look like
T-Bone Burnett:"After All These Years"
Was her hair still Blonde
Were her eyes still blue
Why do they care if I ain't got much hair?
-- Sonny Bono, Laugh at Me
(though I am more familiar with the Skeletons version and Otis Ball version)
Noam said: "See my beard? Ain't it weird? Don't be sceered...it's just a beard."
SMILE X 10!!
CovetedNOPrizeWinnerWithOakLeafCluster said...
Why do they care if I ain't got much hair?
-- Sonny Bono, Laugh at Me
(though I am more familiar with the Skeletons version and Otis Ball version)
Actually, the pre-Bowie Mott the Hoople's version, done a la Blonde on Blonde, remains definitive.
CovetedNOPrizeWinnerWithOakLeafCluster:
Whoa -- dude...do you by any chance have the Otis Ball album? I'm assuming there was just the one...
E-mail me if you get a chance...
Why do they care if I ain't got much hair?
-- Sonny Bono, Laugh at Me
....and from the first, classic Was/Not Was album, Out Come The Freaks
Open the door
& there’s Suzanne,
she eats her breakfast
from the pan
She never even burns her tongue
And someday she’d like to get hung up on a millionaire
She don’t even care
if he ain’t got no hair
She says “Long as he
signs the checks
I figure what the heck,
I’ll get him a toupee”
What more can you say?
They just don't write 'em like that any more.
The Replacements-"Talent Show":
With my waxed up hair and my painted shoes,
I have an offer that you might refuse.
Timbruk 3-"Hairstyles and Attitudes":
Hairstyles and attitudes-are the connected?
Will you sell me one of those if I shave my head?
"Get me out of town" is what Fireball said.
Never trust a man in a blue trench coat.
Never drive a car when you're dead.
The only one I can think of that hasn't been taken is that song,
Yellow is the color of my true love's hair, in the morning...
Donovan did it I think but maybe he didn't write it.
Oh wait, thought of one more. William Topley Delta Rain from the only album I really liked a lot. Of course that may have something to do with the fact one of my favorite past lovers introduced me to it.
Shake your hair out and come and dance with me
We are lonely with no good need to be
Where the river grows wide to kiss the sea
Floods the delta and lovers’ eyes can see
Libby -- I don't know that song. A lovely lyric, though...
It was a great romantic album to --um -- dance to. Succeeded in seducing me anyway. Maybe you can hear it here. Can't seem to find his old stuff on youtube.
Oh and I thought of one more hair song that probably doesn't qualify because I think it may have been pre-Beatles, but I had a teenage crush on the guy from, I think, the program "77 Sunset Strip," so naturally I loved the song.
Kookie, Kookie, lend me your comb.
Edd Byrnes. (Not Ed Burns, the filmmaker/actor).
I dug him the most, too...
He was, indeed, the ginchiest.
Well they fly in the air
as you comb your hair
and the summertime
will make you itch a
mosquito bite
Just to correct the Frank Zappa reference, above:
"I'm a little PIMP with my hair gassed back..." from Hot Rats
To which I am forced to add:
"She told me, don't bother to call again, less I cut off all of my hair", My Guitar Want to Kill Your Mother.
And even:
"Oh my hair's getting good in the back!", Who Needs the Peace Corps.
Frank had something about hair...
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