Song Talk with Morry Campbell

James Taylor: Songwriting God

I was in the gym yesterday, and James Taylor's Greatest Hits came up. I had just put it on the iPod, and I hadn't listened to it for years. I'd forgotten just how good those songs are. I loved them when I was younger too, but now it seems that I've kind of grown into those songs and that music. James Taylor is one of the true masters of the American song, a musical and American icon.

Songtalk Recommends: Across the Universe

In the annals of the history of popular music, perhaps no band has been more influential than The Beatles. You can't find many contemporary songwriters that don't claim at least some Beatles influence. If you want to learn how to write a great song, listen to The Beatles.  Nowhere Man, Eleanor Rigby, She's Leaving Home, Come Together, Hey Jude, Octopus' Garden, Help!, Ticket to Ride, Cry Baby Cry, Helter Skelter, While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da, Across the Universe, Yesterday, The Long and Winding Road, Strawberry Fields, Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, Here, There and Everywhere--the list goes on, and on, and on.

There have been some admittedly great covers of Beatles tunes in the past. The Carpenters' version of Ticket to Ride and Help! come to mind, and Aerosmith recorded a pretty decent cover of Come Together for the '70s film Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. But there is no substitute for the real thing. The Beatles were a monumental band and their recordings rank among the best contemporary music ever put to tape.

That being said, Julie Taymor presided over a film project that produced perhaps the best cover versions of Beatles songs ever recorded. The film, Across the Universe, is this month's Songtalk Recommendation. In the same process as the Abba-based Mamma Mia!, the story was created around pre-existing music, only with Beatles songs instead of Abba songs. And like Mama Mia!, sometimes the story gets a little thin, but the music is so consistently good that you don't care. It's a wonderful introduction to some of the Beatles' greatest hits for the non-initiated (not-yet Beatles fan). If you doubt how great these songs are, check out this film, or the soundtrack. 

Introducing "Songtalk Recommends"

From time to time, I'll recommend a book, or a CD, or something else, and it will appear right up there on the lefthand side of the screen.

In my writing group, we're going to start working with a book called  Writing Down the Bones. I've taken a few playwriting classes, and even more songwriting classes, and in every one of them, this book has come up. So we decided we might profit from reading it as a group. In fact, March's songwriting challenge, to be posted on Friday, will have something to do with the book.

So if you don't have it, click the link above, under Songtalk Recommends and get it now from Amazon. And if you click from this page, Songtalk makes a little cash. So thanks.