Faithless Love

Tonight's song is one that my daughter and I used to play on the piano and sing back in Las Cruces. I guess we learned it from the Linda Rondstadt version of the song written by J.D. Souther. Band in a Box is playing the drums, bass and one of the pianos and I planned on adding a sweet, melodic, clean guitar over it, but I found out that if you go for years, if not decades, not playing regularly you lose the ability to play clean, melodic licks for a whole song. So I moved over to the keyboard (which has been not played regularly even longer than the guitar) and played some arpeggioed chords. Maybe the quality of the song itself can carry my lackluster rendition.

FAITHLESS LOVE

 

Dead Man

This is a song whose time has come -- to be yanked headfirst from the grave where it has languished for the past 40 years. The Calhoons used to do this song in the early years. It was a holdover from Knees' time in Durango where his band did a lot of Asleep at the Wheel. The Texas band was perfect for integrating the bars of Colorado and New Mexico because the Bob Wills swing sound pleased the cowboys and the hipness of the lyrics satisfied the hippies.

DEAD MAN

I would think the tune would kill on THE WALKING DEAD. And out of the 900+ zombie movies that have been made so far, at least one of them ought to have this being gurgled by a zombie band in a C&W bar.

Let's travel back to New Years' Eve of 1976 and usher in 1977 with the Bros. Hopefully the scene got wilder as the midnight hour approached.  

DEAD MAN (Calhoon Bros Version)

 

You and Me Instead

I wanted to see if I could still dash off a song a night as I was doing a couple of months ago so I picked one that was easy and I knew, a little late-night ditty by Asleep at the Wheel. We used to do this at the Las Cruces Inn back in the early days of Knees' Las Cruces career. 

YOU AND ME INSTEAD

What makes this song extra nostalgic is its lyrics, where the singer keeps saying "with you and me instead". In this day and age, any modern singer would sing "with you and I instead". The world may be more democratic than ever, but the people you see on TV are much stupider.

Let's sit back and listen to what the Mighty Calhoon Brothers did with this song back on September 18, 1976.

YOU AND ME INSTEAD (Bros Version) 

I'm Alone (But That's Okay)

I've taken a vacation from music lately, mainly working on books. But when a song comes along that catches my ear -- even though I am not listening -- it means that it's an extraordinary song. Written by Christopher Guest and sung by Ron Sexsmith, it's the end theme song from the HBO show, Family Tree. As soon as I heard the song I knew it was a song that I had to do for the Ramble.

But it's so short. It's perfect as an end theme and at one minute in length says what it wants to say and ends. The performance by Sexsmith is absolutely beautiful and I feel a little sheepish about making the song a little longer and more Calhoon-like. With only a guitar and a weird organ or something, the original has more soul than my drums, bass, guitars and harmonizer version. If you like the way it sounds when I sing it, you really should hear the original. It's fantastic.

I'M ALONE (BUT THAT'S OKAY)