"NOTHING CAN CHANGE THIS LOVE" SAM COOKE (1963)

The moment a song is born, the world is different. It’s now a part of our lives. We sing it in the shower. We dance to it at our wedding. We get pumped with it. We break up to it. We memorize it. We try to forget it. We rediscover it. This month, I’m joining Arron Wright’s Twitter music challenge: ##Popiversary2. Because why the hell not. Songs deserve their own anniversaries, too.

Year: 1963

It’s time to pay homage to a legend. The king of soul. The man whose voice and music influenced Aretha Franklin, Al Green, Curtis Mayfield, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Otis Redding and so many others. Play a single note from any one of his songs and his voice is instantly recognizable. In 1963, he released two albums – Mr. Soul and Night Beat. The latter is considered to be the stronger of the two, but I love the track “Nothing Can Change This Love” from Mr. Soul.

This was the one song from Mr. Soul that Cooke wrote – and it’s one of the best from the bunch. I can listen to it a hundred times in a row – and never grow tired marveling at Cooke’s effortlessly sublime vocals. His voice is as smooth as molasses, but it’s also his delivery that is worth taking note of. It’s his timing that allows Cooke to create a sense of gravitas in every line. It’s why something so simple sounds so exceptional.

“If I go a million miles away I'd write a letter each and every day. 'Cause honey nothing, nothing Can ever change this love I have for you.”

"GLORIA" THEM (1965)

For the month of January, I’m selecting some of the most memorable and influential songs of the 60’s. While they all hail from the same decade, these are some of my favorite songs of any era. They remind me that the 60’s were so much more than just Woodstock and psychedelic rock. It was a flourishing period for blues, folk, progressive and straight-ahead rock. #31DaysOf60sSongs

I was never part of a real band, but there were a few afternoons in high school when a few friends of mine and I had a small taste of it. We huddled into our friend’s basement where we had a couple of amps, guitars, a drum set, keyboard and a mic set up. It was our playground. “Gloria” gave us the satisfaction of knowing we could play a song from beginning to end. Only one of us was musically trained. Our drummer could barely keep a beat. But all of us were crazy about music. We had a lot of fun together. We felt like rock stars for a couple of hours. And we played “Gloria”.

Three chords. One hard rocking number from the annals of rock & roll. With Van Morrison on lead vocals and songwriting duties, Them put together a garage rock classic that had that rhythm and blues groove, that distorted, raw edge, and Van Morrison soul. Like many of the great songs from the 60’s, “Gloria” was a b-side. The single “Baby, Please Don’t Go” wasn’t too shabby either. But it wasn’t a Them original. This made “Gloria” more important in many ways. While The Velvet Underground may get credit for getting countless listeners to start their own band, “Gloria” made it possible for many of them to actually play. E - D - A - E - D - A, etc.

“G-L-O-R-I-A, Gloria. I'm gonna shout it all night.”

"MORNING DEW" THE GRATEFUL DEAD (1967)

For the month of January, I’m selecting some of the most memorable and influential songs of the 60’s. While they all hail from the same decade, these are some of my favorite songs of any era. They remind me that the 60’s were so much more than just Woodstock and psychedelic rock. It was a flourishing period for blues, folk, progressive and straight-ahead rock. #31DaysOf60sSongs

Today the Mental Jukebox is playing a song from a band that simply can’t be given justice in this format. Listening to the Dead’s albums on Spotify I feel utterly gypped, knowing that I’m getting a tiny fraction of the experience, the magic that happens at a Dead concert where set list formations flow like water and improvisations come on like a flood. Spotify can’t capture the aura of a band so largely defined by its live shows, but it has given me the chance to get reacquainted with legendary albums like Workingman’s Dead, American Beauty and the self-titled debut album that spawned “Morning Dew”.

Music critics have often praised how the Dead is in a category all their own. Garcia, Weir, Pigpen, Lesh and Kreutzmann all brought different influences with them, the most obvious ones being blues, folk and country. They took those genres and layered on an electric guitar rock sound that’s highly experimental and improvisational. That’s the beauty of “Morning Dew”. It’s a pretty standard melody masterfully sung by Garcia and taken for several twists and turns with a dual guitar jam fest from Weir and Garcia, and a melodic, meandering bass line from Lesh that jumps into the upper octaves. Still, the individual members never sound like they’re competing with each other. They move and groove in one flow. It’s the beautiful magic of the Dead.

“I'll walk you out in the morning dew my honey. I guess it doesn't really matter anyway.”