Sincerity

I was thinking about this a bit in the context of yesterday's Third Eye Blind post and a bit in the context of the fact that I'm on a huge Don Williams kick right now, but I think very straight-forward sincerity in love songs is underrated. Music about flirtation, about lust, about sex, about the girl you see across the room, all of that's great, of course. So many songs get close to straightforward declarations of love without quite getting there. Many of them are gorgeous. Belle & Sebastian's "My Wandering Days Are Over," for example: "I hung my boots up and then retired from the disco floor / Now the center of my so-called being is / The space between your bed and wardrope with the lourvred doors" is a phenomenal set of three lines, but it's not actually a straightforward "I love you."But I'm really into directness at the moment. It's one of the reasons I love the Beach Boys so much: the Beach Boys generally address their songs to "you," while the Beatles usually sing songs about "her." I don't mean the kind of pop stuff where love shows up a million times in the chorus and verse, it's not so much the word itself, but the songs that distill what love is in a way that makes it more explicable than it was before. And so, to wit, a mid-week mix of some great, direct love songs.

1) Don Williams--"Listen to the Radio" (no embed, sorry). "When someone wants you, they should just say it's so" is a killer line in its gentleness. A whole song about how much Williams loves someone, and how hard it is to find the precise words it is to say that convincingly. Gorgeous, short, and sweet.

2) The Zombies--"I Want Her, She Wants Me." "There's nothing on my mind / Life seems kind / Now I want her, she wants me." Such a great, succinct description of the transformative power of love. This whole album is fantastic, and extremely underrated if you've only ever heard "Time of the Season." "A Rose For Emily" is the tragic inverse of this song.

3) Bruce Springsteen--"Tougher Than The Rest." Seriously, does there exist in popular music a sexier line than the Boss singing "If you're rough enough for love, baby I'm tougher than the rest"? This is THE definitive "true love is no picnic, but I'm ready to go" song. Patti Scialfa is the luckiest woman on the planet.

4) Patti Scialfa--"Spanish Dancer." This song really ought to be disqualified on the grounds of excessive metaphor, but I am a total sucker for the directness of the phrasing: "Oh, mama, the bridges were burned / Over a river black and cold / But I walked when love commanded me / Up to the edges of his soul / I'm still frightened of that dark divide / Will I gain entrance or be denied?" This song is the absolute definition of the kind of bravery I aspire to. Bruce Springsteen is the luckiest man on the planet.

5) Split Enz--"I Got You." The terror in this song is absolutely amazing. I can't think of another song that crystallizes the fear you sometimes feel in a perfectly happy relationship in the same way. The vulnerability of admitting "I don't know why sometimes I get frightened" is admirable.

6) Pet Shop Boys--"Home and Dry." The Boys are the absolute masters of cutting lyrics, but "Home and Dry" is one of the sweetest songs I know. And it has one of those rhymes that I fall for every time: "There's a plane at JFK / To fly you back from far away / All those dark and frantic / Transatlantic miles."

7) Scritti Politti--"Snow In The Sun." Probably the most emotionally complicated song on this list, sung from the perspective of someone who probably doesn't deserve the love he's getting, a la the Beach Boys in "You Still Believe Me." "There'll be something good about me soon" is one of the saddest promises I've ever heard.