Songs That Transcend Their Origins

[Egyptian Feast]

I was listening to my favourite Prince album Parade over the weekend. The final track 'Sometimes It Snows In April', one of the most beautiful, heartbreaking songs he ever wrote, always had a potent emotional charge which has only increased in intensity since that awful day in April 2016. Hearing it for the first time after his death was particularly painful – it seemed like a perfect epitaph to the man. It even snowed in West London a few days later. No bullshit. I recall being in a car with a friend as the snowflakes fell and saying "See? Prince was right. Sometimes it snows in April." He just looked at me with a "Holy shit" expression and we changed the subject.

I wasn't the only one who found it hard to handle at the time. D'Angelo tearfully performed it on The Tonight Show (changing the deceased subject's name to 'Prince') and barely made it through the song. Who could blame him? It's difficult to listen to even now without thinking about the man who wrote it and how this incredible talent was taken from us much, much too soon. It's such a powerful, loaded track that it's easy to overlook the inspiration for the song: a frankly very poor romantic comedy named Under The Cherry Moon that would be the worst film of Prince's career had he not followed it with the execrable Graffiti Bridge a few years later.

Chief among the many failings of the film is poor utilisation of the exquisite soundtrack, a failing that can be pinned on the film's director...umm, Prince. The only song we hear in full is 'Mountains', played over the end credits (easily the highlight of the movie) and I think we also hear a snatch of 'Do You Lie?' in the background of one scene. Aside from that, the film is very stingy with the music – classics such as 'Kiss' and 'Anotherloverholenyohead' are nowhere to be heard – and we don't even get to see Prince and the Revolution perform until the end. It's as if he forgot the main reason Purple Rain was such a success (CLUE: it wasn't his acting). The greatest collection of songs of his career (IMHO) is neglected in favour of a chemistry-free romance with a young Kirsten Scott-Thomas and tedious, mostly unfunny banter with his wingman, Jerome Benton. At least Graffiti Bridge had the good sense to foreground it's (far inferior) soundtrack.

As far as I can tell from the lyrics, Benton's dickhead sidekick is supposed to be the narrator of 'Sometimes It Snows In April', heartbroken following the death of his only friend Christopher Tracy at the hands of Steven Berkoff's goons. In isolation, it's a truly devastating song and it's perhaps for the best that the film doesn't use the number* as the only emotion the onscreen death of Christopher Tracy inspires is relief that the film is nearly at an end. This snotty little twat doesn't deserve such a touching song as an epitaph, but Prince did, and he's the person we're thinking of when we're sobbing along with it. The entire album seems to tell the story of a much better movie, one that Prince himself was not capable of making. The movie playing in your head while you listen to Parade is undoubtedly much better than the one that inspired it.

I was also listening to the soundtrack of a substantially better movie over the weekend, Curtis Mayfield's Super Fly. It's a decent enough Blaxploitation flick, neither the best or the worst that the subgenre had to offer, elevated massively by a soundtrack it doesn't truly deserve. Curtis went waaay above and beyond the requirements of the project to deliver an accompanying album with infinitely more substance than the film it promotes. It's clear from listening to tracks like 'Little Child Runnin' Wild', 'Superfly' or 'Pusherman' that Mayfield had given a lot more thought to the themes of the movie than the director or screenwriter. One character, Fat Freddy, is little more than a plot point in the movie – his death simply an event to get us from A to B in the story – but Mayfield empathised enough with the tragic character that he wrote the spectacular 'Freddie's Dead', a song that has far more to say in five minutes than the filmmakers could over two entire films (and a 2018 remake). Although the film was a huge hit, I don't think it can be denied that Mayfield's songs had more of a lasting cultural impact and have aged much better than the movie that inspired them.

I'm sure you hustlers can think of many more examples of songs that transcend their origins...


*I could be mistaken here and it may even be playing faintly in the background while Prince dies, it's been a while since I watched it and I don't intend to again.

[non capisco]

^ Great post, man. Sums up my thoughts on one of Prince's greatest songs perfectly.

[The Culture Bunker]

Re the Superfly soundtrack, you could maybe say the same about the title track from another blaxploitation flick, 'Trouble Man', by Marvin Gaye.

[Satchmo Distel]

McCartney's 'No More Lonely Nights' from the appalling 'Give My Regards To Broad Street'.

Arguably 'Woman' from Lennon and Ono's 'Double Fantasy'

[famethrowa]

I once heard some talk that Roy Orbison and his co-writers did advertising jingles as well in the early days, so some of Roy's most heartfelt and artistic songs started out as ideas for dinky little commercial grabs. Anyone know about that?

[famethrowa]

Strawberry Fields starting out as a bloke bumbling around on guitar at home in front of a tape recorder. "I cannae do it..."

https://youtu.be/jD2h0WuQ9kE?t=51

[PaulTMA]

I don't want to make this 'great songs from shite films' exactly, but Bowie's 'Absolute Beginners' must be up there in this department.

[Egyptian Feast]

Re the Superfly soundtrack, you could maybe say the same about the title track from another blaxploitation flick, 'Trouble Man', by Marvin Gaye.

Wow, that one hadn't occured to me at all despite being possibly the album I've played most over the years. It used to be my go-to late night album when I was single and didn't have a telly (amongst the others were In A Silent Way and Orbvs Terrarum). That's a perfect choice for this thread.

I finally got to see the film a couple of years back. I could tell from just checking the fella out on the album sleeve that it could never live up to the soundtrack and unsurprisingly it doesn't. It's a pretty good film though, better than Super Fly certainly. Robert Hooks is very good in the lead, but he isn't the Trouble Man I know in my head. There's a film somewhere in the ether that fits that soundtrack like a glove, but it will never exist in our reality.

Pro-tip for mixtape compilers of the late 1990s: 'Deep-in-it' is perfect filler when you need 1 min 25 secs to bulk out a side, and it can be hilarious when you have it coming straight in after certain songs. Experiment with it, you'll have a lot of fun.

[Egyptian Feast]

Arguably 'Woman' from Lennon and Ono's 'Double Fantasy'

I first heard that song when I saw the Imagine documentary as an impressionable kid, so every time I hear it I have a mental image of John and Yoko rutting.

I haven't seen it years and recalling it just now I had a quick image of John and Yoko with cream crackers stuck to their arses, but that was just my brain doing a mash-up with The Tall Guy.

[buzby]

I once heard some talk that Roy Orbison and his co-writers did advertising jingles as well in the early days, so some of Roy's most heartfelt and artistic songs started out as ideas for dinky little commercial grabs. Anyone know about that?

Roy may have written some jingles while he was a songwriter for Acuff-Rose at the end of the 50s, but his big hits came when he started writing with (fellow Texan and old Odessa College aquaintance) Joe Melson, who encouraged him to start using the full range of his voice. His demo recordings of their early songs landed a contract with Monument Records in Nashville and they then co-wrote Only The Lonely (which they had tried to sell to Elvis and The Everly Brothers before recording it themselves), Blue Angel, Running Scared, Crying and Blue Bayou.

From 1964 onwards Orbison also worked with prolific Nashville songwriter Bill Dees, and they wrote It's Over and Pretty Woman together.

[Satchmo Distel]

'A Little Less Conversation' by Elvis Presley from the 1968 film Live A Little, Love A Little. Inexplicably issued as a B-side.

[Better Midlands]

Re the Superfly soundtrack, you could maybe say the same about the title track from another blaxploitation flick, 'Trouble Man', by Marvin Gaye.

I love the instrumental "T Plays It Cool" off that soundtrack.
https://youtu.be/wof5qoR147A

Candi Staton's "You Got The Love" was recorded for a direct-to-video 1980s documentary about an obese man who was trying to lose weight and was never intended for release.

[Egyptian Feast]

I love the instrumental "T Plays It Cool" off that soundtrack.
https://youtu.be/wof5qoR147A

Absolute banger.

Candi Staton's "You Got The Love" was recorded for a direct-to-video 1980s documentary about an obese man who was trying to lose weight and was never intended for release.

Wow! That may just be the best example in the thread.

[Lordofthefiles]

Fruit Tree - Nick Drake

https://youtu.be/lQHXY4zqG3o


Fame is but a fruit tree
So very unsound.
It can never flourish
'Till its stock is in the ground.
So men of fame
Can never find a way
'Till time has flown
Far from their dying day.

Forgotten while you're here
Remembered for a while
A much updated ruin
From a much outdated style.

Life is but a memory
Happened long ago.
Theatre full of sadness
For a long forgotten show.
Seems so easy
Just to let it go on by
'Till you stop and wonder
Why you never wondered why.

Safe in the womb
Of an everlasting night
You find the darkness can
Give the brightest light.
Safe in your place deep in the earth
That's when they'll know what you were really worth.

Forgotten while you're here
Remembered for a while
A much updated ruin
From a much outdated style.

Fame is but a fruit tree
So very unsound.
It can never flourish
'Till its stock is in the ground.
So men of fame
Can never find a way
'Till time has flown
Far from their dying day.


Fruit tree, fruit tree
No one knows you but the rain and the air.
Don't you worry
They'll stand and stare when you're gone.

Fruit tree, fruit tree
Open your eyes to another year.
They'll all know
That you were here when you're gone.


It truly blows my mind that a young lad could write something as beautiful, subtle, bleak and prescient as this song.

[studpuppet]

'Amen, Brother' by The Winstons (or more specifically six seconds in the middle of it).

[famethrowa]

Roy may have written some jingles while he was a songwriter for Acuff-Rose at the end of the 50s, but his big hits came when he started writing with (fellow Texan and old Odessa College aquaintance) Joe Melson, who encouraged him to start using the full range of his voice. His demo recordings of their early songs landed a contract with Monument Records in Nashville and they then co-wrote Only The Lonely (which they had tried to sell to Elvis and The Everly Brothers before recording it themselves), Blue Angel, Running Scared, Crying and Blue Bayou.

From 1964 onwards Orbison also worked with prolific Nashville songwriter Bill Dees, and they wrote It's Over and Pretty Woman together.

Thanks always Buzby.

While we're talking the Big O, his original version of "I Drove All Night" was first released on a Nintendo Super Mario album.

[SpiderChrist]

Funky Drummer

[The Culture Bunker]

While we're talking the Big O, his original version of "I Drove All Night" was first released on a Nintendo Super Mario album.

Not sure a song about sneaking into a sleeping woman's room to molest her is very appropriate for a video game cash-in album. No, Roy, it's not alright, OK?

[poodlefaker]

Funky Drummer's a good one because the whole thing sounds like it was moreorless made up on the spot because the studio time was booked.

[boki]

Pretty much anything that's become meme material, but particularly Smash Mouth's All Star and Rick Astley's Never Gonna Give You Up.  The way the former has massively embraced this and leaned into it is quite the thing.

[poodlefaker]

John Coltrane was masterful in taking the most whitebread showtunes and turning them into stellar works of art - My Favourite Things, of course, but also The Inch Worm and Chim Chim Charee.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Re the Superfly soundtrack, you could maybe say the same about the title track from another blaxploitation flick, 'Trouble Man', by Marvin Gaye.

Across 110th Street, that's another one!

[grassbath]

Good call on Coltrane!

Also how could I forget Nina Simone turning 'Feelings' from a cheesy 70s easy listening hit to a confrontational ten-minute exploration of the heart at the Montreux Jazz festival.

[Sebastian Cobb]

'Amen, Brother' by The Winstons (or more specifically six seconds in the middle of it).

Apache, I guess both the original and the Incredible Bongo Band one.

Lyn Collins - Think

Marva Whitney - It's My Thing

[Sebastian Cobb]

Meters - Cisssy Strut
Booker T & The MG's - Green Onions

[Cuellar]

Bethlehem Down by Peter Warlock, lyrics by Bruce Blunt. A great christmas carol written

to finance an "immortal carouse" (a heavy bout of drinking) on Christmas Eve 1927 for himself and Blunt, who were experiencing financial difficulty. The pair submitted the carol to the Daily Telegraph's annual Christmas carol contest and won