quote by Mr. Vargas, the science teacher from "Fast Times at Ridgemont High"
Happy Valentine's Day (or not)
No blood this year!
I thought I'd change it up and do a playlist, or what used to be known as a 'mixtape'...
The following playlist aren't really all love songs...but they all have the word "heart" in the title in some shape or form, each with it's own backstory, as it should be.
The Last Beat of My Heart Valentine's Playlist
"The Last Beat of My Heart" - Siouxsie & the Banshees (from the 1988 album, "Peepshow")
First of all, I must admit that I chose this as the lead track for the playlist becase the title was similar to this French film, "The Beat that My Heart Skipped" which I randomly watched one day on one of those foreign film channels. Next, I was reminded of this song because Astroboi and I traveled to LA by Amtrak into visit our good friend N in L.A. We were all in college at time. N and Astroboi had tickets to see Siouxsie and the Banshees at the Wiltern that weekend (this was the tour to support "Peepshow") while I went out to dinner with her college roommates at Gladstone's for Fish in Malibu.
"Two Hearts Beat as One" - U2
Early U2, up to 1987's "The Joshua Tree was the best. They had so much passion and fire in their songs. The radio station 91x was still relativey new and played this, as well as "Sunday Bloody Sunday" in heavy rotation. This single was from 1983's "War" (one of their best albums, in my opinion). Confession time - I used to have a crush on their drummer, Larry Muller, Jr.!
"Closer to the Heart" - Rush
From their 1977 album, " A Farewell to Kings". Love the chiming guitars and the meaningful lyrics. One of my favorite rock bands from Canada! I even geekily quoted a Rush song in my high school yearbook, "All the world's indeed a stage and we are merely players...each another's audience inside the gilded cage" (from the song "Limelight" on the album "Exit Stage Left", which borrowed the words from Shakespeare's "As You Like It")
"Time (The Clock of the Heart)" - Culture Club
Memories of junior high with my dearest GBF Astroboi! I know you're reading this! Don't you still have the picture disc? Do you still have your BOY of London hat? :)
"You Took My Heart and You're Tearin' it Apart" - Harry Nilsson
This cynical and deadpan song was heard over the opening credits of the raunchy teen sex comedy, "Private School" which starred every early 80's guy's wet dream, Phoebe Cates. I always thought this song was hilarious! "You're breaking my heart...you're tearin' it apart, so FK YOU!"
"It's Called a Heart" - Depeche Mode
Of couse, we cannot forget Depeche Mode, can we? I remember N had this single which she probably bought at Licorice Pizza; the B-side was "Fly on the Windscreen", which we actually liked better. Look how young they were back then!
""Change of Heart - Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers
Despite his sometimes garbled delivery, I am enamored of Tom Petty's songs. I was 14 when this song came out in 1983; the album was "Long After Dark" which also had the single, "You Got Lucky", another one of my favorite Tom Petty songs. The album was produced by Jimmy Iovine who the youngers will recognize as one of the 'mentors' on "American Idol" for the past two seasons.
"Bringin' on the Heartbreak" - Def Leppard
Now this song has got to be one of the best Def Lep songs ever! I guess you could call it a "power ballad". The kind of song you would "flick your Bic" at during a concert, but nowadays, people will just wave their glowing cell phones in the air.
"Bringin' on the Heartbreak" was one of the first singles from their second album, "High 'n Dry" (one of my "Desert Island Discs), which was released in summer of 1981. I was about to enter 7th grade and heavily into hard rock (my musical tastes haven't changed much). The band was getting some airplay on KGB FM 101.5 and whenever I heard their songs, I was mesmerized. Def Leppard was one of the bands that was lumped into the category, the "New Wave of British Heavy Metal" (NWOBMH), although they really weren't metal, but more like melodic hard rock. The lead single from the album was the fierce "Let it Go" and then there was this ballad which segued into a fkg kick ass instrumental, "Switch 625".
There were two versions of the song as well as two versions of the video. The first had their original lineup with original guitarist Pete Willis (before he was sacked for alcohol problems). The second version of the video had synthesizer keyboards (which I didn't like as much) was re-released in 1984, after the succes of "Pyromania" . The newer version of the song and video featured Willis's replacement, Phil Collen (formerly of Girl). In the newer video, Joe Elliott is seen walking into a giant warehouse (a biscuit factory!) with choreographed fork lifts. Silly shit. I liked the original video where they are just performing on stage.
A small bit of trivia - In 2002, this song was covered by Mariah Carey for her "Charm Bracelet" album. It's excruciatingly slow, but she does a fair job of covering it in her own way.
"Hole Hearted" - Extreme
Featuring lead singer Gary Cherrone before his ill-fated stint as Van Halen's third lead singer (from the craptastic "Van Halen III" album). Yeah, I actually included an acoustic song in here from my least favorite decade of music (the '90's)...am I going soft or what? But really, I like the music and Nuno Bettencourt is one of rock's most underappreciated guitarists. If you've ever watched "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure", the scene where Beethoven is playing keyboards at a mall music store features Extreme in the background soundtrack ("Play with Me" which included various rapid fire neo-classical guitar licks).
"Cross My Heart" - Everything but the Girl
From the 1986 album, "Baby the Stars Shine Bright". N and I would spend hours in her room listening to records and making mixtapes. This was one of the songs we included in one of our mixtapes exclusively with female vocalist.
"Heartbreaker" - Led Zeppelin
Cock Rock at it's best! No one can sing and posture and preen like Robert Plant. No one looks better playing a low slung guitar than Jimmy Page (well, maybe Slash!)...This song is usually played in tandem with "Living Loving Maid". Kind of like how Journey's "Feeling That Way" segues into "Anytime" or Earth Wind & Fire's song "Shining Star" is always followed by "That's the Way of the World".
""Jaded Heart - Dokken
From their most excellent second album, "Tooth & Nail" (1985), an album I used to listen to a lot whenever I hung out with the Pyromaniac, either in his house or in his car. He listened to a lot of Yes, ELP, Rush, and Dokken. The band was relatively new at the time and had a killer guitarist, George Lynch (who later formed Lynch Mob), who had a spectactularly groomed mullet complete with highlights. If you've ever watched "Nightmare on Elm Street 3 - Dream Warriors", you would have heard Dokken's "Into the Fire" (which was from this album but the movie came out two years later) as well s the movie's title track.
Burning Heart - Vandenberg
All right, this was one really UGLY band from the Netherlands! Why couldn't the lead singer look like Mike Trammp (from White Lion) instead? But really, I didn't care about their looks as much as I cared about the amazing mad guitar skills of the band's namesake, Adrian Vandenberg. This power ballad is from their 1981 self-titled debut. They never really hit it big in America. The only one who garnered any fame outside of the band, was of course Adrian Vandenberg who later joined Whitesnake in 1987.
And that is all for now. Music geekery over and out.
Follow up Valentine's post to follow...!
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