More Shelf Life
"Runaround Sue" by Dion
I'd listen to Dion sing the Bronx phonebook (or the Boca Raton, if the arrangements were good). Despite the plays and replays, this one never gets old; the magic's in the grooves: his confidence and slyness, the buoyancy of the track, the Del Satins' backing vocals. Pure 1961, what Richard Price so well knows and communicated so convincingly in his debut novel The Wanderers.
"Sweet Jane" by the Velvet Underground
I don't know what it's about. You tell me. I don't care. Simply the coolest chords and chorus ever slapped together by a misanthropic Long Islander who packed up and split to the city. It's like Old Man River, a loop that's constantly rolling along somewhere all the time.
"Wendy" by the Beach Boys
Perched smack dab in the middle between the blinding shine of the group's surf 'n' drag and the mature melancholy of Pet Sounds, this is an easily overlooked gem. A bittersweet symphony that uses gorgeous harmony to tell a most familiar sad story: Love was here and now it's gone.
"Queen Jane Approximately" by Bob Dylan
What'd she ever do to His Bobness to deserve this volley of superior trash-talk? One of his great underrated vocals rolls out across deep-ply piano, organ, harp, guitar, bass and drums, the whole five-plus-minutes seething. Plus, it's simultaneously an indictment and a desperate plea ("Won't you.. come... see... me...?").
"Louise" by Howlin' Wolf
A later Chess single (the flip of "Killing Floor"), more produced and therefore with more heft than some earlier cuts. The Wolf growls over a clean, loud track bursting with guitar, piano and lazy-riffing saxes. No novelty here, just greatness from a master.
"Marlena" by the 4 Seasons
Sure, they dated others--"Sherry," "Ronnie," "Dawn," "Marianne"--but this gal had more spark and spice. A corner flirt like "Gingerbread" or that sister in the "cute mini skirt with your brother's sloppy shirt" from "Oogum Boogum," she inspires Valli's crew to snap to and go all martial. Such an instrumental attack, so much vocal heart.
"Anna" by the Beatles
Among Lennon's most expressive vocals ever. Arthur Alexander's original sounds sedate in comparison; from someplace deep inside Johnny channels hurt in a more oblique, less obvious way than on subsequent, later-Beatles/early-solo writhings. Pop music used to accommodate such transformative records. As long as we're at it, props too for the Fabs' "Lovely Rita."
"Oh Marie" by Louis Prima
Here, as elsewhere in his meatball canon, he's so unapologetically happy: mugging, getting sloppy with the lyrics, playing that You-can't-catch-me game with Sam Butera's sax. Forget drugs. Music like this is the real temple of ecstasy. Enter here.
"Mona" by the Rolling Stones
Sure, it's first and foremost Bo's, but the lads' non-hostile takeover is a cornerstone of Sixties garage-punk, one of a handful of sides that launched a thousand bands. Mr. Diddley supplied the beat and backstory, but Jagger and company brought the spookiness that makes it all so beguiling.
"Loretta" by the Nervous Eaters
First-generation Boston punk/New Wavers float one of the best Lou Reed/V.U. derivatives on the market, in 1976. Chop-shop rhythm guitar, deadpan vocal with much attitude and an arrangement that, in a more righteous universe, would've made this a chart-topper.
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