Numbers: 25 or 6 to 4

Chicago/Earth, Wind & Fire: 25 or 6 to 4 (YouTube)
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Not one, not two, but three numbers in a single title: 25 or 6 to 4 (and when you say it aloud, you hear a fourth, no?) Releasing their first album in the late 60s as the Chicago Transit Authority, the band quickly renamed themselves Chicago when faced with legal action from the “official” CTA.

My friends and I (and obviously millions more) had their music on heavy rotation in the early 70s. You must know their major hits such as Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is and Color My World. They rank 13^th on the Billboard list of All Time Top Artists.

There was speculation that the songs was about drugs (“Flashing lights against the sky …”?) So much else in that era was. However, Chicago band member and the song’s composer, Robert Lamm, says it is a reference to 3:35AM (“Waiting for the break of day …”)

There are a number of YouTube versions of this song, but as I viewed them, one stood out in particular: Chicago and EWF together. Sorry: the sync seems to be off just a little, but the color, energy (check out Verdine White, the EWF bass player!) and sound quality here is better than in many of the other online files.

Earth Wind and Fire rank a little lower on Billboard’s list, but still within the Top 100. Like Chicago, they also hail from the Windy City and trace their roots back to within a year or two of Chicago’s. Like Chicago, one of their strengths is a horn section. I think they make a great combination on stage.

Dance Music: Boogie Wonderland

Earth, Wind & Fire with The Emotions: Boogie Wonderland

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Earth, Wind & Fire's "Boogie Wonderland" is not about what you think it's about.

The casual listener can be forgiven for believing "Boogie Wonderland" is merely a paean to the disco era: The bouncy rhythm, the cool vocals by Maurice White, the Emotions' soul-sister backing chorus. The song wants you to believe it's a magical place, this Boogie Wonderland.

But, for a moment, stop dancing and listen closely to the lyrics. "Boogie Wonderland" is actually a tale of lonely people at the end of their rope.

The mirror stares you in the face and says, baby, nuh uh, it don’t work. You say your prayers though you don’t care, you dance and shake the hurt.

"Boogie Wonderland" is about escaping into fantasy, and, perhaps even surrendering to insanity. In an interview on the SongFacts website, Allee Willis, the song's writer, says the lyrics were inspired by the movie Looking for Mr. Goodbar. "It's really about someone on the brink of self-destruction who goes to these clubs to try and find more, but is at least aware of the fact that if there's something like true love, that is something that could kind of drag them out of the abyss."

I chase my vinyl dreams to Boogie Wonderland, I find romance when I start to dance.

Says Willis: "'Boogie Wonderland' for us was this state of mind that you entered when you were around music and when you danced, but hopefully it was an aware enough state of mind that you would want to feel as good during the day as you did at night."

As a listener, I'm a sucker for music like this -- songs that seem happy, even optimistic, on the surface, but are really about things much darker. "Happy Trails to You," which I wrote about a few weeks ago, is like that. So too is "We'll Meet Again," the Carter Family's "Keep on the Sunny Side," and even "My Window Faces the South."

But "Boogie Wonderland" stands out for me -- partly because it has a serious groove those songs lack, and partly because it's from my era. And maybe mostly because the song's writer, the amazing Allee Willis (read about her here), is my aunt.

Dance and shake the hurt. Boogie Wonderland!

Beatles Covers: The Lonely Hearts Club Edition

Salamander Crossing: Things We Said Today

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I posted a Salamander Crossing track about six months ago - nothing says Beatles like the banjo (just kidding!... but that is Tony Furtado sitting in). I do love this bluegrass version with accompanying fiddle... and a small snippet of I've Just Seen a Face ("falling, yes I am falling") - pay attention during the instrumental break after the bridge or you'll miss it...

The Nields: Lovely Rita

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The Nields are another group I've introduced to this forum - what's not to love about this part-psychedelic/part-rock/all-fun bouncy tune about a meter maid, featuring Dar Williams in the background chorus? (rhetorical question)...

Earth Wind & Fire: Got to Get You Into My Life

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Before I begin writing a post, I always go into Star Maker Machine's back catalog to make sure I'm not duplicating a previously-chosen musical entry - in this case, I found the song had already been used, and stunningly written about by BoyHowdy... but, since the link is dead, figured this would be the perfect occasion to re-up... :-)

Horns: Got To Get You Into My Life

The Beatles: Got To Get You Into My Life

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Earth Wind & Fire: Got To Get You Into My Life

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Bloggers don't usually bother prattling on about The Beatles; there seems to be an unspoken assumption in modern culture that the larger-than-life phenomenon of the Beatles as icons somehow contains their history, making any discourse moot. And it is true, I suppose, that the Beatles' use of horns is so culturally recognizable, it's practically memetic; I'm sure I'm not the only one who grew up believing that the French stole the first few bars of All You Need Is Love for their national anthem.

But before the brassband sound of 1967's Sgt. Pepper and its horn-carrying cover, or the faux-military capriciousness of the psychedelic, love-happy 1969 Yellow Submarine, came the sunshiny britpop of 1966 masterpiece Revolver, and it is here, in the underrated Got To Get You Into My Life, we find Beatles' first use of horns -- in truth, a better harbinger of the anthemic, almost carnivalesque sound of Sgt. Pepper than the animated nonsense of a brightly lit underwater world which would follow, though GTGYIML didn't chart until 1976, a full decade after its original release, when it was re-cast as a single with Helter Skelter on the B-side.

The song takes on a darker foreshadowing, too, revealing the kernels of later, deeper Beatles songs, if you accept the underground explanation, later confirmed in Paul's 1998 bio, that he wrote this one about his desire to smoke marijuana, rather than about, say, a girl.

Meanwhile, where the original song's use of brass provides a blare of orchestral sound right from the starting block, thus framing the Beatles' paean to reefer with a swinging pace, Earth Wind & Fire adopt a totally different approach for their take on the song for 1977 movie Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Here, the electric fuzz of funk takes the intro, while the horn section takes a more Disco-era turn as a form of rhythmic flair more typically found in elevators than anywhere else these days. Take the two versions together, and despite the fact that they ultimately achieved their fame within a year from each other, you've got practically a textbook study in contrast between two musical genres, and their respective use of brass.