MAR* SONGS: March 11th 1962/Mary Gauthier

When this assignment was sent out, it was on the understanding that March might be too restrictive a heading, something the plethora, perhaps, of military band favourites will demonstrate as being a tad pessimistic. But are there many songs about March the month? April, July and September seem to have plenty, I have learnt, but few seem to acknowledge this month, variously either that of the roman god of war or of, largely, the zodiacal fish. Actually, there are a few about pisces. So what could be better than a song that actually references a date, a birthdate, even. (OK, a birthdate that follows, by a day or so, the end of this fortnight, but.......)

Mary Gauthier is somewhat of an unexpected success story, not writing a single song until she hit 35, and probably then never expecting to have an 8 album and counting career. All at the age of, do the math, 55, for March 11 1962 is her true birthdate, as well as being the title of the song above. The Foundling, from 2010, is an inherently autobiographical song cycle based upon her always less than mainstream life. Given up for adoption at birth, truly a foundling, she spent her childhood in the care of an italian catholic couple, from whom she ran, aged 15. Seeking, I guess, herself, she found little but drugs, alcohol and trouble, spending her 18th in jail. Via an abortive period studying philosophy, she learnt cooking and opened the restaurant she ran for 11 years, 'Dixie Kitchen', also the name of her first album, the sale of which funded her 2nd, and breakthrough album, 'Drag Queens and Limousines'. Her almost instantly recognisable drawled tones, imagine an even more raddled Lucinda, often portray tales of life between low and the gutter. Perhaps her most famous song is this, 'I Drink', featured in these very pages some years ago. Here's a link.

But that would do her disservice, to attribute her merits solely to a quasi-Tom Waitsian underworld of squalor and disappointment. Her songs can also lift the soul. Eagerly awaited as I scribble is her latest, a work in conjunction with U.S. army vets and their families, described here. Not out yet in my home country, she is over for a short tour later in the year. Never yet having caught her live, I hope to remedy that. And here is a song from the forthcoming.

Never cute, never gentle, always acutely precise and demanding of thought, here's to you, Mary, have a great 11th.

Dig in!

Circuses and Carnivals: Five From The Midway

Dan Zanes: Wonderwheel

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I went to a weekend fair
met someone while I was there
we put flowers in our hair
and rode the wonderwheel...

It sure sounds like a carnival, thanks to a rollicking accordion, a bouncy beat, and a subtle surfer's acoustic groove. And that's the point, for sure: after all, Dan Zanes is a master of the seemingly-casual kidsong, when in actuality, every note and tone is designed to add to the perfect festive mood, the inner child called to exquisitely.


Richard & Linda Thompson: The Wall of Death

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Roller coaster as metaphor for the nauseating thrill-ride risk of the love affair? Yes, please. REM covers this one, but the Richard Thompson original is better by far, a perfect take from his mid-eighties solo work with ties to both true-blue rock and roll and his early folk rock sound with Fairport Convention.



David Wilcox: Top of the Roller Coaster

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A bit more specific, softspoken southern folkie David Wilcox - a master of the sustained metaphor - looks at the roller coaster's moment of anticipation as a model of the inner heartjump turning thirty can bring. Love the way the bouncy tonality and sweet harmonies bring midlife crisis alive. So much joy.



Norah Jones: Carnival Town

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A broad title belied in the first few lines - this is actually a song mostly about carnival rides and their motion as a reflection of life-movement, with each of the first two verses taking on a different ride (the third verse covers clowns). Loneliness on the downswing makes this a perfect lullaby.


Mary Gauthier: Merry Go Round

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Gauthier holds off on her titular metaphor until the chorus, setting the stage with the violent and stark images of an early life of drug and family abuses that fit cleanly among the rest of the songs on powerful third album Filth & Fire. The carousel "horse" here is heroin; the turning of the wheel a path of addiction and recurrence - and so we come full circle, as it were, from the cheerfulness of Dan Zanes, proving the versatility of midway as macrocosm, reflecting the vastness of the inner world.

Drinkin' Songs: I Drink

Mary Gauthier: I Drink

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Sorry to start the week off with a Debbie Downer song... but, hey... if the bottle fits - this one used to apply a little too close for comfort. But I digress...

1998 found me discovering, and then fully immersing myself in, our local folk community - seems I had just missed the South Florida Folk Festival... but was asked to be on board for the following year's event. We were known for our songwriter competition and my volunteer position was as preliminary judge - along with 3 others, we would rate the incoming songs (listen and lyrics, artists not revealed to us) and narrow (over 200 entries/400 songs) down to a Top Twenty, for the final judges to then choose a winner...

At that time, the songs were being dubbed onto cassettes and I would load one into my Walkman for my daily 45-minute walk around the neighborhood, making it through one side of a tape - when one particular song came on, I burst into tears and had to sit down on the curb to continue listening... and compose myself...

It was the first I'd heard of Mary Gauthier (pronounced go-shay... I of course later found out her name) and became an immediate fan - her songs were dark, taking us to those places we didn't want to go, but needed to in order to do things differently in our lives. Her website quotes such juxtapositions as "hope and anguish"... "faith as well as fear"... "accomplishment and devastation" - one of my favorite lines of hers (from Drag Queens in Limousines) is: "sometimes you got to do what you gotta do... and hope that the people you love will catch up with you"...

I Drink had me re-examining the history of alcoholism in my family - my father "inherited" it from his father and, for years, I worried it would trickle down to me. In January 2003 I made the conscious decision to quit drinking - I didn't set a time frame, but figured I'd just take it, to use the AA vernacular, one day at a time. I kept expecting it to be more of a sacrifice, but it wasn't - I found I was still fun to be around, and could continue to have a good time, without artificial stimulants. When a year had gone by, I realized I was in no danger of addiction and began drinking again - you can't imagine what a relief it was to know I had power and control over the substance...

"...and the wisdom to know the difference" - thanks, Mary...