April Skies

The months seem to fly by. Maybe it’s something to do with my advancing age? But another one has gone, which means it is time for a round up of what you may have missed. It was quite a busy month for me, with thirteen posts in total, so there is a fair amount for me to remind you about. All of those posts were music-based, though two of them were more wide-ranging in their themes.

As always, I’ll start with the regulars, and that of course means Tuesday Tunes. There were four of these in April, the first of which saw me belatedly catching up with April Fools Day in Tuesday Tunes 143: Fools For April? This saw a selection of songs with ‘fool’ in their title, from World Party, The Rolling Stones, John Mellencamp, Grateful Dead, Bonnie Raitt, The Bunch, Paul McCartney, and Rod Stewart.

I followed that up with the first of two posts which were themed around country names, in Tuesday Tunes 144: Countries. The idea for this was prompted by one of the songs in the previous post, and it included music by The Beatles, David Bowie, Mike Oldfield, The Vapors, Counting Crows, The Bangles, Brewer And Shipley, and Bruce Springsteen.

I realised I was dipping into a rich vein with that theme, and still have a list of songs I could play for it even after a second go round, in Tuesday Tunes 145: More Countries. Sometimes those titles are really inspired, aren’t they! The tunes were by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, James Taylor, Simon & Garfunkel, Frank Turner, Supertramp, Kirsty MacColl, Alphaville, and Jackson Browne.

The final one for last month saw a change of theme, for something which had come to me in what passes for a flash of inspiration when I was checking the weather forecast. This turned into Tuesday Tunes 146: Rain, which picked up on a British obsession. Even by limiting myself to songs with just the word ‘rain’ in their title, rather than ‘raining’ or ‘rainy,’ I found loads of possibilities for this. For this first set I played songs by The Move, The Beatles, Fogerty’s Factory, The Lovin’ Spoonful, Steve Earle, Cosmic Rough Riders, The Pogues, and Prince. I did a second set of these, but that took us into May, so it will be in next month’s review post (or you could just look back to three days ago if you missed it!).

The other regular set is for my participation in the weekly Song Lyric Sunday link up. I still think of this as new for me, but to my surprise I looked back and found that I’ve been doing it for ten months now, apart from the gap over Christmas and New Year. There were five Sundays in April, which began for me with Song Lyric Sunday: Sugar. The theme for that week was alternative rock music, and I seized the chance to play a couple of songs by a band I loved but who went under the radar for most people. They are both great, so I can recommend you take a look if you missed it.

For the next week we were invited to play some soul music. I decided that rather than go for something American, where the majority of this music came from as I was growing up, I would fly the flag for here with Song Lyric Sunday: British Soul. This gave me the chance to play a couple of songs by a band I always enjoyed, even though they were more pop chart oriented than most of what I listened to: Hot Chocolate. These brought back happy memories for me, and for others too, it seems: it was my most viewed post last month.

Next up was funk music. I nearly didn’t take part in this one, as my knowledge of the genre is matched by my liking for it – a big fat zero! But I chanced upon the subgenre of funk rock, and was pleased to see that one of the bands listed as purveyors of this is a favourite of mine. So I went for it with Song Lyric Sunday: What the Funk? and gave you two great songs by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Despite my initial wariness, I really enjoyed this one.

Reggae music was the theme for the next Sunday, which I celebrated with Song Lyric Sunday: “That Reggie Music” – the title for which had kindly been provided by my dear departed Mum, who left both my sister and me helpless with laughter when she called it that. It gave me the chance to play a fabulous song by Jimmy Cliff – Going Back West – and I threw in his lovely version of Cat Stevens’ Wild World as a bonus. Another week that I really enjoyed.

The closing April Sunday had the theme of Gospel music. Again, this is one where I felt a little out of my comfort zone but was rescued by Wikipedia, who mentioned the subgenre of Southern Gospel. This gave me the chance to play a beautiful song by the wonderful Alison Krauss, in Song Lyric Sunday: Time To Pray. Her version of a traditional American song was included on the soundtrack album for the fabulous movie O Brother Where Art Thou? which I recommend if you haven’t seen it. However, the song’s treatment in the movie was slightly different, so I also played the clip to show that.

I also kept up my fairly regular habit of filling in the gap between Tuesdays and Sundays with a post each week – two on Thursdays, and two on Fridays just to even things up. Two of these were simply music pieces, the first of which was 🐣💐Songs For Easter 2023🐇🌷 which continued my recent habit of playing a few songs to mark the holiday weekend. The tunes were by Murray Head, John Mellencamp, Bruce Springsteen, Norman Greenbaum, Joan Osborne, Alison Moyet, Cat Stevens, Yvonne Elliman, and finally the Monty Python team, which I couldn’t resist adding in.

The other music-only piece was one of my revisits to a previous post in A Tuesday Tunes Reprise, which gave you a second chance to catch up on one from April 2021. I was doing a series of Sixties songs at that point, and this one included tracks by The Beach Boys, The Moody Blues, Delaney and Bonnie, The Troggs, Eclection, and Billy Preston. The usual mixed bag!

That just leaves the two more serious posts. The first of these was Musicians And Health Revisited. The original of this, which I bookended with additional comments, was posted last year, but it remains an important post for me. I took its idea from an article I had read on the mental health website The Mighty, which talked about a wide range of musicians who had performed songs prompted by their health issues: not just mental health, but many other conditions too. It acts as a reminder for me – and I hope for you – that these musicians who provide so much entertainment for us are all human beings like us, with their own concerns and worries. The music in this came from Roseanne Cash, Lana Del Rey, Lady Gaga, and two from the brilliant Lewis Capaldi. If you missed it, do take a look and you’ll see what I mean.

That just leaves one more to cover. This one saw me return to a message I have posted before, and I used a previous post as the basis for this one: the message is still just as valid. The post was Earth Day 2023, which contained a good deal of fact and comment on why we need to take the whole issue of climate change much more seriously than I think we are currently doing, together with a couple of videos expanding on this theme. As is my wont, I also illustrated the message with some songs to drive home the point: these were by Cat Stevens, Jackson Browne, Queen, and The Eagles.

By way of closing, as I always do I’m playing for you the song from which I have borrowed my title for today. I’ve never played this band before, but on the basis of this one perhaps I will again:

The Jesus And Mary Chain are a Scottish indie/alternative rock band who have been around since 1983, though they did have a hiatus for some years. They are apparently recognised as key figures in the development of the ‘shoegaze’ subgenre – a wonderful name for a style that is typified by an ethereal mix of obscured vocals and guitar distortion, according to Wikipedia. This is one of their clearer ones! It was a track on their second album, Darklands, which was released in August 1987, peaking at #5 in the UK and #161 in the US. The song had actually come out as a single four months before that, and gave them their biggest UK hit, reaching #8 here. I wasn’t a huge fan, but have always liked this one, and it is a good fit for this month’s posts, given that the weather and climate featured several times!

I hope you’ve enjoyed this trawl back through my April, and I’ll see you again for the next instalment of Song Lyric Sunday. 😊