April 2014 – The Ear Regular

A Week’s Worth of Songs

This is a list of seven songs with days of their week in the title, which I would actually recommend to people. This isn’t an incredibly inspired idea, but it is a good collection of songs. Wednesday and Thursday do not receive anywhere near as much songwriting attention as other days of the week, but there are still some excellent songs with those days in their title. Alternatively, you could also just listen to the Happy Days theme song every day of the week.

1. The Velvet Underground- “Sunday Morning“: This is one of the prettiest songs The Velvets ever released. It slowly twinkles its way into existence, and it coupled with “I’m Waiting for the Man” to give The Velvet Underground & Nicco a fantastic 1-2 punch.

2. New Order- “Blue Monday”: This never ending early dance anthem is the biggest selling 12” of all-time, which is pretty incredibly. It definitely provides a kick in the pants everyone needs on Monday.

3. The Rolling Stones- “Ruby Tuesday”: On the surface this is a short, simple song about fleeting romance with a free spirit. It’s easy enough to appreciate it at that level, but it also has an interesting back story. In Keith Richards’ autobiography Life, Richards claims the song is about an ex-girlfriend, who had taken up drugs and Jimi Hendrix.

Oddly, there are at least 10 good songs about Tuesday, including songs by The Pogues and Lynyrd Skynyrd.

4.Charles Mingus- “Wednesday Night Prayer”: While researching for this article, it became apparent Hump Day doesn’t serve as a muse to many. However, this driving, bluesy cut from Jazz great, Charles Mingus, is excellent .

5. The Weekend- “Thursday”: Thursday’s field of competition was even narrower than Wednesday’s, but Thor can be proud this spacey, impassioned R&B takes its name from the day named after him, even if it isn’t particularly thunderous.

6.Spider Bags- “Friday Night“: While songs by The Cure or Rebecca Black are undoubtedly more famous, Spider Bags’ brand of disheveled debauchery is absolutely fitting for the wildest night of the week.

7. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart- “Come Saturday“: This song is from fantastic self-titled debut from The Pains of Being Pure at Heart. It’s a jangly, shoe gaze-y pop song about the joys of a simple night in with someone. Despite being entendre-laden, this excellent song’s sentiments are actually sweet.

Bonus Song: The Beatles- “Eight Days a Week“: This is an absolute layup.

Tweens- “Be Mean”

This is the catchiest admission of masochistic self-sabotage I could possibly imagine.

2 Edgy 4 Me: Ranking the quality of references in Losing My Edge.

Losing My Edge was the world’s introduction to the post-punk-dance-rock sound of LCD Soundsystem. It’s the first song on the second album of LCD’s eponymous debut, and it’s essentially an 8-minute groove accompanied by James Murphy’s wry observations of the many ways the then 35-year-old was becoming progressively less cool.

Toward the end of the song, Murphy starts proudly cataloging his own record collection.

In the process, he name dropped almost every musical group, location, event or notable personality typically considered cool. Of the many, many references these are the 10 best things Murphy endorses.

10.PIL- John Lydon’s band that isn’t the Sex Pistols

9. The Germs- This seminal L.A. punk act’s original lineup included a pre-fame Belinda Carlisle

8. Lou Reed- The man fronted the Velvet Underground and is responsible for the masterpiece live album, Rock’n’Roll Animal, but he also helped make Lou Lou. If this list was based on cool instead of the total quality of the artsits’ bodies of works, Reed would be on top.

7.Joy Division– Universally considered one of the most influential bands of the ’80s. Ian Curtis was that decade’s Kurt Cobain.

6.Erik B. and Rakim- This legendary tandem produced some of Golden Era Hip-Hop’s best tracks, the sheer number of hits googling “Rakim best rapper ever,” yields is amazing.

5.The Modern Lovers– This Massachusetts band always exuded cool, their proto-punk sound was incredibly influential and they released their fair share of great songs too. The Modern Lovers obscurity actually makes them more popular, which makes them a go-to band for cool music aficionados.

4.Daft Punk– In Losing My Edge James Murphy claims to be the first person to show Daft Punk to his rockist peers. Although, they were well-established by 2005 Daft Punk’s stature has exploded almost a decade later. Two French robots rocked the Grammys and produced a song even the casual pop fan couldn’t ignore. Great find Mr. Murphy.

3.The Sonics

2.The Sonics

1.The Sonics– OK, this is a bit of a cop out, but Murphy does give them three consecutive mentions to close the song, and he’s absolutely right to do so. Stop reading this and go listen to Here are the Sonics. It’s a garage-rock masterpiece.

Honorable Mentions: The Swans, Gil Scott Heron, The Human League, Yaz, Captain Beefheart

Here’s a full list of all the bands and most of the locations or events referenced by Murphy during Losing My Edge according to RapGenius.