The Stranger; Billy Joel

I always knew the whistling of this song but never knew who it was until... well, until now! I couldn't even remember the rest of the song, only came to my mind its slow introduction. And now, listening to the entire song, I am thinking how a very slow and moody introduction can be so well arranged with the fast and shaking melody that goes after. A great ability of this such Billy Joel, who needs no introduction, right?

“The Stranger” was written by Billy Joel and gave the name from his 1977 album. The album hit #2 in USA hit parades and the song (only featured as single in Japan) also reached #2 in that country.

Recently, in a interview with USAToday, Joel explain why he put the whistling on it: "After we recorded the song, I remember thinking, 'it needs some sort of introduction. It needs a prelude or a theme, and then it should slam into the song.'

"I played the theme on the piano to show Phil and whistled along with it, and I said, 'What instrument do you think should do that?' And Phil said, 'You just did it.' I heard it played back and went, 'That's kind of cool, I like that.'

"It was really the theme to the album because it was born in the studio during the process, and it just kind of captured the mood."

As usual, there are the lyrics, the audio and the videoclip!

Well we all have a face
That we hide away forever
And we take them out and show ourselves
When everyone has gone
Some are satin, some are steel
Some are silk and some are leather
They're the faces of the stranger
But we love to try them on

Well we all fall in love
But we disregard the danger
Though we share so many secrets
There are some we never tell
Why were you so surprised
That you never saw the stranger?
Did you ever let your lover
See the stranger in yourself?
Don't be afraid to try again
Everyone goes south
Every now and then
You've done it, why can't someone else?
You should know by now,
You've been there yourself

Once I used to believe I was such a great romancer
Then I came home to a woman
That I could not recognize
Though I pressed her for a reason,
She refused to even answer
It was then I felt the stranger
Kick me right between the eyes

Well we all fall in love
But we disregard the danger
Though we share so many secrets
There are some we never tell
Why were you so surprised
That you never saw the stranger?
Did you ever let your lover
See the stranger in yourself?
Don't be afraid to try again
Everyone goes south
Every now and then
You've done it, why can't someone else?
You should know by now,
You've been there yourself

You may never understand
How the stranger is inspired
But he isn't always evil
And he is not always wrong
Though you drown in good intentions,
You will never quench the fire
You'll give in to your desire
When the stranger comes along

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After It All; Cat Power

I won't write anything until Chan Marshall tell me why she wrote this song. And why she put whistles on it.

Why?

After it all
When it's said and done
Will you come back to me
And tell me that
It never was up to you or up to me

When you stand up so tall
With your back to me against the wall
And you make demands with your angry eyes
You say you're sorry that you
Didn't mean to scream you say
You're back again that you still love me
And that you never meant what you said to me
Should I believe what you're telling me

To wait for you
Was all I could do
To have you back with me so peacefully
You broke your back
You left your scratch
Then you came back to me
Just to get some sleep.

After it all
When it's said and done
Will you come back to me
And tell me that
It never was up to you or up to me

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(Sittin' On) Dock of the Bay; Otis Redding

One of the websites where I take information about this kind of tune is the Rolling Stone magazine website, right here. They made a toplist (don't know if it is oficial) with the six best whistling songs. Patience and Don't Worry, Be Happy have already appeared in this blog. Posting, now, (Sittin' On) Dock of the Bay, will remain only two, that will come in the next updates.

This song was written and recorded by Otis Redding, shortly before his death. Redding was a brillant soul music singer and died at 26 in a plane crash (his aeroplane crashed into Lake Monona, Wisconsin) — days before his most sucessful song, this “Dock of the Bay”, being released. An unfortunate disaster, because he was going to be an artist of first magnitude, with his “ability to convey strong emotion through his voice”.

The Rolling Stone magazine (today is merchandising day! xD) ranked Redding the eighth greatest singer of all time and “Dock of the Bay” the 28ª of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. As it could not leave of being, it reached the #1 on the Bilboard Hot 100 for 4weeks in 1968.

In a 1990 interview on NPR's Fresh Air, the guitarist Steve Cropper, co-writer of this song, explain how it came: “Cropper says Redding came into the studio to record ‘(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay’ with only one line: ‘Sittin’ in the morning sun.’

“The way I wrote with Otis, it was a pretty simple formula, actually,' Cropper says. 'Otis was just bigger than life. It was real easy to write about Otis, and if you listen to any of the other songs that have 'Cropper' written on them, where I was the co-writer with Otis, usually those songs are about him — you know, 'Mr. Pitiful' and all these other songs. And so I just started writing. And he had just left San Francisco, where he played at the Fillmore.

“I thought he was talking about watching the big ships come in, you know, by the San Francisco Bridge, Golden Gate Bridge,' he says. 'And what he was really referring to were the ferries that ran back and forth to Sausalito there. So the rest of the song, where I said, you know, 'I left my home in Georgia, headed for the Frisco Bay,' it was just about him going out there to perform at the Fillmore.

“Even though most of Redding's previous songs were about loneliness, including 'Mr. Pitiful' and 'Fa-Fa-Fa-Fa-Fa (Sad Song),' '(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay' didn't lack the emotion with which he usually sang.

“I think the difference in 'Dock of the Bay' — just lyrically, it hits the masses,' Cropper says. 'It hit the working man. It hit everybody. You know, 'I'm working my can off, and it seems like nothing's going to happen, nothing ever comes my way.' It's, you know, 'My whole life is about bad luck,' and that sort of thing. And, 'I'm just going to take life as it comes.' ... That's why I think it hit so many people.”

In the always-present Songfacts.com, I found this lovely information: “When Otis recorded this, he and Cropper didn't have a last verse written, so he whistled it. He planned to return to Memphis and fill in the verse after performing in Madison, Wisconsin, but he died before he had the chance. When Cropper produced the song, he left the whistling in, and it fit the mood of the song perfectly. It is probably the most famous whistling in any song”.

Sittin' in the mornin' sun
I'll be sittin' when the evenin' come
Watching the ships roll in
And then I watch 'em roll away again, yeah

I'm sittin' on the dock of the bay
Watching the tide roll away
Ooo, I'm just sittin' on the dock of the bay
Wastin' time

I left my home in Georgia
Headed for the 'Frisco bay
'Cause I've had nothing to live for
And look like nothin's gonna come my way

So I'm just gonna sit on the dock of the bay
Watching the tide roll away
Ooo, I'm sittin' on the dock of the bay
Wastin' time

Look like nothing's gonna change
Everything still remains the same
I can't do what ten people tell me to do
So I guess I'll remain the same, yes

Sittin' here resting my bones
And this loneliness won't leave me alone
It's two thousand miles I roamed
Just to make this dock my home

Now, I'm just gonna sit at the dock of the bay
Watching the tide roll away
Oooo-wee, sittin' on the dock of the bay
Wastin' time.

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Dance Tonight; Paul McCartney

Paul in double dose! And, what is better, accidently! Let me explain: when I was finishing the previous post I went again to Google trying to find some information about the whistling. Didn't find, but I discovered here (thank you, Mr. Blas) that there is another whistling song in the album “Memory Almost Full”. How wonderful!

Here again, on Mail On Sunday interview: “This was the last track I recorded for the album. I was on my way to a meeting, but before I got there I went for a walk, to experience life for a minute. There’s a guitar shop I like to visit and so I went there and got chatting to the guy who works there. He said he had a left-handed mandolin to show me, and I ended up buying it. The great thing was that I didn’t know how to play it – it’s tuned like a violin, so I had no idea what the chords were. It took me back to when I was a teenager being presented with an instrument. I had to figure out how to play it. I found one chord, then another, and then a really strange chord. I still don’t know what it is but it sounded great. At home, I started stomping around the kitchen, playing this little instrument, just enjoying myself. I sang, ‘Everybody gonna dance tonight’ and my little girl came running in and started dancing, so I fell in love with the song. In fact, I liked it so much I ran into the studio to record it, and stuck it on the album. It seemed like a good atmospheric opening.”

For a change, didn't find anything about the whistling but this time there is a videoclip! And in the video, directed by Michael Gondry, appears the beautiful Natalie Portman in a troupe of ghosts when Paul starts to play his mandolin. Hmmm... I want this mandolin! xD~

Everybody gonna dance tonight
Everybody gonna feel alright
Everybody gonna dance around tonight

Everybody gonna dance around
Everybody gonna hit the ground
Everybody gonna dance around tonight

Well you can come on to my place if you want to
You can do anything you want to do

Everybody gonna dance tonight
Everybody gonna feel alright
Everybody gonna dance around tonight

[Whistling]

Well you can come on to my place if you want to
You can do anything you want to do

Everybody gonna stamp their feet
Everybody's gonna feel the beat
Everybody wonna dance around tonight

Everybody's gonna dance tonight
Everybody gonna feel alright
Everybody gonna dance around tonight

Everybody gonna jump and shout
Everybody gonna sing it out
Everybody gonna dance around tonight

Well you can come on to my place if you want to
You can do anything you want to do

Everybody gonna dance tonight
Everybody gonna feel alright
Everybody gonna dance around tonight
Everybody gonna dance around tonight
Everybody gonna feel alright tonight

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The End of the End; Paul McCartney

As I promissed: Sir Paul McCartney. And his shy whistle. And his song of death. Song that was released on his last studio album, Memory Almost Full, in 2007.

“The End of the End” speaks how he would like to be remembered after his death. That's what he said in an interview with Mail On Sunday, in 2008: “I’d read something somebody had written about dying and I thought, ‘That’s brave.’ It seemed courageous to deal with the subject rather than just shy away from it. So I fancied looking at it as a subject myself. I like the Irish approach of a wake, where it’s celebratory. I remember once an Irish woman wished me well by saying, ‘I wish you a good death’, and I said, ‘Say what?’ I thought about it later and actually it’s a great thing to wish someone. I thought, ‘Well, what would I like?’ Jokes, a wake, music, rather than everyone sitting around looking glum, saying, ‘He was a great guy’ – though they can do a bit of that, too. So that led into the verse, ‘On the day that I die I’d like jokes to be told and stories of old to be rolled out like carpets.’ I have played it to my family and they find it very moving because, you know, it’s Dad. It’s a strange combination, because you’re talking about a serious subject. But I’m dealing with it lightly.”

The whistling is in the middle and seems to me (but not only to me) that Paul whistles out of key. What do you think?

Anyway, here it is. But I coudn't find any official or alive videoclip good enough, just those homemade with pictures passing by, in YouTube. With your little help maybe I will post it soon. ;)

At the end of the end
It's the start of a journey
To a much better place
And this wasn't bad
So a much better place
Would have to be special
No need to be sad

On the day that I die
I'd like jokes to be told
And stories of old
To be rolled out like carpets
That children have played on
And laid on while listening
To stories of old

At the end of the end
It's the start of a journey
To a much better place
And a much better place
Would have to be special
No reason to cry

On the day that I die
I'd like bells to be rung
And songs that were sung
To be hung out like blankets
That lovers have played on
And laid on while listening
To songs that were sung

At the end of the end
It's the start of a journey
To a much better place
And a much better place
Would have to be special
No reason to cry
No need to be sad

At the end of the end

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