I’ve come to appreciate Bob McDill’s amazing career. 31 number one hits. I don’t know if thats a record or not. But its one heck of an achievement.
I bought a autographed copy ofhis songbook. A vintage item from the late 80’s and only $25. Cheap enough. There were several songs that I wanted to learn and perform. Its unusual to find a songwriter’s songbook. Most of my songbooks are by the performing artist. Bread, Bob Seger, Jim Croce, Linda Ronstadt an so on. I get a lot of vintage songbooks cheap. Theres always a couple songs in each that I want to eventually learn.
But then I started really looking at Bob McDill’s songs. All hits that I recognized but never knew he wrote. I put together a mp3 playlist of many of those songs that I owned. Hearing his body of work just blew me away. I really like how his songs tell a great story but its not at the expense of the music. They are still very beautiful melodies and the three I’ve learned so far, are quite fun to sing and play on my guitar.
Who are some other great songwriters that I should check out?
Yes, Jimmy Web is one of the legendary songwriters. Wrote many many hits.
Paul Overstreet is both a songwriter and a performing artist. Wrote major hits for Randy Travis, Blake Shelton, and Keith Whitley, The Judds and Kenny Chesney. He’s recorded 10 studio albums and gotten a handful of singles in the top 10, but most of his success has been in songwriting.
*****We sailed up a river wide as a sea
And slept on the banks
On the leaves of a banyan tree
And all of these spirit voices rule the night
Some stories are magical, meant to be sung
Songs from the mouth of the river
When the world was young
And all of these spirit voices rule the night
By moon
We walk
To the brujo’s door
Along a path of river stones
Women with their nursing children
Seated on the floor
We join the fevers
And the broken bones
The candlelight flickers
The falcon calls
A lime-green lizard scuttles down the cabin wall
And all of these spirit voices
Sing rainwater, seawater
River water, holy water
Wrap this child in mercy – heal her
Heaven’s only daughter
All of these spirit voices rule the night
My hands were numb
And my feet were lead
I drank a cup of herbal brew
Then the sweetness in the air
Combined with the lightness in my head
And I heard the jungle breathing in the bamboo
Jeff Barry. An unknown name to most, because he was never a performer, but one of, if not the, most prolific pop songwriters of all time.
There’s a listing of his songs at the Songwriters Hall of Fame page. I’m not sure it’s complete, but it runs to 13 pages. You’d recognize about a zillion of them.
Carole King was a Brill Building stablemate of Jeff Barry’s in the early 60s. Before her successful singer/songwriter career, she also wrote a bunch of wonderful bubblegum hits, among them “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow.”
“Elephant”
She said “Andy, you’re better than your past”
Winked at me and drained her glass
Cross-legged on a barstool, like nobody sits anymore
She said “Andy you’re taking me home”
But I knew she planned to sleep alone
I’d carry her to bed, sweep up the hair from her floor
If I’d fucked her before she got sick I’d never hear the end of it
She don’t have the spirit for that now
We just drink our drinks and laugh out loud
And bitch about the weekend crowd
And try to ignore the elephant somehow
Somehow
She said “Andy, you crack me up”
Seagram’s in a coffee cup
Sharecropper eyes, and the hair almost all gone
When she was drunk, she made cancer jokes
Made up her own doctors’ notes
Surrounded by her family, I saw that she was dying alone
But I’d sing her classic country songs and she’d get high and sing along
She don’t have a voice to sing with now
We burn these joints in effigy and cry about what we used to be
And try to ignore the elephant somehow, somehow
I’ve buried her a thousand times, given up my place in line
But I don’t give a damn about that now
There’s one thing that’s real clear to me: No one dies with dignity
We just try to ignore the elephant somehow
We just try to ignore the elephant somehow
We just try to ignore the elephant somehow
Somehow
Somehow
I hadn’t remembered this as a pop hit by some else, because she does s beautiful ballad version on Tapestry. She also wrote a lot of hits with Gerry Goffin.
I have to throw Neil Young’s name in for consideration. I don’t think everything he’s done is genius, by any means, but at his best, he’s an excellent songwriter.
Also, I’m not a country music fan, so I may be all wet here, but I think Dolly Parton has also done some wonderful songs.
What’s the largest selling album with all the songs written by one person? Meat Loaf’s Bat Out of Hell, that’s what. All the songs were written by one of my favorites Jim Steinman.
And he penned a little tune called Annie Christmas
I woulda guessed Carole King’s Tapestry, but I’m not 100% certain that she wrote every song. But she did sing them all herself, which is more than your Mr. hoity toity Steinman can claim.
I would like to find out what is the largest selling album with all the songs written by the singer. I’d guess it’s either Dylan, Springsteen or Joel).
