Meeting a Man from the Motor Trade

I've long loved the Beatles song "She's Leaving Home," but I've also long been puzzled by the line "waiting to keep the appointment she'd made, meeting a man from the motor trade." The Wikipedia page on the song has lots of information about how it was written, but it does not saying anything about the significance of "the motor trade." Does "the motor trade" have any significance here? (Perhaps, as an American, I am missing some British slang?)

Here's Brad Mehldau's version of the song, in any case:

Neil Young in Zurich, Aug. 21

Neil brought his "Electric Band" to Zurich last Thursday and tore the walls down with feedback and beautiful melodies. The sound of his electric guitar gets more complex and subtle with every tour, aging like a fine wine, with new flavors emerging every year, it seems.

The setlist:

1. Love And Only Love
2. Hey Hey, My My
3. Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere
4. Powderfinger
5. Spirit Road
6. Cortez The Killer
7. Cinnamon Girl

Acoustic stuff:

8. Oh, Lonesome Me
9. Mother Earth
10. The Needle And The Damage Done
11. Unknown Legend
12. Heart Of Gold
13. Old Man

Back to the electric guitar:

14. Get Back To The Country
15. Just Singing A Song
16. Sea Change
17. Cowgirl In The Sand
18. Rockin' In The Free World

Encore:
19. A Day In The Life (The Beatles)

Highlights:

The explosive version of "Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere" ... Neil forgot the third verse of "Powderfinger" and sang the second verse twice ... The wonderfully slow chords of "Cortez the Killer" with the usual gorgeous guitar lines (so gorgeous that it does not matter if one is used to how gorgeous the song is) ... "Unknown Legend," which always grabs me, and was as beautiful as ever ... "Cowgirl in the Sand," with another round of intensely crescendoing noise and melody ... "Rockin' in the Free World," with its ever-present irony overloading when the crowd sings along on the chorus in such a celebratory way, apparently oblivious to the horrors described in the verses, and which took the crescendo of noise one step further ... making me wonder what else could still be done, and then came "A Day in the Life," in which Neil turned an unplayable song into a masterpiece of live performance.

Snowdrops and Summer Snowflakes, Drooping

Another moment in Reginald Shepherd's Fata Morgana that caught my attention was this, from the poem "Snowdrops and Summer Snowflakes, Drooping":

The river is silted with sentiments, Ophelia
sings flowers in hell to all the goodnight
ladies martyred to plots ...

That makes this poem a much better version of one I wrote long ago, "Gretchen and Ophelia," which toyed around with the similarities between Gretchen in Goethe's Faust and Ophelia, the way that they die over and over again on stages all over the world.

Where is Hamlet being played tonight? Who is playing Hamlet? Who Ophelia? Where is Faust being played? And who is playing Gretchen? Questions like the claim that somewhere a radio station is playing a Beatles tune as you read this. Which station? What tune? "Things We Said Today" would be my choice.

Shepherd continues with all the things he would give Ophelia, all the flowers, and concludes with this:

... What I wouldn't give
to hear her shut up that infernal singing,
walk out of sullen water open-eyed.

Brad Mehldau, Basel, October 26, 2007

For his second encore last night in Basel, Brad Mehldau began with some playing that sounded like "Mehldau does stride piano," his left hand managing to get into a stride rhythm while still doing what it does best: arpeggiating chords in rapid swirls of notes, rather than playing all the notes of the chord at once, as a standard stride rhythm would do. (Is there a term for that? Playing a chord "normally," so to speak, rather than with arpeggios?) Then out came the head: "Monk's Dream." And what a version followed: solo piano, first developing the bluesy stride playing, then becoming more like a ballad before moving into the swirling kaleidoscope of sound that is Mehldau's specialty.

That was one of the highlights for me. As Mehldau did not announce any of the tunes, there were only two other tunes I was sure about: Billy Joel's "New York State of Mind" (stately and elegant) and the final encore, "Mother Nature's Son," moving from beautiful highlighting of the melody to vary playful soloing. I was pretty sure I heard Radiohead's "Exit Music" in there, too.

Mehldau in Basel tomorrow night

As I mentioned a few months ago, I'll be getting to see Brad Mehldau solo in Basel tomorrow night. Here's Brad solo, the only video of him on youtube without either his trio or Pat Metheny! Unfortunately, this cuts off rather abruptly. Oh well.



"Dear Prudence" is a tune that also always makes me think of Jerry Garcia, who used to play such soaring versions of it with the Jerry Garcia Band.

Perhaps I should also mention that the duo CD Mehldau recorded with Metheny is beautiful.

Aimee Mann on Sgt. Pepper's

I enjoyed Aimee Mann's article on Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. (Just typing in the title is fun: what a great phrase.)

As I live with a seven-year-old Beatlemaniac (Miles), I've been listening to lots of the Fab Four for the past few years (he first turned Beatlemaniac when he was two, I think, with "Here Comes the Sun"). And one thing I agree with Mann (and others) about: SPLHCB is deservedly influential, but it also has some surprising weaknesses. The hit songs on it are brilliant, but the other tunes are only very good, even though many songwriters would kill to write even one as good. "She's Leaving Home" has been singled out in some of the commentaries I have read as a weak song, but all you need to do to hear how brilliant the music is is here Brad Mehldau play it on jazz piano.

I was surprised to learn elsewhere that "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane" were supposed to be on the album, but were not put on it because they had been released as a single already.

Songs to play

"I shall remain in Borges, not in myself (if it is true that I am someone), but I recognize myself less in his books than in many others or in the laborious strumming of a guitar." (Jorge Luis Borges, "Borges and I")

Many people have been posting lists of songs that blow their minds. My list of songs includes those that it blows my mind to play. In alphabetical order by title, with the line I most like to sing:

1. Comes a Time, by Neil Young

It's a wonder tall trees ain't layin' down

2. Friend of the Devil, by The Grateful Dead

Got two reasons why I cry away each lonely night

(especially on mandolin)

3. I Love Paris, by Cole Porter

I love Paris in the summer when it sizzles

(Oh, that shift from minor to major!)

4. If I Had Known, by Greg Brown

Summer was invented for her to wear that dress

(That line is so cool that I stop strumming to sing it)

5. New Coat of Paint, by Tom Waits

Heard the mystery shuffle of an overflowin' day

6. No Woman, No Cry, by Bob Marley (though it was written by Vincent Ford, Marley's guitar player at the time)

In this great future, you can't forget your past

7. Suzanne, by Leonard Cohen

And when he knew for certain only drowning men could see him

8. Things We Said Today, by The Beatles

Me I'm just a lucky guy

9. What a Wonderful World, by Sam Cooke

Maybe by being an A student, baby, I could win your love for me

10. You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go, by Bob Dylan

I could stay with you forever and never realize the time

All You Need Is Blah

A postscript to my previous post:

Michael Hofmann's translation of Durs Grünbein's poem "Ashes for Breakfast" contains a line that made me laugh for a very personal reason: "Maybe what will survive of us is Blah ..." This echo of Larkin is an echo of the Beatles for me: when Miles was two or three years old, he became a great fan of the Beatles, and we used to drive along singing along to Beatles CDs. One parody we liked to sing was "All You Need is Blah"!