St. Patrick's Day and The Who

I'm a day late - and probably a dollar short - of posting this but I have some Irish-related songs from two of the principle members of The Who. Above is a YouTube video playing the song "Tipperary" from Pete Townshend's Scoop album. Scoop was an album of demos that Pete did while having some fun in the studio.

This is a link to Roger Daltrey joining up with The Chieftains and performing "Raglan Road" for The Chieftains 1992 album, An Irish Evening (Live). I have a handful of albums by The Chieftains, and they are probably my favorite of Irish songsmiths. "Raglan Road" is a poem by Patrick Kavanagh which has also gone under the name of "Dark Haired Miriam Ran Away."

Happy Birthday Roger Daltrey!

Since I am always on top of things, I'm going to send out early birthday wishes to The Who's Roger Daltrey. The frontman from Shepherd's Bush turns 65 on Sunday.

"Real Good Looking Boy" is a song that The Who recorded back about five years ago - with Greg Lake of Emerson, Lake and Palmer fame on bass - and this above video has some very cool highlights of Roger and the boys.

The Who - Athena

Tomorrow all of the love songs will be rolled out for St. Valentine's Day. Sticking with that topic, I have decided to post The Who's "Athena" off of their 1982 album It's Hard. Purportedly, Pete Townshend wrote this song after an encounter with actress Theresa Russell. He promptly fell in love with her and his subsequent frustration of being rejected by the married woman is conveyed in this song.

The Who - Heat Wave

I’ve had enough of the snow! The only time I like the falling white stuff is when I get a day off out of it, otherwise, ugh! I don’t necessarily want a heat wave either, I just like this song - "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" - covered nicely by The Who in the above video. Of course, the tune was originally and most notably done in 1963 by Martha and the Vandellas (known as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from 1967-1972).

Pepsi's Generation

I'm not a Pepsi drinker but I really like this new commercial that the soft drink company has come out with featuring The Who's "My Generation." They aired a similar Bob Dylan Pepsi commercial during the SuperBowl, which was one of the few that I liked. What happened to the days when commercials during "the big game" had a big-game feeling? Regardless, I'm looking forward to seeing this spot on t.v.

Bettye Lavette Sings "Love Reign O'er Me"

There were three performances that stood out for me last night while watching the Kennedy Center Awards; Dave Grohl singing "Who Are You," Beyonce singing "The Way We Were" and Bettye LaVette singing "Love Reign O'er Me." The latter of which I have posted the video courtesy of YouTube above.

Let's forget comparing this singer to that singer or this actor to that actor for a moment and let's look at it this way: There are billions of people that have walked this planet; millions have tried to sing; and then there is a small percentage that gains some notoriety and then even a smaller percentage that gets honored by the President of the U.S. at such a classy and very well put together event. That's amazing to me and I'm sure those honored (Twyla Tharp, George Jones, Roger Daltrey, Pete Townshend, Morgan Freeman and Barbra Streisand) realize that as well.

Because Barbra Streisand is so out-spoken in her political views, I forget how talented and accomplished she is: winner of a Tony, Grammy, Emmy and Oscar!!!! I would say she has done quite alright.

The Who "Love Reign O'er Me"

I can't imagine having a more difficult song to sing then, "Love Reign O'er Me," so Godspeed to the person or persons that tries to perform it and do it as well as Roger Daltrey could back in his heyday. I couldn’t find video yet – probably will be available tomorrow – of Bettye LaVette’s performance at the Kennedy Center Awards show, however, I did find this video which someone made that fits pretty well with the song. The tune closes out the Quadrophenia album.