Tag Archives: Beatles

A Dialectical Critique of “Teenager in Love”

[Dion. Photo probably taken in the 1960’s. Source: Mancrushes.com]

If you ask me, far too many words have been written about the hidden meanings and subtleties of Bertolt Brecht’s Mack the Knife or Pirate Jenny. Granted the Weimar Era in Germany (1918-1933) were pretty wacky times. But lyrics like: “You gentlemen can watch while I’m scrubbin’ the floors…”, are not all that existential. I love Puccini and I think Nessun Dorma is the aria for the ages, but does it rate being a theme song for the World Cup? It’s a song about sleeping which triggers the yawn reaction. Right?

One could write an interesting article about the sub-text of Fly Me to the Moon by Old Blue Eyes, but it probably doesn’t rate a tome or even a Master’s Thesis from Ball State University.

Some of you will say that the Nobel Laureate, Bob Dylan penned some interesting songs. I’ll give you a point or two for bringing him up, but really, can you stay forever young? No. You’re born, you age and then you die. Nice sentiment, though. And, you must admit, Lay Lady Lay borders on the pornographic. While I’m on this individual, there’s Rainy Day Woman 12 & 35. What is that all about? What kind of title is that? It reminds me of foul weather and a questionable number of females. My readers will surely bring up the fact that I mention Mr. Dylan in not a few blog posts. That’s only because someone gifted me a fifty-seven pound book of his lyrics. I use it as a paper weight on the desk where I write these stories. But, speaking of a master of songwriting, we must include Meatloaf (please don’t email me about the fact he had a wonderful songwriter who gave him the gems that made musical history. Yes, I’m thinking of Bat Out of Hell and the deeply felt and tender ballad I’ll Do Anything For Love But I Won’t Do That. The words are positively sublime bordering on the sacred and just beside the transcendence of pure art. I won’t even mention the song that did more for teenage sexual education than a semester of Health & Hygiene taught by the school nurse. I’m talking, of course, about Paradise By The Dashboard Light. (It’s really a song about baseball disguised as a teen lust ballad. Some claim there are deeper meaning in this song, but I only write G-rated blogs.

I know there are a few of my readers who will be asking: What about the Beatles? Well, what about them? The team of John Lennon and Paul McCarney did, I admit, write a few interesting ditties like A Day In The Life (but we all knew Paul was dead anyway) and I Wanna Hold Your Hand, a true tune about friendship among the post-adolescent crowd.

But I digress.

I really intend to breakdown a song that…well…a song that is for the ages. I’m referring, of course to Dion’s Teenager In Love.

Unlike Pavarotti, who was born in Modena, Italy on October 12, 1935, where so few singers have originated. Dion (born Dion Francis DiMucci) was born only four years later in The Bronx, where all the doo-wop singers hailed from.

I’ll skip over his early life and his later life (when he became very religious) and concentrate on his middle years which probably should include some of his later younger years when he became something of a “Pop Star”.

When I was a teenager I went to the Touring Dick Clark Show at the EJ Rec Center in Johnson City, New York. He wasn’t there that night. Neither was Fabian or Frankie Avalon (but that’s a different blog for a different time).

I think I saw Jimmy Clanton sing Venus In Bluejeans and Johnny Maestro may have sung Sixteen Candles, but I don’t remember. (Another vague and maybe false teen memory was that my brother, Dan, stood at a urinal next to Bo Diddley in the Rec Center’s Mens Room).

~ ~ ~

I will keep you waiting no longer. Here is my analysis, line by line, of Dion’s monumental hit Teenager In Love:

Each time we have a quarrel [precurser to a failed marriage?], it almost breaks my heart [note ‘almost’]

‘Cause I’m so afraid that we will have to part [Co-dependency?]

Each night I ask the stars up above [suggestive of psycho-active drugs]

Why must I be a teenager in love? [the ultimate philosophical question]

One day, I feel so happy, the next day, I feel so sad [clearly a bi-polar disorder (manic-depressive)

I guess I’ll learn to take the good with the bad [passive/aggressive sado-masochism]

Repeat second verse

Repeat third verse

I cried a tear for nobody but you

I’ll be a lonely one if you should say we’re through [common threat used by abusive partners]

Well, if you want to make me cry that won’t be so hard to do [Hmmm. S-M again?]

If you should say goodbye, I’ll still go on loving you [not realistic because he hasn’t yet met the blonde named Taffy in the apartment down the hall]

Repeat second verse

Repeat fifth verse

Repeat sixth verse

~ ~ ~

Well, there you have it. I hope I’m leaving you with some food for thought and something to chew over in your mind. And to think that dozens of volumes have been penned on the analysis of Bob Dylan’s work. There once was a guy who would go through Dylan’s trash (when the singer lived in Greenwich Village, New York. I wouldn’t even know where Dion’s trash can is so it’s not like I’m a crazed fan or something.

For next time, I’m taking notes on Melanie. I will be dissecting her seminal song, I’ve Got A Brand New Pair Of Roller Skates And You Have A Brand New Key.

Have a great month of May and remember it’s my birthday. I’m one year younger than Melanie and eight years younger than Dion.

The Pump: I Can’t Handle It

[The Pump. Located at the village green in Annandale-on-Hudson, NY.]

“How does it feel?”

–Bob Dylan Like A Rolling Stone

For many years Bob Dylan has provided a plethora of quotes for me for use in most social situations. Armed with these literary bites, I have made something of a name for myself as a Dylanologist. Yes, I’ve read many books about Bob and I can often be seen leafing through the big volume of Lyrics, looking for just the right wording, the satisfying cadence, the rhyme, the syntax and the deep theology found within his five hundred + songs. If you’re a follower of mine, you know that I often find appropriate places to insert a quote or two into a Blog (like I’m doing here) or a Facebook post.

Dylan was not awarded the Nobel Prize for scratching girl’s phone numbers on phone booths or public bathroom walls.

Just the other day I asked an attractive woman:

“My warehouse has my Arabian drums, should I put them at your gate?”

She stared at me with a blank expression. “Watch it, buster. My husband lifts weights.” I closed my trench coat and retreated back into the alley. I didn’t want to hear that her husband was kicked out of the Soviet Secret Police for being too rough on snitches.

Years ago I walked over to the Typing Teacher at the school where I taught. “Time is an ocean and it ends at the shore. You may not see me tomorrow.”

“What? Are you taking a sick day?”

Another time I was struggling to recall the name of a somewhat obscure song by Dylan. My head was lowered in concentration. A woman standing near me apparently thought I said something. She asked: “What did you say?”

At that very moment I recalled the song.

“Wiggle. Wiggle,” I said. I can still feel the stinging of my cheek. It was a left hand swipe and I can tell you that she was sporting a ring on her finger the size of an oxen yoke.

You can see that I’ve had varying degrees of success with these quotes. And I have the scars to prove it. But there is one line, buried deep inside Subterranean Homesick Blues. In fact, there are several keepers from that song. I once asked a woman who was sitting next to me in a bar: “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.” She glared at me with big brown cow eyes which quickly narrowed to evil slits. She seemed to breath fire, and not the good kind.

‘Hey grandpa,” she said, “I don’t need a weatherman. I have an App.” She shook her iPhone with a barely hidden malevolence that would frighten any witch in MacBeth.

But I digress.

The real story I intended to tell you about is how a long-time search on my part led me to a quaint upstate college campus on a day just like today. Actually, it was yesterday, in the afternoon. After several Google searches I finally located the famous pump that does not have a handle.

“The pump don’t work ’cause the vandals took the handle.”

You may have seen the music video of the song. Dylan is standing in an alley near the Savoy Hotel in London. He’s holding large cards which has bits of the song written on them. He drops each one as the words are sung.

[The Pump. A Closer Look]

I read somewhere that there is a picture of a street in London supposedly showing the Beatles crossing the intersection. Maybe there’s a song about that. Maybe there are some lyrics that I can adapt for a supply of pick-up lines.

I heard a song from those days once. Now I remember. I was riding an uptown M104 bus in New York. I was sitting next to a ravishing redhead with green eyes and a provocative plaid flannel shirt from L. L. Bean. I turned to her and, pointing to the Chrysler Building, I said in my best Ringo nasal voice: “You know that in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.”

It took three doctors and four nurses, using industrial strength Saline Solution to wash the Mace from my eyes.

I waited for everyone to leave except the younger blonde RN. I quietly said to her: “Cast your dancing spell my way, I promise to go under it.”

I woke up in the ER twenty minutes later.

My jaw was wired shut. No more quotes from me for a while.

[The video.]

[All photos are mine with the exception of the Dylan picture with the sign Government. Credit: Tony Frank/Sygma/Corbis.]

Passports 15: Good-bye England [I Want You]

We sat in an Irish Pub, O’Neills, in the west end of London.  It is my last night in England.  I can see Bushmills Irish Whiskey etched into the glass of the large window.  The letters are backwards.

Two singers–one on an acoustic and the other on an electric guitar.  They are playing a Beatles tune when we enter.  Then they switch to a Dylan song as we sit.  The singer says the next one was penned by Robert Zimmerman.  They play I Want You.

Through the window and across the street is the massive and glorious St. Pancras Station.

It is my last night in England–until the next time.  But, then there will be another last night…and another.

I recall the hills I walked, the rocks where I rested and the hedges where I conquered my fear.  I think of my British friends, people I’ve known for thirty years.  People who have aged and matured and moved homes and raised children.  I am thankful for the friendship these people have shown me.  I think of Tim, Jo and their family in North Dorset.  I think of Marion and Bill in Purbeck.  Bill, the old quarryman who cut Purbeck marble since his youth.  I think of Alex and Janice in Hampshire.

They are the best of mates…all of them.

Tomorrow, I will climb the steps of the Basillique du Sacre-Coeur in the Montmartre section of Paris.  I will climb to the last step and turn around to look at the magnificent City of Light.

There, I will celebrate my 67th birthday.

I will ache when I climb those steps.  The ache that comes with age, old bones and unused muscles.

But, I’ll be happy…happy just to be alive.

Then I will descend the steps, one by one.

I will reach the bottom step a year older, but a thousand years wiser.

 

Non, Je ne Regrette Rien.  

–Edith Piaf