"Hold Me" (Fleetwood Mac)

When it comes to Fleetwood Mac, I don't normally go for Christine McVie's songs.  If you've been reading any of my blog entries for a substantial amount of time, you'll know that I'm a bigger fan of Lindsey Buckingham and (to a lesser degree) Stevie Nicks.  McVie's tracks tend to be too wan and toothless for my taste.  (Give me the pulsing weirdness of "What Makes You Think You're the One" or the lush dreaminess of "Sara" any day over the poppy-yet-plodding "Little Lies.")
But the song "Hold Me" from 1982's Mirage is my one McVie exception.  Its crisp, New Wave vibe—which owes a lot to Lindsey Buckingham's arranging/producing—always felt a little more like Talking Heads or Pretenders to me than Fleetwood Mac.  In fact, for many years, I didn't realize the song was a Fleetwood Mac tune until my parents bought the band's 1988 Greatest Hits album.  (Side 1, track 4.)
From what I've read over the years, McVie co-wrote the song with British musician Robbie Patton about her fling with the late Dennis Wilson of The Beach Boys.  Which sheds light on the arrangement of the song, particularly its distinctive chorus: the harmonized call-and-response vocals singing Hold me (hold me) hold me (hold me) bear a striking resemblance to The Beach Boys' sunny, multi-layered harmonies.  What's more, those oddly compressed Come on and's (which sound like they were recorded in a shipping container) kind of bring to mind Mike Love's bow-bow-bow-bow accent vocals on the chorus of "Help Me Rhonda."  
But if there's one thing that makes this song for me it's Buckingham's guitar.  It takes on the unlikely role of percussion instrument, sounding almost like a cow bell for most of the track, until he launches into his simple-but-effective guitar solo, which wails with just a tinge of Eastern flair.

"Bennie and the Jets" (Elton John)

"Bennie and the Jets" from the classic album Goodbye Yellow Brick Road (1973) might be the weirdest song Elton John ever recorded.  The Frankie Valli-esque falsetto.  The sci-fi/glam imagery over plastic funk.  The crowd noises and on-the-beat clapping.  Totally bizarre, and totally infectious.
It was a huge favorite of mine as a little kid.  (And not just because he'd performed the song on The Muppet Show.)  My mother owned his Greatest Hits album (the one from 1974), and she played it constantly.  Every time it was on the turntable, I'd impatiently wait for "Bennie" to come on and then go crazy when he hit that first block chord on piano—mainly because I knew that easy singalong hook was imminent: Bennie!  Bennie!  Bennie!  Bennie and the Jets!  I drove my mom nuts more than once, screeching that line ad nauseam.
Basically, the song is about a fictitious band of android musicians that John's lyricist Bernie Taupin dreamed up.
As Taupin told Rolling Stone in March 2014, "I saw Bennie and the Jets as a sort of proto-sci-fi punk band, fronted by an androgynous woman, who looks like something out of a Helmut Newton photograph."

As for the sound of the track, John's producer Gus Dudgeon was the mastermind behind making it a "live" recording.  Truth is, it's a studio recording.  But when Dudgeon was at the mixing board and heard that opening splash of notes on piano, it immediately brought to mind a musician on stage, cueing up a band.

So he added copious amounts of reverb and overdubbed some crowd noise from one of John's concerts along with audio from Jimi Hendrix's 1970 show at the Isle of Wight Festival.  Then to really cinch it, he beefed up the ambient crowd noise by recording himself, engineer David Hentschel, and an assistant, whistling, clapping, and stomping "onto the wrong beat to simulate a British audience," as Dudgeon put it to Sound on Sound online.  

In the end, Dudgeon transformed John and Taupin's odd R&B number about rocking robots in mohair suits into a full-on concert spectacle.  (That huge cheer that erupts just before John launches into his falsetto immediately conjures the image that he's doing/wearing something outlandish for the grand finale of the song.  It creates intrigue.  In fact, my guess is that the single wouldn't have been half as successful without the guise of it being a "live" performance.)

"Samba Pa Ti" (Santana)

For as much as I enjoy Santana's rendition of Tito Puente's "Oye Como Va" (as well as the band's famous covers of Willie Bobo's "Evil Ways" and Fleetwood Mac's "Black Magic Woman"), my favorite Santana track is Carlos Santana's own composition "Samba Pa Ti" ("Samba for You") from the album Abraxas (1970).  

Based on the various interviews with Santana that I've read/seen over the years, the instrumental holds a special place for him, too, as the first composition of his own that got substantial airplay back in the day.  The sentiment he often expresses about the song is one of liberation.  Basically, it's the song where he finally felt like he was coming into his own as an artist and could successfully express himself in a way that wasn't consciously trying to emulate any other guitarist's sound or technique.

To me, "Samba Pa Ti" perfectly captures the warmth of Santana's signature tone and the fluidity/soulfulness of his soloing.  It's a showcase for his skills without being showy.  There's even a sweetness and humble majesty to the track that I feel pays homage to his modest upbringing as the son of a classically-trained violinist who basically traded performing in orchestras in Mexico for playing in mariachi bands in California so that Carlos and his five siblings could ultimately have a better life in the States.

He pretty much confirmed this in a December 3, 2014, interview with veteran rock journalist Ben Fong-Torres at San Francisco's Castro Theatre.  Journalist Steve Roby's article for BAM magazine online chronicled Santana's response to Fong-Torres's question about what "Samba Pa Ti" means to him.

"(Through that song) I represent all of the people that pick up your food, clean the sheets at every hotel from here to New York...clean the toilets, babysit, gardeners...I am the dreams and aspirations of these invisible people."

A beautiful sentiment for a beautiful song.

"Do It Again" (Steely Dan)

It's still amazing to me that Steely Dan pulled off the feat of having a hit album its first time out of the gate with Can't Buy a Thrill (1972).  And had an instant #6 hit song with "Do It Again."  Not that the album or the single aren't great; they are.  It's just that, for a band named after a sex toy in the William S. Burroughs novel Naked Lunch and a quirky debut single that tells an odd tale of some junkie gambler who shoots a guy and then ends up on a debauched spree in Vegas, I'm surprised it fared as well as it did in the bubblegum musical landscape of 1972.  After all, we're talking a period of time when a pubescent Donny Osmond was ruling the charts.
Anyway, "Do It Again" is a surprisingly strong single for a band that essentially was just getting started.  Its undulating Latin funk makes it easy to mistake for a Santana song; even Denny Dias's fluid, surprisingly effective solo momentarily makes one wonder if Carlos Santana decided to pick up an electric sitar for s's and g's.  But it's Donald Fagen's distinctive jazz-tinged vocals that really let you know it's Steely Dan and no one else.  (Funny to think that Fagen initially was reluctant to be the band's lead singer.  I can't picture what albums like Countdown to Ecstasy or Aja would have sounded like without his "yeah, I'm from South Jersey; what of it?" vocals.)

"Mango Meat" (Mandrill)

I became aware of the track "Mango Meat" from the album Just Outside of Town (1973) by Brooklyn-based band Mandrill the same way others of my generation probably first learned about it: through the 1988 hip-hop classic "Straight Out of the Jungle" by New York's Jungle Brothers.
But for many years, I didn't know where the JBs crew had gotten the guitar lick and horn fanfare that punctuate the track.  I'd pretty much figured it was some obscure B-side from James Brown or one of his disciples that only the most seasoned crate diggers knew about.
But then a few years ago, I was poking around the InterWebs late one night, when I stumbled upon this cat named DJ Funktual.  If you're a sample junkie (like me) and you haven't seen his videos on YouTube, you've got to check him out.  He's a DJ out of Fort Lauderdale with this massive library of ol' skool soul and funk, and he has 50+ videos online where he reveals the sources of pretty much every key track in the history of hip-hop.  The guy knows his shtuff and is passionate about conveying his knowledge to others, which is what makes the video series crazily addictive.  (Seriously, don't start watching at 1 am, because you'll suddenly realize it's 5 am.)
Anyway, DJ Funktual pointed out that the sample was from "Mango Meat," and I've been seeking out Mandrill's music ever since.
Mandrill came on the scene in the late 60s, founded by three siblings born in Panama and raised in Bed-Stuy—which sheds some light on the band's unique sound.  Difficult to pigeonhole, Mandrill's music is essentially hard funk; however, there are Afro-Caribbean, Latin, Afrobeat, jazz, and rock influences in the bubbling stew, too.  And those influences come through loud and clear in "Mango Meat."
In fact, what I love about the track is the way each element—the horns, guitar, clav, organ, vibraphone, whistle, etc.—has its own distinct flavor yet blends perfectly in the melting pot.
And I'd be remiss if I didn't also point out the drumming on the song.  Drummer Neftali Santiago lays down an incredibly complex groove.  It twists and turns in unexpected ways yet still flows like hot metal, giving the rest of the band a strong foundation to get down.
It's just the perfect deep cut for funkateers and sample hounds alike.

"I Shot the Sheriff" (Eric Clapton)

This is one of those rare instances when I actually prefer a cover version to the original.  But just by a hair.
"I Shot the Sheriff" was written by Bob Marley for The Wailers and originally recorded for the band's second album, Burnin' (1973).  Eric Clapton was introduced to the song after his  rhythm guitarist George Terry played him Burnin' during the sessions for 461 Ocean Boulevard, the 1974 album that marked Clapton's return to the music industry after kicking a years-long addiction to heroin.  
When Clapton eventually met Marley in the late 70s, Marley hinted that parts of the song were true; although, I seriously doubt that he ever shot anyone.  I've always taken the song as a metaphor for standing up to a bully.  Considering the unrest in Jamaica in the early 70s, when police harassment of poor blacks in Kingston's Trenchtown neighborhood was commonplace, the tale of shooting a corrupt sheriff as an allegory of the disenfranchised overcoming an oppressor seems pretty plausible.
As spirited as the original is, the groove on Clapton's version is what makes it for me.  Specifically, it's drummer Jamie Oldaker.  There's still that slight reggae feel in Oldaker's hi-hat pattern, but he shifts the downbeat ever so slightly, giving it a Latin/funk feel.  
And purely from a recording/production standpoint, the snare sounds amazing: clean, present, and alive.  (In my humble opinion, "I Shot the Sheriff" and the entire 461 Ocean Boulevard album have some of the purest, best-sounding drums of any rock album of the 70s, next to maybe Led Zeppelin's albums.)

"Get Up, Stand Up" (The Wailers)

"Get Up, Stand Up" from The Wailers' 1973 album Burnin' probably was the first true reggae song I ever heard.  It either was around the time of Bob Marley's passing in 1981 or the anniversary of his death in 1982.  But I recall hearing a snippet of the funky "Get Up, Stand Up" on a morning news program.  It was playing under interview footage of a righteously dreadlocked Marley, discussing his music.  Sounds funny to say, but the song's simple refrain reminded me of the "Hokey Pokey"; although, rather than directing you to put your left foot in, it urged you to get up, stand up instead!  It was catchy, easy to repeat, and it stuck in my little brain.
I got to thinking about that years later, listening to the song again on 1984's Legend compilation.  I'm certain that's what Marley and guitarist/vocalist Peter Tosh had in mind: a protest song that was so straightforward even a child could grasp the words; a populist anthem that clearly urged people to stand up for their convictions.
Which is a perfect segue into the song's origins.
I had always thought the melody of "Get Up, Stand Up" shared a striking similarity to War's 1971 single "Slippin' Into Darkness"; there's a little riff that harmonica player Lee Oskar plays in tandem with saxophonist Charles Miller toward the end of the track that exactly matches the notes in the refrain of "Get Up, Stand Up."
Turns out, I was onto something.  
In a 2011 blog piece for Paste online, journalist Denise Sullivan references a long-circulating story that Marley had befriended members of the band War while on tour in the U.S.  As further confirmation of this, I stumbled upon an interview* with former War drummer Harold Brown on YouTube.  In the video, Brown says that Marley was with him and his bandmate/percussionist Papa Dee Allen, walking down the street in downtown Atlanta on their way to a radio interview, when Marley told them he was going to write an homage to War because he saw the band as fellow "street musicians" who played music for the people, just like The Wailers.
Apparently, "Get Up, Stand Up" was that song, and "Slippin' Into Darkness" was the inspiration for it.

(*This guy Calvin Lincoln has a great show called Soul School Television, produced for Vallejo Community Access Television in Vallejo, CA, where he conducts interviews with soul/funk greats from the 60s and 70s and also discusses classic albums and music history.  The production quality is lo-fi, but he really knows his stuff and asks great, insightful questions.  I ended up watching about 20 clips in a row of his on YouTube and probably would have watched even more if my computer's battery hadn't run out of juice.  If you're a fan of classic soul, funk, and R&B, check him out.)