"I Saw the Light" (Todd Rundgren)

I remember hearing "I Saw the Light" from Todd Rundgren's double album Something/Anything (1972) on the radio as a kid and loving the sound of the song.  It wasn't just the melody (even though it is the perfect R&B-inflected, power pop confection); it was the literal placement and separation of the instruments on the track.  Everything felt like it was in its proper place: the tom-toms in the right channel, the slide guitar in the front-middle, the piano and maracas way over to the left, the bass just left of center, Rundgren's lead vocal dead center, and the backing vocals in perfect stereo.
I knew the terms "arranger" and "producer" from reading the backs of album covers.  So I knew whoever had been at the helm of arranging/producing this track was on their game.
It wasn't until years and an Internet connection later that I discovered Rundgren had done it all himself.  And when I say all, I mean all: writing, arranging, producing, playing every instrument, and singing every vocal—even those high falsetto backing harmonies.  
Somehow, knowing that makes it more than just some catchy pop song to me; it's art.

"Chain of Fools" (Aretha Franklin)

Aretha Franklin's sessions with the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section (a.k.a. "The Swampers") in 1967 produced 3 albums-worth of material and a string of hit singles, including a little song called "Respect."  And while music historians and other list-makers rightfully cite "Respect" as a landmark recording, not only for its deep groove but also its cultural impact, I prefer her gritty take on soulster Don Covay's "Chain of Fools," a funky R&B workout that began its life as a song about field laborers until Covay changed the lyrics for Franklin, turning it into a song about a woman who realizes her man is two-timing her.

From moment one, Franklin sets this track ablaze.  The fact that the verses are as hot (or hotter) than the hook itself is a testament to her ability to interpret and own a song completely.  

But, for me, it's her riveting delivery on the breakdown that makes it the best Franklin track of all time.  With just a kick drum and some backing singers, clapping and ooh-ing in time behind her, she easily could have let the energy level drop.  Instead, she testifies like her life and love depend on it.  And it's gripping. 

And as I've said before, The Swampers can do no wrong.  Alongside Stax's house band Booker T. & The MG's, they were the tightest soul musicians of the late 60s.  I mean, just listen to Jimmy Johnson and Joe South's greasy tremolo guitars, Tommy Cogbill's thumping bass, and Roger Hawkins on drums.  It doesn't get funkier than that groove.

In fact, next to Franklin, Hawkins completely steals this show.  His steady, thumping heartbeat on the bass drum and the crack of his sticks against those snares are the stuff of Highway 61 roadhouses.  But then his lively fills and swinging sixteenth notes on the ride cymbal after the breakdown are like an aural signature, letting you know who funkafied the track.

"Hold On, I'm Comin'" (Sam & Dave)

I loved the original Blues Brothers movie (1980) as a kid.  Cable would run it (chopped up and censored, of course), and I'd be there, glued to the set, soaking up every minute.  It's where I first heard Stax soul: Elwood and Jake, driving around in their converted police cruiser, listening to The Best of Sam & Dave on their tape deck.  It made quite an impression on me.
It's where I heard the Sam & Dave track "Hold On, I'm Comin'" (1966) for the first time—a track that never wears out its welcome for me.  Along with featuring the entire Stax rhythm engine (i.e. Booker T. & The MG's + the Mar-Keys horn section), the song boasts the anointed vocals of Sam Moore and the late Dave Prater.  Although Moore and Prater often didn't get along outside the studio, when their voices came together, it was harmony.  The perfect high and low/fire and ice/yin and yang to stir the soul.  There's nothing quite like their blend on the hook: Hold on, I'm comin'...  Pure church.
And I'll even assert that Moore's final verse (When the day comes, and you are down / In a river of trouble and about to drown) is one of the best vocal performances ever recorded.  It's rare to hear that kind of unbridled emotion come through on a studio recording.
Incidentally, I've found that a lot of people don't realize "Hold On, I'm Comin'" was written by Isaac Hayes with lyricist Dave Porter.  (Before Hayes was a star in his own right, he and Porter wrote a number of legendary songs for Sam & Dave at Stax: "When Something is Wrong with My Baby," "I Thank You," as well as the ubiquitous "Soul Man.")
Years ago, I heard Hayes tell Conan O'Brien an anecdote about how "Hold On, I'm Comin'" came about.  And, God bless the Internets, I found the clip on YouTube!
I'll let you watch the video for yourself, but I'll set it up: Stax Records was located in an old movie theater that hadn't been changed or renovated all that much.  Whereas other studios in those days would have had specially-built echo chambers to capture reverb on vocals, Stax just ran mics into the theater's (working) restrooms, which were covered in ceramic tile.  As you might imagine, this made for great reverb on vocals, but maybe a little awkwardness whenever someone needed to use the facilities.
Long story short: Hayes and Porter were working on new music one evening, when Porter excused himself to use the restroom.  Porter was taking longer than his writing partner thought necessary, so Hayes hollered for him to hurry up.  
You might guess Porter's response.

"Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours" (Stevie Wonder)

Stevie Wonder's 1970 hit single "Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours" was a landmark: it was the first time Motown chief Berry Gordy had allowed him to both write and produce on his own.  (Thankfully, it wasn't the last.)  It also was his first Grammy nomination—not to mention the first Grammy nom for his mother, Lula Mae Hardaway, who is credited as a co-writer on the track.  Apparently, after she heard him play the melody on piano for the first time, she exclaimed, "Signed, sealed, delivered, I'm yours!" giving him the idea for the hook.

The first time I heard the track was in summer 1987.  My family was packed into my mom's Oldsmobile, heading down I-26 to the South Carolina coast.  I was crammed into the backseat with a cooler full of Sunkist and enough snacks to feed five families.

Back in those days, there used to be a radio dead zone between suburban Columbia, SC, and the junction of I-95, where all you could pick up were faint signals, all bleeding together in a garble of incoherent static.  It always was my least favorite stretch of the trip: the topography was flat, skinny pine trees and sweltering asphalt were the only things to look at outside the car window, and there was no music.  Not even the crappy adult contemporary stuff my parents often chose to listen to in those days.  It was very "are we there yet?"-inducing for a 9-year-old kid.

So the moment I began seeing billboards and road signs indicating that we were about 50 miles from Charleston, I started lobbying my parents to turn the radio back on.  Nothing was coming in all that well, except for this one station (I believe out of Orangeburg, SC) that was playing vintage R&B.  I was going through a phase at the time anyway of wanting to hear nothing but oldies, largely because my friend Bill had been sharing mixtapes of his mom's old vinyl with me.  So throwback soul was right up my alley.

Anyway, crackling through the static, came this funky electric sitar riff, followed by this sanctified howl and barrage of drums.  Although I wasn't familiar with the song itself, the moment the vocal kicked in, I instantly knew it was Stevie Wonder.  And by the first chorus, I was jamming: Oooh, baby, here I am / Signed, sealed, delivered, I'm yours.

Then a curious thing happened: about halfway through the track, the right channel suddenly dropped out.  The song kept playing, but it felt lopsided—the bass, the backing singers, and the tambourine all had vanished.

The moment the song had finished, the DJ came on with an announcement.  "Ladies and gentlemen, we had some technical difficulties on that last one.  So I'm going to play it again.  Because Stevie deserves to be heard in stereo."

And he immediately played the song again, in its entirety.  It was one of the coolest things I've ever heard a DJ do.  I think about it every time I play this track.

(And Stevie does deserve to be heard in stereo, by the way.)

"Dust" (Van Hunt)

"Neo-soul."  Such an uninspired term.  It means nothing.  When you consider that everyone from Musiq to The Roots have been lumped into that genre (and I use the term "genre" loosely) at some point in their careers, it's clear that "neo-soul" is little more than greasy record exec-speak for "we don't know how to pigeonhole you."
Case in point: Van Hunt. 
I heard the song "Dust" from his self-titled debut for the first time at a Starbucks in suburban Charlotte back in 2004.  At the counter, they had the CD for sale with a description beneath it—something pulled from an online review that referred to Hunt as "a neo-soul crooner."
I had to wonder if the reviewer even had ears.  "Neo-soul crooner?"  If anything, I heard tinges of Funkadelic's raw, twisted funk, circa Maggot Brain.  A little of Sly Stone's Fresh.  Station to Station-era Bowie.  Maybe even a bit of post-punk (note the jittery crunch of the rhythm guitars backing him on the track).
What I did not hear was some "crooner" on a quest to make panties drop.
The lyrics alone to "Dust" reveal a deeper ambition than that.  Hunt's carefully chosen words convey someone in a tenuous mental state.  Whether it's the product of personal anxiety or chemical-fueled paranoia is not clear.  Lines like So you see, it's no blow to my sophistication / That I've gone crazy again could go either way.  Even the title and chorus leave you wondering.
And that's the intrigue of the song.  That's the complexity of this artist.  That's pure soul.  No "neo" to it.

"Come As You Are" (Nirvana)

Even now, when I hear Kurt Cobain's burbling, underwater riff that opens "Come As You Are," it stirs something within me.  (Forget the fact that he subconsciously lifted it from post-punk band Killing Joke.  Besides, there were no hard feelings in the end.)  That intro reminds me of the simultaneous relief and exhilaration I felt as a teenager when there was a worthy successor to "Smells Like Teen Spirit."  It signaled that Nirvana wasn't some flash in the pan, and the over-produced schlock that had passed for rock for half a decade was finally dead.  
I just wish Cobain would have hung around a bit longer to embrace and enjoy what he'd helped create.
Over the past few days as I was poking around the internet, brushing up on the facts of "Come As You Are," it became clear that the song (like many others that Cobain wrote) is a mosaic of personal experiences—not blatantly autobiographical, but still intensely intimate.
The most enlightening thing I stumbled across was an article from early 2014 about the possible origin of the song's title.  When Cobain was in his teens, his father kicked him out of the house for bad behavior.  For a brief time, he stayed with his alcoholic mother but then took off when the two had a falling out, which rendered him effectively homeless.  Apart from occasionally crashing with friends, he spent most of his nights seeking shelter in old/abandoned buildings around his hometown of Aberdeen, WA.  According to biographer Charles R. Cross, Cobain also occasionally crashed at a flophouse in Aberdeen called The Morck Hotel, which advertised using the slogan: "Come as you are."  (By the looks of the Morck's website, it's currently going through a major renovation to become some kind of upscale boutique hotel.  Figures.)  
When I think about the lyrics of the song (which involve people contradicting themselves by saying one thing but really meaning/expecting another) in the context of Cobain's experience as a teenager, the pieces begin to fall into place.  His experience also sheds light on the use of the word memoria, which gets repeated throughout the song.  Memoria is one of the elements of the art of rhetoric.  Basically, it means recalling a bit of knowledge or experience to support your argument.  (The fact that he puts the emphasis on the wrong syllable, making the word rhyme with "diarrhea," also isn't an accident, in my opinion.)
In short, he's questioning whether you can take people's rhetoric at face value.  (Would you be inclined to believe someone who claims they don't have a gun?)
Along with that, it's about actions speaking louder than words.  Or as the late Maya Angelou put it: "I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."

"Get Together" (The Youngbloods)

Mid/late 60s folk-rock has always been a hot or cold proposition for me.  For every profound and bold statement like "The Sound of Silence" or "Maggie's Farm," there's a bit of vapid fluff like "Sunshine Superman" that serves as a reminder of how dippy, pale, and stoned the purveyors of the genre could sound.

The Youngbloods' rendition of the song "Get Together" by singer/songwriter Chet Powers (a.k.a. Dino Valenti) falls into the former category for me.  The song is a poetic plea for humanity to choose love instead of fear, and it has some truly deep lyrics:

Love is but the song we sing,

And fear's the way we die

You can make the mountains ring

Or make the angels cry

To me, that single stanza is as powerful as a hundred protest songs put together, because it's not really "anti" anything; it's pro-compassion.
The sincerity of the message keeps the song from being just some hippie curio, even though the sound of the track—the close vocal harmonies, the Roger McGuinn-esque guitar, and the steady/poppy rhythm section—sets it squarely in the 60s.  (If I had to pick a favorite part of the song, it would be lead singer/bassist Jesse Colin Young's simple-yet-grooving bassline on the break, just after the guitar solo.)

A few bar trivia facts: The Youngbloods weren't the first ones to cover the song.  The Kingston Trio actually did the first version in 1964, titled "Let's Get Together."  Jefferson Airplane also did a version on their first album in 1966.  

The Youngbloods' version was first issued as a single from their eponymous debut album in 1967, but it was ignored upon release.  It wasn't until February 1969, when the National Conference of Christians and Jews (now known as the National Conference for Community and Justice) used "Get Together" in a commercial to promote its annual National Brotherhood Week, that the music-buying public began to pay attention.  By August of that year, "Get Together" had become a Top 5 hit—nearly two years after its original release.