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Which will it be?

The New Neo Posted on by

Is he going to just let her walk away?

Or is he going to plead with her to come back?

Then again, maybe she’s been giving him mixed messages. This song, written by Bruce Springsteen, was popularized in a female version by the Pointer Sisters, who give a really steamy rendition here featuring what is probably the longest mid-song pause in history. The lyrics are now so very un-PC that my guess is that this song is now verboten to perform. But hey, it’s a great song, and ambivalence can be a very real thing:

Or maybe he’s reached the point of zen indifference (I recently discovered to my surprise that this song was written by none other than Paul Simon):

It’s good to get my mind off the dismal subject of politics for a while.

Comments

Which will it be? — 32 Comments

  1. “It’s good to get my mind off the dismal subject of politics for a while.” [Neo]

    Yes, and Thanks.

    (Paul Simon, Whooda thunk it? Like Carole King with Locomotion.)

    Perhaps a Jello post, too?

  3. (I recently discovered to my surprise that this song was written by none other than Paul Simon): Red Rubber Ball

    I also recently discovered this, some time in the last 6 months. It also surprised me. 🙂

    Speaking of Paul Simon, back in the day in Berserkeley I knew a New Yorker who claimed to have made music with Simon and Garfunkel during their high school days. He did play the guitar fairly well. Decades later from some online searching I found out that he had graduated from Forest Hills High School the same year (1959) as Simon and Garfunkel. So, maybe he was telling the truth.

  4. Very good, New. I never knew who did “Walk Away Renee” – thought it may have been “The Balloons” lol (Fifth Dimension) all this time. Always loved how some of the music of that time had kind of a spaceship-taking-off sound.
    And “Fire” – dear Jesus, the power in that woman’s voice!
    Great music. Thanks for the memories, and for the escape.
    Jim

  5. Of course she’s going to walk away.

    The Left Bank was the highlight of wuss rock until Firefall!

    She probably ditched him for real man ZZ Top!

  6. When “Walk Away Renee” came out, I was entranced by the Left Banke. My vinyl got scratchy and I rejoiced when I located the CD (which were hard to find at first).

    The story of the song is fascinating. The writer, Michael Brown, was sixteen years-old and he was totally crushed and unrequited on Renee, who was the bassist’s girlfriend. Oh man!

    Well, she was pretty crushable:

    https://purpleclover.littlethings.com/entertainment/3218-15-beautiful-women-who-inspired-classic-love-songs/item/3-renee-fladen-kamm/

    But it was worth it. Brown didn’t get Renee but he got two solid hits for the Left Banke. The other was “Pretty Ballerina,” also about Renee. Then there was “She May Call You Up Tonight,” also also about Renee. And I suspect, “I’ve Got Something On My Mind” was about Renee too.

    And that about sums up the best songs of the Left Banke IMO.

    The band blew apart. Brown tried to set up a new Left Banke with the blonde Spinal Tap guy, the others sued, and nothing was ever the same again.
    ___________________________

    Yay! Mr. Edit hath returned.

  8. Re: Fire…

    But you ain’t heard nothin’ until you’ve heard Robin Williams sing “Fire” as Elmer Fudd:
    ___________________________________________

    I puww you a wittle cwoser
    You say, no.
    You say, you don’t wike it
    I say, you’re a wiar.
    But when we kiss…
    It’s wike…fi-were.

    –Robin Williams (as Elmer Fudd), “Fire”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vT-VaMXsAw

  14. Surfing the web I see there have been many covers of “Renee” — including by the Four Tops, Linda Ronstadt and Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes.

    I’m a sucker for Southside Johnny at his best and his version is good, but doesn’t quite ring the bell. However, Ronstadt and her collaborator bring such tenderness to it:

    –Linda Ronstadt & Ann Savoy, “Walk Away Renee”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSXfMQuiqwg

    According to the comments, this was one of her final recordings before Ronstadt retired due to a rare degenerative brain disease. Tragic.

  15. Before I ever had a girlfriend I knew, and liked, Red Rubber Ball. I looked it up a few years and was surprised then to learn Simon had written it, but it fit with why I liked it.
    “And I think, __ it’s gonna, __ be alright.
    Yeah, __ the worst, __ is over now.
    And the morning sun is shining like a
    Red Rubber Ball.”
    Maybe my Dad and (first) stepmom had broken up around then.

    Many of my own break-ups, many times remembered that song.
    One breakup was with a Renee.
    So that song, too, was remembered.

    Baby Come Back is a fine song; Fire, too, and live with such energy.
    Funny how some songs are associated with stronger memories, and the evocations of the memories evokes a shadow, or echo, or a concentrate, of the remembered emotions.

    I thought this blog was to complain about ignorant Trump-haters all the time
    It’s good to remember tomorrow’s sun will be coming up again.
    Like a Red Rubber Ball.

  21. When I examined the lyrics, I was surprised to discover “Feelin’ Alright” was about a relationship gone bad, not getting high.
    ________________________________________

    Boy you sure took me for one big ride
    And even now I sit and I wonder why
    That when I think of you I start myself to cry
    I just can’t waste my time, I must keep dry
    Gotta stop believin’ in all your lies
    ‘Cause there’s too much to do before I die, hey

    You feelin’ alright?
    I’m not feelin’ too good myself
    You feelin’ alright?
    I’m not feelin’ too good, little girl

    –Joe Cocker, “Mad Dogs & Englishman”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T461aWavPYo

  23. I’m trying to think of an equivalent song to “Renee” without success.

    There are breakup songs, “Baby, please don’t go” songs, “Babe, I’m gonna leave you” songs (which includes Leonard Cohen’s “So Long, Marianne”) and “I will survive (you bastard)” songs but “Renee” is about the only one of pure pathos in which the singer just gives up.

  24. Springsteen, Simon, the Gibb brothers among many others wrote songs(its what they did and they wrote constantly) for other artists while they were on the way up in their own careers. Springsteen, for one, recorded his own songs long after the song was made famous by others as he finally scratched out his own recording career. “Fire” is a good example. Writer’s write, as I constantly tell my 16 yo daughter who aspires to be a writer. Cheers.

  26. neo: We-e-e-l-ll, the Blunt narrator gives up the girl, but he only knew her for a moment while walking by and high. Not much of an investment.

    The Renee guy, on the other hand, has been obsessing about a real girl in his life, most likely for months. We don’t know the backstory, but it’s serious for him. Giving up on her is no small thing and I bet he’ll be haunted for years by her and his fantasies of what might have been.

    * I didn’t know the Blunt song except it was the first example on the Axis of Awesome’s awesome compilation of hit songs using a trite set of chord changes:

    –Axis of Awesome, “4 Chords”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOlDewpCfZQ

  27. Bill Owens: Springsteen is a great example of a guy who let other people use his songs before he got around to it himself.

    Though most of the examples I can think of were after his career was well-established. Such as “Fire” for the Pointers and “Because the Night” which rebooted Patti Smith’s career.

    However, there was “The Fever” — an early Springsteen song — which he gave to Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes to record as as favor of to Steve Van Zandt, who had left the Jukes to join Springsteen.

    The Jukes did a great version of “The Fever,” one of the premier yearning “I want you back” songs of rock’n’roll.
    _____________________________________________

    When I get home from my job I turn on my TV
    But I can’t keep my mind on the show
    When I lay down at night, oh, I can’t get no sleep
    So I turn on my radio
    But the only sound I hear is you whisperin’ in my ear
    The words that you used to say
    Now my days grow longer
    ‘Cause my love grows stronger
    And the fever gets worse
    And I’ve got the fever for this girl

    Got the fever, oh, I’ve got the fever
    Nothing that a po’ boy can do
    When he’s got the fever for this girl
    Got the fever, oh, I’ve got the fever
    Left this little boy blue

    –Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes – The Fever
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5aDLeWoxbms

  28. huxley:

    I think that Blunt actually wrote the song about his ex, whom he briefly saw again in a public place after they had broken up.

    I agree, though, that the song doesn’t clearly convey that, although there are slight hints, such as when he says that she smiles at him. But here’s the backstory:

    Newspapers have claimed that “You’re Beautiful” is about a former girlfriend of Blunt, Dixie Chassay, casting assistant for the Harry Potter films, although Blunt refuses to confirm or deny this. On 8 March 2006 on The Oprah Winfrey Show, Blunt said of the song, “It’s kind of miserable. It was about seeing my ex-girlfriend on the Underground in London with her new man, who I didn’t know existed. She and I caught eyes and lived a lifetime in that moment, but didn’t do anything about it and haven’t seen each other since.” According to Blunt, he wrote the lyrics of the song at home in two minutes after meeting her, and then finished the song with Sacha Skarbek in Los Angeles, and with Amanda Ghost also credited as a co-writer.

  29. neo: Well, that’s different!

    It also explains why he cares to emphasize that he’s not just high, but “f***ing high.”

  30. huxley:

    What on earth makes you think that I’m being serious?

    Of course Simon didn’t mean “take a pee.”

    My point is just that it came to my mind that the person in the song was probably more likely to take a pee when he left that room than do anything else. The lyric strikes me as a bit odd, that’s all. But odder still – much odder – is the guy breaking into the house and slipping into the singer’s girlfriend’s bed in just the short time it takes to wash a face OR take a pee.

    A song that always reminds me somewhat of “Cecilia” is Richard Thompson’s ““Valerie.“

  31. Let’s say a word for “Baby Come Back” by Player. That’s a great song, that holds up very well after all these years. It brings back a lot of memories. Wonder what ever happened to her, anyway. Nah. Who cares? Just looked up Player. They continued in various lineups for a long time. Two of the members sued each other for rights to the name in 2018. I’m surprised it would have had much value by then.

  32. What on earth makes you think that I’m being serious?

    neo: No disrespect intended, but you generally seem serious. Or at least I can’t always tell when you aren’t.

    I post enough goofy stuff that I imagine people know better than to take me too seriously.

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