30 Day Song Challenge

day 30 - your favorite song at this time last year 

The Cranberries - Linger


Cranberries guitarist Noel Hogan wrote the music for this song before Dolores O’Riordan joined the band. Originally, it had lyrics written by the group’s first singer Niall Quinn. When O’Riordan auditioned for the band, she had some ideas for the song, and after she was hired, she wrote her own set up lyrics, turning it into a song of regret and based on a soldier she once fell in love with. The emotional, girlie sound was a huge departure for the band, but wildly successful. (Songfacts.com)


Lyrics: 

If you, if you could return, don’t let it burn, don’t let it fade. 

I’m sure I’m not being rude, but it’s just your attitude, 

It’s tearing me apart, It’s ruining everything. 

I swore, I swore I would be true, and honey, so did you. 

So why were you holding her hand? Is that the way we stand? 

Were you lying all the time? Was it just a game to you? 

But I’m in so deep. You know I’m such a fool for you. 

You got me wrapped around your finger, ah, ha, ha. 

Do you have to let it linger? Do you have to, do you have to, 

Do you have to let it linger? 

Oh, I thought the world of you. 

I thought nothing could go wrong, 

But I was wrong. I was wrong. 

If you, if you could get by, trying not to lie, 

Things wouldn’t be so confused and I wouldn’t feel so used, 

But you always really knew, I just wanna be with you. 

But I’m in so deep. You know I’m such a fool for you. 

You got me wrapped around your finger, ah, ha, ha. 

Do you have to let it linger? Do you have to, do you have to, 

Do you have to let it linger? 

And I’m in so deep. You know I’m such a fool for you. 

You got me wrapped around your finger, ah, ha, ha. 

Do you have to let it linger? Do you have to, do you have to, 

Do you have to let it linger? 

You know I’m such a fool for you. 

You got me wrapped around your finger, ah, ha, ha. 

Do you have to let it linger? Do you have to, do you have to, 

Do you have to let it linger?

30 Day Song Challenge

day 29 - a song from your childhood 

Spice Girls - Wannabe

Yo I’ll say you what I want, what I really really want
So tell me what you want, what you really really want
I’ll tell you what I want, what I really really want
So tell me what you want, what you really really want
I wanna huh, I wanna huh, I wanna huh, I wanna huh, I wanna really
really really wanna zig a zig ah

If you want my future, forget my past
If you wanna get with me, better make it fast
Now don’t go wasting my precious time
Get your act together, we could be just fine

I’ll tell you what I want, what I really really want
So tell me what you want, what you really really want
I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna really
really really wanna zigazig ha

If you wanna be my lover, you gotta get with my friends
Make it last forever, friendship never ends
If you wanna be my lover, you have got to give
Taking is too easy, but that’s the way it is

What do you think about that, now you know how I feel
Say you can handle my love, are you for real?
I won’t be hasty, I’ll give you a try
If you really bug me, then I’ll say goodbye

Yo I’ll say you what I want, what I really really want
So tell me what you want, what you really really want
I wanna huh, I wanna huh, I wanna huh, I wanna huh, I wanna really
really really wanna zigazig ha

If you wanna be my lover, you gotta get with my friends
Make it last forever, friendship never ends
If you wanna be my lover, you have got to give
Taking is too easy, but that’s the way it is

So here’s a story from A to Z
You wanna get with me, you gotta listen carefully
We got Em in the place who likes it in your face
We got G like MC who likes it on an
Easy V doesn’t come for free
She’s a real lady!
And as for me, ha you’ll see

Slam your body down and wind it’s all around
Slam your body down and wind it’s all around

If you wanna be my lover, you gotta get with my friends
Make it last forever, friendship never ends
If you wanna be my lover, you have got to give
Taking is too easy, but that’s the way it is

If you wanna be my lover, you gotta,
you gotta, you gotta, you gotta,
you gotta, slam, slam, slam, slam

Slam your body down and wind it’s all around
Slam your body down and wind it’s all around

Slam your body down and wind it’s all around
Slam your body down zigazig ah

If you wanna be my lover

30 Day Song Challenge

day 28 - a song that makes you feel guilty

 Iron Maiden - Run To The Hills

Just remembering the days I said I didn’t like Iron Maiden…


White man came across the sea

He brought us pain and misery

He killed our tribes, he killed our creed

He took our game for his own need

 We fought him hard we fought him well

Out on the plains we gave him hell

But many came too much for Cree

Oh will we ever be set free?

 Riding through dustclouds and barren wastes

Galloping hard on the plains

Chasing the redskins back to their holes

Fighting them at their own game

Murder for freedom a stab in the back

Women and children the cowards attack

 Run to the hills,

run for your lives.

Run to the hills,

run for your lives.

Soldier blue on the barren wastes

Hunting and killing their game

Raping the women and wasting the men

The only good Indians are tame

Selling them whiskey and taking their gold

Enslaving the young and destroying the old

Run to the hills,

run for your lives.

Run to the hills,

run for your lives.

(Electric guitar solo) 

Yeeeeeeeeeeeah oooooooooohhh

Run to the hills,

run for your lives.

Run to the hills,

run for your lives.

Run to the hills,

run for your lives.

Run to the hills,

run for yooour liiiiiiives.

  • 0 Plays
  • Johnny B. Goodefrom “Chuck Berry Is on Top”by Chuck Berry

30 Day Song Challenge

day 27 - a song that you wish you could play

Chuck Berry - Johnny B. Goode


Leaving aside all the classical piano songs I will probably never be able to play, I choose this one… :)a


This song is based on Berry’s life. It tells the tale of a boy with humble beginnings with a talent for guitar. Some details were changed: Berry was from St. Louis, not Louisiana, and he knew how to read and write very well. He graduated from beauty school with a degree in hairdressing and cosmetology.
The line, “That little country boy could play” was originally, “That little colored boy can play.” Berry knew he had to change it if he wanted the song played on the radio.
Berry got the name “Johnny” from Johnnie Johnson, a piano player who collaborated with Berry on many songs, including “Maybellene,” “Roll Over Beethoven” and “Sweet Little 16.” Johnson often wrote the songs on piano, and then Berry converted them to guitar and wrote lyrics. Berry joined Johnson’s group, The Sir John Trio, in 1953, and quickly became the lead singer and centerpiece of the band.
Johnson was very well-respected among many musicians. He played with Keith Richards, Eric Clapton, John Lee Hooker and many others before his death at age 80 in 2005.
The guitar intro came from the Louis Jordan song “Ain’t That Just Like A Woman.” Jordan was a very influential R&B singer and a huge influence on Berry.
Berry got the word “Goode” from the street in St. Louis where he grew up. He lived at 2520 Goode Avenue, which in 1986 was renamed Annie Malone Drive after the woman who financed a children’s home on the street.
In 2000, Johnnie Johnson sued Berry, claiming that he never got credit for helping write many of Berry’s hits, including this. The case was dismissed in 2002, with the judge ruling that too much time passed between the writing of the songs and the lawsuit.
This song is a great example of the care and precision Berry used when writing and delivering his lyrics. He wanted the words to his songs to tell a story and stand on their own, and took care to clearly enunciate so listeners could understand them. Many of the Country and Blues singers who preceded Berry weren’t so clear with the words.
In 1981, Keith Richards went backstage at a Chuck Berry show in New York. Not knowing who he was and thinking he was an annoying fan, Berry punched him, which wasn’t out of character for the sometimes-prickly Berry. Richards later said: “I love his work, but I couldn’t warm to him even if I was cremated next to him.”
Berry recorded a sequel to this song called “Bye Bye Johnny,” which tells the story of Johnny as a grown man. (Songfacts.com)


Lyrics:

Deep down Louisiana close to New Orleans
Way back up in the woods among the evergreens
There stood a log cabin made of earth and wood
Where lived a country boy named Johnny B. Goode
Who never ever learned to read or write so well
But he could play the guitar just like a ringing a bell

Go go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Johnny B. Goode

He used to carry his guitar in a gunny sack
Go sit beneath the tree by the railroad track
Oh, the engineerswould see him sitting in the shade
Strumming with the rhythm that the drivers made
People passing by they would stop and say
Oh my that little country boy could play

Go go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Johnny B. Goode

His mother told him “Someday you will be a man,
And you will be the leader of a big old band.
Many people coming from miles around
To hear you play your music when the sun go down
Maybe someday your name will be in lights
Saying Johnny B. Goode tonight.”

Go go
Go Johnny go
Go go go Johnny go
Go go go Johnny go
Go go go Johnny go
Go
Johnny B. Goode 

  • 10 Plays
  • Correntefrom “Meus Caros Amigos”by Chico Buarque

30 Day Song Challenge

day 26 - a song that you can play on an instrument

Chico Buarque - Corrente

I was going to put Blackbird by The Beatles… But then I realized I had only just posted it a couple of days ago… And I haven’t published any brazilian songs so far, and this is definitely one of the most difficult songs I have ever played…

Eu hoje fiz um samba bem pra frente
Dizendo realmente o que é que eu acho

Eu acho que o meu samba é uma corrente
E coerentemente assino embaixo

Hoje é preciso refletir um pouco
E ver que o samba está tomando jeito

Só mesmo embriagado ou muito louco
Pra contestar e pra botar defeito

Precisa ser muito sincero e claro
Pra confessar que andei sambando errado

Talvez precise até tomar na cara
Pra ver que o samba está bem melhorado

Tem mas é que ser bem cara de tacho
Não ver a multidão sambar contente

Isso me deixa triste e cabisbaixo
Por isso eu fiz um samba bem pra frente

Dizendo realmente o que é que eu acho
Eu acho que o meu samba é uma corrente

E coerentemente assino embaixo
Hoje é preciso refletir um pouco

E ver que o samba está tomando jeito
Só mesmo embriagado ou muito louco

Pra contestar e pra botar defeito
Precisa ser muito sincero e claro

Pra confessar que andei sambando errado
Talvez precise até tomar na cara

Pra ver que o samba está bem melhorado
Tem mais é que ser bem cara de tacho

Não ver a multidão sambar contente
Isso me deixa triste e cabisbaixo

Por isso eu fiz um samba bem pra frente
Dizendo realmente o que é que eu acho

30 Day Song Challenge

day 25 - a song that makes you laugh

 Lily Allen - Smile


When you first left me I was wanting more

 But you were fucking that girl next door, what cha do that for (what cha do that for)

When you first left me I didn’t know what to say

I never been on my own that way, just sat by myself all day

I was so lost back then

But with a little help from my friends

I found a light in the tunnel at the end

Now you’re calling me up on the phone

So you can have a little whine and a moan

At first when I see you cry,

And it’s only because you’re feeling alone

yeah it makes me smile, yeah it makes my smile

At worst I feel bad for a while,

Whenever you see me you say that you want me back

but then I just smile I go ahead and smile

And I tell you it don’t mean jack, no it don’t mean jack

I couldn’t stop laughing, no I just couldn’t help myself

I was so lost back then

See you messed up my mental health I was quite unwell

But with a little help from my friends

I found a light in the tunnel at the end

Now you’re calling me up on the phone

So you can have a little whine and a moan

At first when I see you cry,

And it’s only because you’re feeling alone

yeah it makes me smile, yeah it makes my smile

At worst I feel bad for a while,

but then I just smile I go ahead and smile

lalalalalalalalalalalalalalalala lalala

At first when I see you cry,

yeah it makes me smile, yeah it makes my smile

At worst I feel bad for a while,

but then I just smile I go ahead and smile

lalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalala 

  • 10 Plays
  • Blackbirdfrom “The White Album”by The Beatles

30 Day Song Challenge

 day 24 - a song that you want to play at your funeral

The Beatles - Blackbird


This one was really hard to choose… I even thought of things like The Show Must Go On by Queen or Candle in the Wind by Elton John…


Paul McCartney wrote this about the civil rights struggle for blacks after reading about race riots in the US. He penned it in his kitchen in Scotland not long after Little Rock, when the federal courts forced the racial desegregation of the Arkansas capital’s school system. McCartney told Mojo magazine October 2008: “We were totally immersed in the whole saga which was unfolding. So I got the idea of using a blackbird as a symbol for a black person. It wasn’t necessarily a black ‘bird’, but it works that way, as much as then you called girls ‘birds’; the Everlys had had Bird Dog, so the word ‘bird’ was around. ‘Take these broken wings’ was very much in my mind, but it wasn’t exactly an ornithological ditty; it was purposely symbolic.”
Only 3 things were recorded: Paul’s voice, his acoustic guitar, and a tapping. According to the video The Complete Beatles, the tap was not a foot or metronome - the Master was intentionally scratched. If you listen closely you will notice that is sounds like a scratch on a record. Birds were dubbed in later.
 Blackbird Singing is the title of a book of poems McCartney wrote. (songfacts.com)


Lyrics:

Blackbird singing in the dead of night

Take these broken wings and learn to fly

All your life

You were only waiting for this moment to arise.

Blackbird singing in the dead of night

Take these sunken eyes and learn to see

All your life

You were only waiting for this moment to be free.

Blackbird fly Blackbird fly

Into the light of the dark black night.

Blackbird fly Blackbird fly

Into the light of the dark black night.

Blackbird singing in the dead of night

Take these broken wings and learn to fly

All your life

You were only waiting for this moment to arise

You were only waiting for this moment to arise

You were only waiting for this moment to arise.

30 Day Song Challenge

day 23 - a song that you want to play at your wedding

Ronan Keating - When You Say Nothing At All

30 Day Song Challenge

day 11 - a song from your favorite band 

The Beatles - Helter Skelter

The Beatles Forever! ♥

Paul McCartney wanted to write the “loudest, nastiest, sweatiest rock number we could” after reading a Pete Townshend interview describing a Who track (possibly “I Can See For Miles”) as “The most raucous rock ‘n’ roll, the dirtiest thing they’d ever done.” This was the result. Some historians of popular music now believe that this song was a key influence on the development of heavy metal.

McCartney told Mojo magazine October 2008: “Just reading those lines (of the Townshend interview) fired my imagination. I thought, Right, they’ve done what they think was the loudest and dirtiest; we’ll do what we think. I went into the studio and told the guys, ‘Look, I’ve got this song but Pete said this and I want to do it even dirtier.’ It was a great brief for the engineers, for everyone- just as fuzzy and as dirty and as loud and as filthy as you can get it is where I want to go. I was happy to have Pete’s quote to get me there.”
The first version was a 27 minute jam that was never released. During the July 18, 1968 sessions, The Beatles recorded this version, which was much slower and much more tame than the album version. Another recording from the same day was edited down to 4:37 for The Beatles Anthology, Volume III. For the album version, recorded September 9, 21 takes of approximately 5 minutes each were recorded, and the last one is featured on the official LP.
Ringo played the drums so forcefully that his shout of “I’ve got blisters on my fingers!” accompanies the musical fadeout. Ringo explained what happened in The Miami Herald June 29, 2008: “The track was actually very long, and we were just pounding. It was a jam, really, it turned into that. And at the end, the only way off the kit was, ‘Look, my fingers are bleeding, and I just have to get up.” And I decided to shout it.”
The song is named after a slide at a British amusement park. The first line is a joke about this: “When I get to the bottom I go back to the top of the slide, where I stop and I turn and I go for a ride.” (songfacts.com)

Lyrics:

When I get to the bottom I go back to the top of the slide

Where I stop and I turn and I go for a ride

Till I get to the bottom and I see you again

Yeah yeah yeah hey

Do you, don’t you want me to love you

I’m coming down fast but I’m miles above you

Tell me tell me tell me come on tell me the answer

Well you may be a lover but you ain’t no dancer

Now helter skelter helter skelter

Helter skelter yeah

Ooh!

Will you, won’t you want me to make you

I’m coming down fast but don’t let me break you

Tell me tell me tell me the answer

You may be a lover but you ain’t no dancer

Look out helter skelter helter skelter

Helter skelter ooh

Look out, cos here she comes

When I get to the bottom I go back to the top of the slide

And I stop and I turn and I go for a ride

And I get to the bottom and I see you again

Yeah yeah yeah

Well do you, don’t you want me to make you

I’m coming down fast but don’t let me break you

Tell me tell me tell me the answer

You may be a lover but you ain’t no dancer

Look out helter skelter helter skelter

Helter skelter

Look out helter skelter

She’s coming down fast

Yes she is

Yes she is coming down fast

[My head is spinning, ooh…

Ha ha ha, ha ha ha, alrgiht!

I got blisters on my fingers!]

30 Day Song Challenge

day 05 - a song that reminds you of someone

Kiss Me - Sixpence None The Richer


My mobile ring for my boyfriend… :)


Written by the group’s guitarist Matt Slocum, this dreamy truffle of a Pop song had humble beginnings. Released on their third album, which came out November 22, 1997, it was issued as a single on August 11, 1998.

This being the late ’90s, TV producers were on the lookout for fresh songs to provide dramatic underscore for big scenes, like maybe a pivotal kiss in a popular teen drama. “Kiss Me” got some attention when it was used on the second season of the WB TV show Dawson’s Creek, first on November 11, 1998 and then on another episode that aired April 28, 1999. In between, it was used in the movie She’s All That, which premiered January 29, 1999. With just about every teenage girl in America hearing the song on the TV show, the movie, or the many radio stations that put the song in rotation, it cracked the Top-40 on February 27, 1999 and made it all the way to #2.
Vocalist Leigh Nash recalled to Baeble Music the song’s origins: “It’s pretty crazy,” she said, “Matt wrote that song overseas. At the time he was reading some Dylan Thomas poetry, and I think he just started writing that song, and the words were a little different, the song was a little bit darker, but it was basically the same song, and we performed it the very night he wrote it.” (Songfacts.com)


Lyrics: 

Kiss me out of the bearded barley

Nightly, beside the green, green grass

Swing, swing, swing the spinning step

You wear those shoes and I will wear that dress.

[Chorus:]

Oh, kiss me beneath the milky twilight

Lead me out on the moonlit floor

Lift your open hand

Strike up the band and make the fireflies dance

Silver moon’s sparkling

So kiss me

Kiss me down by the broken tree house

Swing me upon its hanging tire

Bring, bring, bring your flowered hat

We’ll take the trail marked on your father’s map

[Chorus (repeat)]