Top Romantic Songs for Valentine’s Day

By Jack Stephen

I was asked to join in the musical circle jerk on this blog. I have to say I was flattered, but somewhat wary—I mean it is a circle jerk after all. However, Null and I have talked about the scene in the movie Repo Man where the Circle Jerks performed as a lounge act, so I guess ya’ll are on the level. Here you go fuckers. For Valentine’s Day, my top romantic tracks are:

1. “Sleep Late My Lady Friend” by Harry Nilsson. 

This one was pretty much a no brainer. Harry Nilsson brings an impassioned soulful vibe to this track. Working with the great producer Rick Jarrard, on the album Pandemonium Shadow Show, Nilsson was really able to find some structure and settle into his personal style, performing in a zone known as mind blowing. I don’t know how many times I’ve played this song for my wife, but each time it seems like we always look at each other and sing the line: “We did the town, we tore it upside down.” If there’s a song that solidifies the statement made by both John Lennon and Paul McCartney in the famous press interview of 1968, “we’re listening to Harry Nilsson,” this song is it.  

2. “Nothing Even Matters” by Lauryn Hill. 

When Lauryn Hill arrived on the scene, so to speak, people were just gushing over the Fugees and the “Killing Me Softly” cover. It ended up being a huge hit. While I was happy to hear the song back in the mix, I would say overall it was rather “meh.” A couple of years later, Hill came out with the great The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, which is just a fantastic album. Interestingly, “Nothing Even Matters” was a duet with D’Angelo, who began his ride with a cover of the Smoky Robinson track “Crusin.’” I really love their back and forth on this song; the “snapping” adds texture with a subtle Hammond B-3 organ holding everything together. And those lyrics, how “nothing even matters,” with a myriad of examples, and finally “nothing but you” is just beautiful. 

3. “Little Harbor” by Jamie Saft. 

A vignette: I look out a window from a cabana on a hill. There’s a light rain falling. My wife naps lightly under some mosquito netting. We just made love. The air is steamy. I smell the ocean. A macaw cries in the distance. I see a little harbor, a small fishing boat pulls in. I wonder what I did to deserve this lovely moment. The sun peeks behind the clouds. I stare out the window. (Note: this song is on the Loneliness Road album featuring Iggy Pop on vocals on another track or two.)

4. “Foolish Heart” by Steve Perry. 

Steve Perry’s vocal mastery is really exemplified in this song. The songs he wrote/performed with Journey, while great, I thought were always were a little watered down by Neil Schon’s swollen ego. Regardless, Journey had some fantastic tracks. “Foolish Heart” feels like a personal song for Perry, somewhat of a departure from Journey’s big album rock songs. While I could not be more over “Don’t Stop Believin’” (thanks Sopranos, season finale), “Foolish Heart” always feels fresh. The lyrics also really spoke to me. I always felt like I had a bit of a foolish heart, and maybe we all do at times. (I was going to place Ambrosia’s “The Biggest Part of Me” in the number four spot, which is a song Perry covered.)

5. “Sweetness” by Yes. 

While typically thought of as the Prog rock masters, Yes is one of those bands that always seems to be operating in their own category. The layers, the harmonizing, the structure—the real question is: What the fuck are they doing anyway? The song “Leave It” is a great example. What does it matter? They’re a great band with some awesome songs, which includes “Heart of the Sunrise,” “Yours Is No Disgrace,” and “Owner of a Lonely Heart.” “Sweetness” is one of those romantic songs I appreciate because it is so smart lyrically. Jon Anderson sings about all these things his partner does for him; little things he sees as so important in his life. This leads to the revelation in the song’s climax “and you’re here.” Wow, what an awesome thing to realize. To my wonderful wife—thanks for being here, love you.

As the Circle Jerk’s say, “we do whatever we can, you gotta duck when the shit hits the fan.”   Happy Valentin’s Day everyone. 

Oxbow, Love’s Holiday (2023)

 

By Jack Rafferty

Oxbow has spent nearly the last four decades being one of the most important and vital forces in experimental music. They are perpetually changing, yet always maintaining a core sound and sense of danger, vulnerability, violence, and love. After 2017’s fantastic Thin Black Duke, I was curious to see what Oxbow would do next. It’s kind of hard to review Oxbow, because there really is nothing out there like them. They have such a unique sound, attitude, and atmosphere, blending jazz, blues, punk, avant-garde, noise, soul, R&B, rock, and so much more. 

Love’s Holiday definitely seems to have a noticeably less sharp edge to it, containing more contemplative, sad melodies and darker introspection. I loved seeing Lingua Ignota featured on the track, “Lovely Murk.” I thought it fit really well. It made me wish an entire collaboration album was made surrounding this, as I think the dynamics really make sense. 

“1000 hours” and “All Gone” both contain some of my favorite vocal moments on the album, with Eugene really delving into tragedy and immense vulnerability. He takes a much more restrained approach on this album, but it is still able to achieve an intense emotional impact. 

This certainly isn’t what I was expecting, but I’m glad that Oxbow continue to change and evolve their sound based on where they are at in their lives. It is music that feels very lived, and for that reason, genuine and intimate. 

Kassi Valazza, Knows Nothing (2023)

 

By Jack Rafferty

Ever since I first heard “Johnny Dear” on Western AF, I was entranced by Kassi Valazza. I loved Kassi’s debut album, and I was curious where she and her band would take their sound from there. Starting from track one of Knows Nothing, I knew I was in for some amazing lyrics:

In the still, I often wonder about your brеathin’

I rise and fall to its rhythm late at night

Clay canyons turn to plaster in my grievin’

And our ceiling overtakes the sky.

In addition to the lyrics, I also notice that there has been a sense of settling into a more comfortable space in terms of sound and identity. There are many great things to be said about the debut record, but I do think it can be a bit sporadic at times in regard to what they want to be going forward. It seems, with Knows Nothing, that they have taken steps in the direction they have chosen, and the project feels more cohesive as a result. There is also a more honed, mature feeling to the songwriting, which is not to say that it didn’t have that before, merely that a greater sense of it is achieved here. 

However, while I do really like a lot of the writing showcased on this album, I do think certain levels of obscurity and abstractness has unfortunately been maintained here, which is a tendency I didn’t love on their debut. I think Kassi’s writing is strongest when it is clear, grounded, and intimate, with lyrics such as,

Morning hasn’t broken since I told you

I could use some time to make it right

Now you’re just a whisper, just a notion

Just a story I can read at night

The clouds move slower than they ever seemed to

Still, they find a way to pass me by.

Thankfully, I do think that this is mostly the case this time around, and there has been a demonstrable sense of progression here. Overall, Kassi has come more into her own style here, and this album has many wonderful moments. 

Tianna Esperanza, Terror (2023)

 

By Jack Rafferty

“Terror knows me by name.” 

This record came completely out of left field for me. I’d never heard of Tianna, and merely found this record by browsing through year-end lists. Even then, it only appeared one time. I’m so glad something about it intrigued me, because from the first moments of the album, I was entranced by it. Especially the lyrics. From the opening lines, sung in a deceivingly dulcet tone, I knew I was in for something special:

Sometimes when I’m walking and a man looks at me

I think of all the ways I could make him bleed

I would dig my key into his eye

I’d crack his teeth, liver and spleen.

The fact that Tianna is only twenty-three writing such visceral and deeply mature lines is a testament to the incredible creative mind behind this music. This album is uncompromisingly dark, unabashedly crude, wild, and chameleon. Tianna also is not afraid to be direct regarding political lyrics. A great example is from “Lewis,” about the civil rights activist and Harlem bookstore owner Lewis H. Michaux:

When the white man landed here he brought two weapons

One was the Bible and the other was the gun

If he didn’t humble you with the Bible,

He crumbled you with the gun.

And they’re still praising the Lord,

And passing ammunition all over the world.

Each song is vastly different, carrying its own complex, unique identity, and there is not a bad song on this album. The sheer diversity of soundscapes and songwriting spanning multiple genres is purely baffling. Also, her grandmother is Palmolive from The Slits and The Raincoats, so there is clearly a lineage of radical, innovative songwriters from whom she has learned. Nothing has recently captivated me like this album, not in this way. Go listen to this right fucking now. 

Ryuichi Sakamoto, 12 (2023)

By Jack Rafferty

Ryuichi Sakamoto’s final album is 12. He tragically lost his long battle with cancer in 2023. Sakamoto is the first Japanese composer to win an Academy Award for his score of The Last Emperor. His career is diverse and spans multitudes. He was an activist in many spheres, participating in the Japanese University Protests at the end of the 1960s, environmentalism, and much more. He was on the cutting edge of many genres, including neoclassical, electronic, electro-funk, and techno, just to name a few. 

This record, 12, very much feels like a meditation. Sakamoto is navigating the ethereal and dense thoughtspace of one’s own mortality. The album itself seems a practice in a sonic version of Jisei, death poetry reflecting upon life. It is precisely that, reflective, not sentimental or cloying. Sakamoto’s soft yet labored breaths are persistent throughout the recordings, and they seem as though they were a part of the composition, a constant reminder to the listener. The profoundness of each moment of this album is hard to grasp. The music that Sakamoto composed throughout his life is what he, in his own words, wished it to be, “meaningful work.” The last fading moments linger only briefly, the sound of chimes in wind. 

Akikaze ya         Autumn wind

hyorohyoro yama no the mountain’s shadow

kagebōshi.         quivering.

—Kobayashi Issa

Kara Jackson, Why Does the Earth Give Us People to Love? (2023)

 

By Jack Rafferty

There’s certain albums that just fuckin’ flatten you the first time you listen to them. Former National Youth Poet Laureate, Kara Jackson, is an absolutely phenomenal songwriter. Her lyrics are one of a kind. Perhaps that would go without saying given her acclaim in poetry already, but I think it is important to distinguish the mediums to a degree, and give Kara credit where credit is due, as extreme talent in one does not always translate to the other. 

Themes of the difficulties of love, not just for others, but for oneself, and how the process of allowing yourself to feel worthy of love is a difficult and nonlinear one. Sometimes it comes at the expense of not trying to please others in cycles of harm or dependence, or rejecting patriarchal standards of how her identity as feminine is defined.

I’m not a liquidated asset

I’m a sharper than a jewel

What kind of miner does that make you?

When I’m the gold and you’re just a fool.

The melodies and cadence she elects to use bring so much character to every line of every song. There is so much subtle detail in every moment to try to absorb, and it all comes together beautifully, with no single element ever attempting to draw too much attention to itself over Kara’s incredible voice and words. The music creates soundscapes that are simultaneously subdued and lush and everlastingly gorgeous. A vocal melody that I especially loved is on the track “brain,” which really highlights Kara’s range and the richness of her voice. In it she sings

Sleep isn’t cheap

And your love is no currency…

If your fear is what comes first

You’ll run from love you deserve

I’ve got so much fear inside

You’ll give me yours

And I’ll give you mine.

I love the ways in which Kara bluntly addresses the weaknesses of men in patriarchal society. Highlighting their emotional detachment, and how that cultivates in them a sense of insecurity, of a lack of empathy, of an inability to reckon with the consequences of their actions. This is highlighted well in many tracks, but I love these lines from “rat,”

California calls him by his collar

His waves were ill-behaved, so now hе doesn’t bother

Shook the country from him likе a cub clawing its father

Couldn’t buy compassion ‘cause it’d cost him 40 dollars…

What he wouldn’t give to have some grits to start his morning

Fascinated by the face of the woman who warms them

Rat has made his bath and this is one he’ll surely drown in

Imitating tales of cowboy trails and traveling men

Hasn’t satisfied a single one of his new women

The one he left alone is in their home and busy hexing…

His brain hallucinating, his ego in his chest

His friends, they never told him it’d cost him close to death

At home, his woman carves another kind of casket

The kind he gladly climbs and closes himself in.

One of the more powerful moments on the album is the title track, which finds Kara reflecting on mortality, lamenting the powerlessness we feel in the ungraspable presence and indifference of death, 

I’ve buried old and young

I’ve watched them lower a saint

We’re only waiting our turn

Call that living?

Frankly, I wish I could include every line of the album here, as each is deserving of it. I could go on and on but at a certain point my words become redundant and don’t do the album justice anyways. Kara Jackson is truly, truly something special. This album is masterful, and I eagerly await what she decides to do next.