YOU ARE HERE: zharth.net / Zharth's Music Log / Week 70 (The American Dream)
(Originally finalized on April 12, 2024)
Preface: I was looking into songs about money for a potential theme, and a narrative started to form in my head. So this week (squeezing in just before the tax deadline), we'll take a journey from rags to riches - and isn't that just the American dream?
Monday: Styx - Blue Collar Man (Long Nights) [Pieces of Eight, 1978]
Comments: From Styx's followup album to The Grand Illusion, which included the smash hit Come Sail Away, and from the album that also featured another perennial radio hit - Renegade - comes this song about a blue collar man who's willing to work long nights in hopes of climbing the corporate ladder. Part of the fantasy of the American Dream is that anyone can make it to the top - if they just work hard enough. "I've got the power, and I've got the will. I'm not a charity case."
Tuesday: ZZ Top - Just Got Paid [Rio Grande Mud, 1972]
Comments: The funkiest blues rock band from Texas lays down a stone cold groove and sings about making an honest living in this song from early in their career (a year before La Grange hit the airwaves). Pay day's what it's all about, isn't it? The confidence and security that comes from that wad of cash in your back pocket. If you've never heard it, Joe Bonamassa does an epic cover of this song, mashed up with the instrumental section from Led Zeppelin's Dazed and Confused. "If you believe like workin' hard all day, just step in my shoes and take my pay."
Wednesday: Foghat - Easy Money [Stone Blue, 1978]
Comments: Featured on their blues-focused album from 1978, Stone Blue, Foghat sings about that elusive treasure we all dream about at some point in our lives - Easy Money. Though it seems to me that sometimes the hardest workers slave for a meager wage, while the high-rollers are bringing in boatloads of cash with relatively little effort, be it through scam and deceit, criminal enterprise, inherited fortune, or exploitation of labor. "Easy money - ain't it hard to find?"
Thursday: AC/DC - Moneytalks [The Razors Edge, 1990]
Comments: A later period hit for AC/DC, from the 1990 album that also featured Thunderstruck, this is a song that celebrates all those fine things that money can bring into your life, from luxury to influence, goods and girls. But underneath it all is a hint of cynicism, about the things people will do to get that money. Because at the end of the day, money talks. "Tailored suits, chauffeured cars. Fine hotels, and big cigars."
Friday: Pink Floyd - Money [Dark Side of the Moon, 1973]
Comments: A song that needs no introduction, from an album that needs no introduction, by a band that needs no introduction. And among the greatest in all three categories. Reading like a laundry list of affluent self-indulgence, written by biting cynicist Roger Waters, for the album that would make the band into living legends. From the offbeat time signature to the driving bass riff, alternating saxophone and guitar solos, and cash register sound effects, this song is as cool as the VIP lounge you can imagine it being sung from. "I'm alright, Jack. Keep your hands off of my stack."
Saturday: Cheap Trick - Taxman, Mr. Thief [Cheap Trick, 1977]
Comments: Feel free to sub in The Beatles' Taxman if you prefer. I thought this would be a good opportunity to showcase Cheap Trick instead. I don't feel that their hard rockin' energy is adequately represented by their radio hits, especially the biggest one - I Want You To Want Me (which sounds like it could be from the Beatles' boy band days itself). Anyway, once you've hit it big, you can bet the taxman's gonna be pinning a target on your back. "You work hard. You went hungry. Now the taxman is out to get you."
Sunday: Robin Trower - It's Only Money [For Earth Below, 1975]
Comments: An underrated song from an overlooked artist - and one of my favorites (on both counts). You can't go wrong with any of the Robin Trower band's first three studio albums, or their first live album from 1976. Like Ten Years After, it's some of the best guitar-driven rock from the '70s, yet the radio just ignores it. Ending our journey, this song reflects what every wise man already knows, and every rich man eventually comes to realize: that money can't buy you happiness. "It's only money, and money don't satisfy."
Honorable Mention: Creedence Clearwater Revival - Fortunate Son [Willy and the Poor Boys, 1969]
Comments: I really think this is a fantastic song, even in spite of how overplayed it is. I'm leaving it as an honorable mention, because I couldn't really fit it into the narrative, but I think it's a great song to end on, as it reveals the American Dream for the delusion it is. Some people are lucky enough to be born into wealth and influence. Others will never get to have it, no matter how hard they might try. And that's a good segue into our next theme... "It ain't me, it ain't me. I ain't no millionaire's son."