No question about it; Randy Newman is the greatest satirist rock has ever produced. He has the uncanny knack of writing songs that double back on themselves—while you’re laughing at the song’s narrator, he’s preparing to turn the joke around on you. Take “Redneck” from 1974’s Good Old Boys; the narrator happily concedes every stereotype about his bigoted ilk (“We talk real funny down here”) before turning things on their head by pointing out that all the Northerners laughing at him have “set the niggers free” by putting them in cages, known as ghettos, in every city on the northern and “enlightened” side of the Mason-Dixon Line.
Newman’s satire is deadly serious, except when it isn’t, and I’m hard pressed to think of a songwriter who can write a tune that can so effortlessly break your heart. Has there ever been a sadder song than “Baltimore”? Or “Guilty”? Or even “A Wedding in Cherokee County,” in which the impotent bridegroom calls out, “Why must everybody laugh at my mighty sword? Lord, help me if you will.”
For Newman, Bad Love spelled a return to songwriting after a decade spent composing motion picture scores, and it demonstrates that he hasn’t lost his edge. No, it’s not his best album, but it will make you laugh and make you think and even make you sad, because Newman always covers all the bases. Take the ambiguous “My Country,” a full-blown anthem written from the point of view of a man whose pride of nation—now lost—consisted solely of a clichéd memory of Mom and Pop and Sally and Donald watching television at night. The swelling crescendos will move you, despite their ridiculousness, and there’s something oddly poignant in this hollow man’s idea of a lost Golden Age.
As for “Every Time It Rains,” it’s a deceptively simple heartbreaker; Newman’s piano is as plaintive as his lament, which is that of a lonely man who can’t hear or see the rain without missing a former lover. It’s a beautiful tune, and when Newman sings, “Every time it rains/Every time I hear the raindrops fallin’/I may say I don’t mind it at all/But I do” I hurt right down to my toes, because I’ve been there and it hurts like death, or like Vietnam.
“The Great Nations of Europe” is a hilarious lark about the destructive colonization of America by sundry European nations. “Hide your wives and daughters/Hide the groceries too/The great nations of Europe coming through” sings Newman, who addresses the “discovery” of the Canary Islands by singing, “There were natives there called Guanches/Guanches by the score/Bullets, disease, the Portuguese/And they weren’t there anymore/Now they’re gone, they’re gone, they’re really gone/You’ve never seen anyone so gone.” And so it goes, atrocity piled atop atrocity, a horrifying history lesson that only Newman could make you laugh about. “The World Isn’t Fair” is about Karl Marx, who achieved absolutely nothing, and in the song Newman tells Karl about the rich and beautiful women at a school orientation before pointing out that he’s glad to be “Living in the land of the Free/Where the rich just get richer/And the poor you don’t ever have to see/It would depress us Karl/Because we care/That the world still isn’t…/Fair.” Those words—“it would depress us”—speak volumes, chiefly because it’s hard to know whether Newman is speaking a simple truth or simply disguising his callous contentment with the unfair state of things.
“Better Off Dead” is a song about falling in love with someone who doesn’t love you, and how you’d be better off dead. To the ironic counterpoint of a forties soundtrack complete with female backup vocalists he sings, “Better off dead/Than living with someone whose every word is like a knife that cuts through you/Better off dead/Than living with someone who doesn’t give a shit what happens to you/And it goes on and on and on.” “Going Home” is beautiful little nonentity; Newman’s piano playing is lovely, and his voice sounds like it’s coming from a 78 rpm record, but the lyrics are as stripped down as they come, and evoke neither laughter nor tears. I’m even more unenthused about “I Want Everyone to Like Me,” which moves to a syncopated Dixieland beat but isn’t particularly funny. The same goes for “The One You Love,” which features some very Steely Dan-like backing vocalists, lots of horns, and generally holds that if you want to keep your lover, you’d better be able to read her mind.
The very funny “I’m Dead (But I Don’t Know It)” is a rare rocker, in which Randy finds himself and his career, well, deceased. It opens with the great lines, “I have nothing left to say/But I’m going to say it anyway/Thirty years upon a stage/And now I hear the people say/Why won’t he go away?” And the lyrics just get better and better, while a chorus calls out, “He’s dead!/He’s dead!” I’m particularly enamored of the lines, “Everything I write all sounds the same/Each record that I’m making/Sounds like a record that I made/Just not as good!” “I Miss You” is a classic Newman tearjerker, only not quite as good as his best. The melody is lovely, but the song lacks the telling detail or two of his best songs—those little particulars that turn a standard heartbreaker into a work of sublimity.
“Big Hat, No Cattle” is a chortle-worthy C&W pastiche, with Newman conceding he’s spent his entire life lying about who he truly is, and comes complete with a chorus worth repeating: “Big hat, no cattle/Big head, no brain/Big snake, no rattle/I forever remain/Big hat, no cattle.” He wonders what he might have become had he become had he “buckled down and really tried,” but in the meantime he calls his family to his side and lies, lies, lies. Some country artist (Kinky Friedman?) ought to pick up on this one, because it’s hilarious. As for “Shame,” it boasts Dixieland horns and a lazy shuffle of cymbals and is Newman, who is playing an aging and unhappy sugardaddy, at his best. Its best feature is the female singers who go, “Shame shame shame shame shame,” to which Newman replies variously, “I ain’t ashamed of nothin’” to “You might be right this time” to “Shut up!/Forgive me” to “Will you stop that please I’m trying to talk to someone.” And it also boasts the immortal words, “A man of my experience of life/Don’t expect a beautiful woman like yourself/To come on over here every day/And have some old dude banging on her like a gypsy on a tambourine.”
So this isn’t Newman’s best LP: duly noted. My personal vote goes to 1974’s Good Old Boys, hands down. But Bad Love has some great songs on it, and it’s always a pleasure to hear Newman’s French Quarter by way of LA slur. His is the voice of an Everyman who doesn’t know the meaning of a happy ending, and he sounds perpetually lazy, like the guy in “Naked Man,” who finds himself sans clothing on a freezing Chicago night and explains his situation by stating, “They found out about my sister and kicked me out of the Navy/They would have strung me up if they could/I tried to explain that we were both of us lazy/And were doing the best we could.” After that, what can you say? Except long live Randy Newman, and beware of the naked man?
GRADED ON A CURVE:
B
