Compiled by Paul VanRaden
Selected ~1992, posted
2024
In the early 1990s, I listed rock and roll songs that fit together and
helped me think more clearly about the topics most important to me. I copied
those songs by topic onto a series of audio cassette tapes, just like a library
placing books on the same topic together on the same shelf, or reports about
science listing past reports on the same topic that gave the authors useful
ideas on how to solve the problems. The internet now lets you hear and see
those songs too, for free, unless you are paying per byte for data. Most songs
below are easy to sing to, and most of the links below are to live concert
videos.
My first two topics were songs on immigration and atheism; those 2 topics had the songs listed in separate reports that I wrote in
the 1990s, posted online in 2003, and since 2024 the song videos are also now
linked. The other topics below are songs about education, being on the stage, mixing races, avoiding too much wealth, feeling sad, and staying sane, plus a few special songs that are one of a kind. After hearing
those songs on the radio for 40 years and singing along with the cassettes
every few months for 30 years, the words below are stored deeply within my
brain. They help me stay on topic. Thank you to the writers and singers whose
words and music inspired me for many years.
The following educational songs
question if you should always do as you’re told or if
you should think for yourself.
|
____ |
Song / Group _____ Year ___ Key Words from the Song
____________ |
|
|
1 |
Teach me how to be
sensible, logical, responsible, |
|
|
|
Supertramp 1979 |
acceptable, respectable, presentable, a vegetable. |
|
2 |
Go to school, don’t forget your books, learn the |
|
|
|
Supertramp
1980 |
golden rule. Don’t criticize, they’re old and wise. |
|
3 |
My name’s the Teacher and I have a lesson: |
|
|
|
Jethro Tull 1970 |
No sense in sitting there hating everyone |
|
4 |
Young teacher, the
subject of schoolgirl fantasies |
|
|
|
The Police 1980 |
Sometimes its
not so easy to be the teacher’s pet |
|
5 |
I have only come here seeking knowledge, |
|
|
|
The Police 1983 |
things they would not teach me of
in college |
|
6 |
There’s a revolution, hand me down
the solution |
|
|
|
The Who 1973 |
It’s a relay, pass it on, pass it on. |
|
7 |
I don’t claim to be an A student,
but I’m trying to be. |
|
|
|
Garfunkel 1978 |
Maybe by being an A student I’d win
your love for me |
|
8 |
You can’t know the fears your elders grew by. |
|
|
|
Crosby, Stills,
Nash 1970 |
Teach your children well… and know they love you |
|
9 |
We don’t need no education or thoughts
control, |
|
|
|
Pink Floyd 1979 |
No dark sarcasm… Teacher, leave them kids alone. |
___________________________________________
The next songs compare the costs and benefits
of performing on stage. For many years my favorite song was Juke Box Hero, which
implies letting people hear a song by pushing a button instead of going to a
concert. But I also liked it because the 6 strings on that one guitar that blew
me away were tuned with ratios of 1:2:4:8:16:32 which inspired me to derive new
music theory. The internet now lets you hear and see the singers
and their concerts, a big improvement over the juke box.
|
____ |
Song / Group _____ Year ___ Key Words from the Song
_____________ |
|
|
1 |
There I am, up on the
stage. Here I go, playing the |
|
|
|
Bob Seger 1973 |
star again. Every ounce of energy you try to give away. |
|
2 |
The only time that seems too short is the time that we |
|
|
|
Jackson Browne
1977 |
get to play. People stay just a little bit longer. |
|
3 |
It’s me they’ve been coming to see to forget about life |
|
|
|
Billy Joel 1973 |
for a while. Sing us the song, you’re the piano man. |
|
4 |
They say I won’t last
too long on Broadway, but I can |
|
|
|
George Benson
1976 |
play this guitar & won’t quit ‘til I’m a star on
Broadway. |
|
5 |
All the world’s indeed a stage & we are merely
players, |
|
|
|
Rush 1981 |
I can’t pretend a stranger is a long-awaited friend. |
|
6 |
[At] Woodstock we were half a
million strong, |
|
|
|
Crosby, Stills, Nash 1971 |
Everywhere was a song and a celebration. |
|
7 |
He couldn’t get a ticket,
it was a sold out show. Gotta |
|
|
|
Foreigner 1981 |
keep on rockin,
can’t stop, gotta make it to the top. |
|
8 |
It’s tough to handle this fortune and fame: |
|
|
|
Joe Walsh 1978 |
Everybody’s so different, I haven’t changed. |
|
9 |
You’re up there under the spotlight, your silver |
|
|
|
Heart 1977 |
trumpet shines. With all you’ve got you must be high. |
_____________________________________________
My research for 40 years was about pure breeding and crossbreeding of
cattle. The next songs are about similar issues for humans but are much more
about feelings than about science or genetics.
|
____ |
Song / Group _____ Year ___ Key Words from the Song
__________ |
|
|
1 |
Is it cold in your little corner of the globe? |
|
|
|
Elton John 1985 |
You will never know
anything about my home. |
|
2 |
I’m a mess without my
little China girl. You |
|
|
|
David Bowie 1983 |
shouldn’t mess with me,
I’ll ruin everything. |
|
3 |
My woman from Tokyo, she
makes me see. |
|
|
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Deep Purple
1973 |
She’s so good to me.
She’s a whole new tradition. |
|
4 |
I had a brother at Khe Sahn. He had a woman he loved |
|
|
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Bruce Springsteen 1984 |
in Saigon. I got a
picture of him in her arms, now. |
|
5 |
Brown sugar, how come
you taste so good? |
|
|
|
The Rolling Stones
1971 |
Just like a young girl
should. |
|
6 |
She was black as the night. Louie was whiter than |
|
|
|
The Stories 1973 |
white. Danger, danger.
Louie fell in love overnight. |
|
7 |
Half-breed, she’s no good they warn. |
|
|
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Cher 1973 |
Both sides were against me since
the day I was born. |
|
8 |
Gather your things
together, and bring your wedding |
|
|
|
The Hollies 1972 |
feather. We’ll steal
away forever, Indian girl. |
_____________________________________________
These
songs are about being a good person instead of seeking a fancy life.
|
____ |
Song / Group _____ Year ___ Key Words from the Song
__________ |
|
|
1 |
To win you, I’ll suffer anything
and be glad. |
|
|
|
The Who
1971 |
I call that a bargain,
the best I ever had. |
|
2 |
Balance the cost of the
soul you lost with the dreams |
|
|
|
Dan Fogelberg 1978 |
you lightly
sold. Are you under the power of gold? |
|
3 |
It seems such a waste of
time. Is that all you get for |
|
|
|
Billy Joel 1977 |
your money? If that’s movin up, then I’m movin out. |
|
4 |
Don’t you know it’s wrong to take what is given you? |
|
|
|
Hall and Oates 1977 |
It’s so easy to hurt
others when you can’t feel pain. |
|
5 |
A good man pays his debts, but you ain’t
paid yours |
|
|
|
Heart 1980 |
yet. Come on, even it up. |
|
6 |
I’m in the high-fidelity first-class
traveling section. |
|
|
|
Pink Floyd 1972 |
Money, so they say, is the root of all evil today. |
|
7 |
Give me a job, give me security,
make me respectable. |
|
|
|
STYX 1978 |
I’ll take those long nights, I’ll be a blue collar
man. |
___________________________________________________
The
topic of sanity was constantly on my mind. My maternal grandmother and my aunt
spent most of their lives in mental hospitals and my younger brother Dave took his own life while hospitalized. I was in hospitals
for mania a few times, but rock and roll songs kept me sane most of the time. James Taylor wrote a
nice song after coming home from hospitals in Stockbridge and Boston. Pink
Floyd’s song from the album A Momentary Lapse of Reason reminded me of
seeing “circling skies” after converting from believing in a finite world to an
infinite universe and from Christianity to Atheism. I may have been switching
my internal navigation from polar coordinates to Cartesian coordinates to more
simply describe how the earth spins and orbits the sun instead of the universe
spinning around a stationary earth. The group Heart asked what you
should do when everybody is insane. The answer is to act normal, be patient,
and hope most people come to their senses eventually.
|
____ |
Song / Group _____ Year ___ Key Words from the Song
_________ |
|
|
1 |
Don’t arrange to have me sent to no asylum. |
|
|
|
Supertramp 1974 |
I’m just as sane as
anyone. |
|
2 |
God stole the handle and the train won’t stop going, |
|
|
|
Jethro Tull 1971 |
no it couldn’t slow down, no way to slow down. |
|
3 |
What you
gonna do when everybody’s insane? |
|
|
|
Heart 1977 |
So afraid of wondering,
so afraid of you. |
|
4 |
Can’t keep my eyes from the circling skies. |
|
|
|
Pink Floyd 1987 |
Tongue tied, twisted,
just an earthbound misfit, I. |
|
5 |
There’s no explaining
what your imagination can |
|
|
|
Fleetwood Mac
1973 |
make you see and feel.
You’ve got me hypnotized. |
|
6 |
With 10 miles behind me and 10,000 more to go. Let me |
|
|
|
James Taylor
1970 |
go down in my dreams, and rockabye sweet baby James. |
_______________________________________________
These next songs can help you feel sad and get it over with. The first 5 are about relationships that did
not end well. The next 2 are about having dreams that seem to go nowhere. The
last song is one that I was ashamed that I liked. It tells about people left
behind in little towns that seem stuck in a rut. I did not know how to help
those left behind in my little town because I wanted to help many other people
that were left much further behind in little countries. In 2024, American
citizens on farms and in nearly all little towns proved how much they hate
others by voting for leaders who spewed hatred. The last line of Simon and
Garfunkel’s song was not true when written in 1975 and is still not true, but
the little towns across America have lost their way. Most people in rural
America have become cult-like followers of an evil person. That makes me very
sad. I hope soon all Americans will stop hating the other humans on this
planet.
|
____ |
Song / Group _____ Year ___ Key Words from the Song
________ |
|
|
1 |
Now my broken heart
cries for you each night. It’s |
|
|
|
Ronnie Milsap 1977 |
almost like a song, but it’s much too sad to write. |
|
2 |
… Rain keeps on falling, I keep on calling her name. |
|
|
|
Ronnie Milsap
1981 |
I’ll keep on searching, can’t go
on hurting this way. |
|
3 |
Gonna buy a ticket as far as I can, ain’t
never coming |
|
|
|
Marshall Tucker Band
1973 |
back. Can’t you see what that woman’s doing to me. |
|
4 |
You never know til it all falls down, somebody
loves |
|
|
|
James Taylor
1981 |
you. Used to be your town, used to be my town too. |
|
5 |
I don’t need peace and harmony, but we both want |
|
|
|
Kenny Rogers 1981 |
it. We don’t need each other
baby, or do we? |
|
6 |
When he shouts, nobody listens,
where he leads, |
|
|
|
Phil Collins 1981 |
no one will go. He’s
waiting for something to show. |
|
7 |
No one knows what it’s like, to be
hated… to be the |
|
|
|
The Who 1971 |
bad man, to be the sad man, behind
blue eyes. |
|
8 |
It’s just imagination we lack.
Everything’s the same, |
|
|
|
Simon and Garfunkel 1975 |
nothin but the dead and dying
back in my little town |
____________________________________________
The first song below is the only one I know about genetics
and animal breeding, my research field. The second song is about having a sense
of purpose. The third song is about keeping life simple. The fourth song is
about telling the truth. The fifth reminds me of life before the constant
stream of lies and hate now spewed by a cult leader.
|
____ |
Song / Group _____ Year ___ Key Words from the Song
_________ |
|
|
1 |
It’s breeding and it’s
training and it’s something |
|
|
|
Dan Fogelberg 1982 |
unknown that drives you and carries you
home. |
|
I held firm to what I felt was right. I was strong as I |
||
|
|
Bob Seger 1986 |
could be, nothing ever
got to me. Like a rock. |
|
3 |
Take your time, don’t live too fast. Be a simple kind of
man, |
|
|
|
Lynyrd Skynyrd
1973 |
Be something you love and understand. |
|
4 |
If you look for truthfulness you might as well be blind |
|
|
|
Billy Joel 1978 |
Honesty is such a lonely word, is hardly ever heard. |
|
5 |
Memories of the smiles
we gave to one another. |
|
|
|
Barbara Streisand
1973 |
It’s the laughter we will remember of the way we were. |
______________________________________________
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