A few months back we tried to determine—once and for all—what the best rock & roll Christmas song is. Maybe next year…
Now, it’s a new season, a new holiday but…are there any rock & roll Easter songs??? I can’t really think of any. Yes, there are songs from Jesus Christ Superstar. I guess they qualify. And Dylan went Gospel and was Saved (“by the blood of the lamb”), that’s somewhat Easterish, as are many gospel songs.
But where is, say, the “Jingle Bell Rock” of Easter? Or even the “Sock It To Me Santa” of Lent? The “Dreidl Dreidl Dreidl” of Passover? I can’t think of them; can you?
And if not, let’s be creative. Can we call this an Easter song?
(And, if nothing else, this lip-sync’ed video presents the most sedate rock & roll audience ever; they are much more suited to a crucifixion.)
Your turn, be creative, what can we pretend is a rock & roll Easter song?
I definitely think Mott’s song qualifies – and that video, which I haven’t seen in a few years – always strikes me for having the least-engaged audience imaginable. Did those people just get laid off, or something?
Our embarrassing high school roots of Nixon’s Head, The Zone, had a song called “Don’t Get Hung Up on Easter,” which actually made it into early Head sets. It wasn’t about Easter, but for lack of contenders it would have to qualify.
I don’t know what Peter Gabriel is going on about in The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, but lambs and Easter often go together, right? Perhaps that title track qualifies?
Does Patti Smith’s Easter album not have a song called or about Easter? (I don’t own that one).
There is a title song on Patti’s Easter album:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WH8KCo8IG5A
Unfortunately there is no title song on the 13th Floor Elevators’ Easter Everywhere album.
The opening track on The Residents’ Commercial Album is Easter Woman:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gK8IKQqOkug
Easter woman came today,
And took away my wife,
Took her through an open doorway,
To the afterlife.
“Here Comes Peter Cottontail” by Gene Autry.
Here comes Peter Cottontail
Hoppin’ down the bunny trail
Hippity hoppin’, Easter’s on its way
Bringin’ every girl and boy
Baskets full of Easter joy
Things to make your Easter bright and gay
Did Leon Russell get a co-write credit on “Don’t Get Hung Up On Easter”?
Ah, just remembered one: “Easter Eve,” from my favorite Big Dipper album.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXOTObaxotw
As much as I know and dig the song, I never paid much attention to the lyrics.
Oh yeah!
Cool. I can’t believe I’ve never bought that album and I own 3 or 4 others by her. Well, I know why I never bought it: I didn’t want to be accused of having a Broooooce tie-in. Man, I carried around a bag of hangups in my youth!
Unconsciously? Am I missing an unintended ripoff? I grew up listening to his records in my uncle’s bedroom.
On “Mad Dogs & Englishmen” Joe Cocker says “It’s Easter if you’re living by the days” and Leon replies “Don’t get hung up on Easter” .
And I’ve just remembered one as well, “Easter Theatre” by XTC.
And that gives me an excuse to bring this up (which I meant to mention in the Rock Book Capsule Reviews thead)
http://www.amazon.com/Complicated-Game-Inside-Songs-XTC-ebook/dp/B01CPMVZDG/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458094438&sr=1-1&keywords=andy+partridge
Friend of Mr. Mod, Andy Partridge taking a different path to getting money for old product. Maybe all the demos are out at last, so now we get the story behind them.
Of course – from my favorite album by that lot! I’m not sure if I was conscious of having taken that line when I was 18. I still have the original cassette on which I practically whispered my sketch for the song.
I’ll keep pondering this. In the meantime, Mr. Royale suggested that the lyrics, “I am the egg man” may indicate yet another meaning to that Beatles song.
In Black Wings by Tom Waits, he describes a strange person (who may or may not be Jesus or Death) but includes the line “He is not there for he is risen.” There’s also a reference to people denying “ever having met him” like Peter did.
Also, anything by Mitch Easter. (Someone had to say it)
That’s the kind of creativity we’re looking for!
Hey, a real one. Dylan wrote a song called Thief on The Cross, never recorded and only performed live once in 1981.
Quite a good song, too, hard to know why it came and went so quickly.
I would submit Dylan’s “In the Garden” from Saved, one of the only songs from that record that he performed long after the album came out. A strong Holy Week song.
I think we can put Bruce’s “The Rising” on this Easter RTH album.
Left the house this morning
Bells ringing filled the air
I was wearin’ the cross of my calling
On wheels of fire I come rollin’ down here
Come on up for the rising
Come on up, lay your hands in mine
We started with Mott’s Roll Away The Stone and discussed Leon Russell. How about Leon’s Roll Away The Stone:
“Roll away the stone
Don’t leave me here alone
Resurrect me and protect me
Don’t leave me laying here
What will they do in two thousand years?”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XJaDzI_wVg
Same album contained a song called “Prince Of Peace”, more general but not specifically Easter.
“When you’re lost in the rain in Juarez and it’s Easter time too”
One last song…Jefferson Airplane and “Easter?”.