Song Lyric Sunday:What’s in Traffic?

Sunday is upon us again and it time Jim Adams to host Song Lyric Sunday. Today July 25 the prompt is – Automobile, Car, Jalopy, Vehicle suggested by Melanie B Cee of sparksfromacombustiblemind.

So I thought what shall I choose there are so many great tunes out there. I was taken back to 1979. We had escaped from Exmouth in Devon, we had not quite made it back home to London but we were back in the hub. Life with two out of what would end up as three boys was not so hard. I always had my music. Gary Newman , part of the new wave was right up my street. I didn’t drive in those days, I had to walk everywhere! This song was actually released on our eighth wedding anniversary!

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“Cars” is the debut solo single by English musician Gary Numan. It was released on 21 August 1979 and is from his debut studio album, The Pleasure Principle. The song reached the top of the charts in several countries, and today is considered a new wave staple.

The song was the first release credited solely to Gary Numan after he dropped the band name Tubeway Army, under which name he had released four singles and two LPs, including the number one UK hit “Are ‘Friends’ Electric?“, and its parent album, Replicas. Musically, the new song was somewhat lighter and more pop-oriented than its predecessors, Numan later conceding that he had chart success in mind: “This was the first time I had written a song with the intention of ‘maybe it could be a hit single’; I was writing this before ‘Are “Friends” Electric?’ happened.” He has since described “Cars” as “a pretty average song”.

In the UK charts, it reached number 1 in 1979, and in 1980 hit number 1 in Canada two weeks running on the RPM national singles chart  ^{(29 weeks in the top 100). It was his only single to}chart there. It rose to #4 on the US Cash Box Top 100 and #9 on the US Billboard Hot 100. Though Numan had a string of hits in the UK, “Cars” was his only song in the American Pop charts.

information from Wiki.

Here in my car
I feel safest of all
I can lock all my doors
It’s the only way to live in carsHere in my car
I can only receive
I can listen to you
It keeps me stable for days in carsHere in my car
Where the image breaks down
Will you visit me please
If I open my door in carsHere in my car
I know I’ve started to think
About leaving tonight
Although nothing seems right in carsSource: Musixmatch.

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Jalopy was a harder until in the back of my mind I remembered this Connie Frances song Hollywood. I was very young but I had older brothers and sisters and music was always playing in our house.

Concetta Rosa Maria Franconero (born December 12, 1937), known professionally as Connie Francis, is an American pop singer, former actress, and top-charting female vocalist of the late 1950s and early 1960s. Although her chart success waned in the second half of the 1960s, Francis remained a top concert draw. Information from Wikipedia

Whose jalopy is covered with junk
But don’t have any money for lunch?
It’s Hollywood, it’s HollywoodWho’s the local star
With the big, fine car?
It’s HollywoodWho wears the shady glasses after dark?
Who tries to talk the little girlie’s into parking?
It’s Hollywood, HollywoodWho’s the local yokel with
The horn rimmed bifocals?
It’s Hollywood
Go, go, goWho else would hold a cigarette like that?
Who else would wear a little Frenchy’s hat?
No one but Hollywood, HollywoodWho thinks he’s been around
But ain’t never been out of town?
It’s HollywoodI’ll give you just one little guess
At who old Hollywood’s trying to impress
You’re right, it’s Hollywood, HollywoodWho’s that farmer
Who think he’s a charmer?
It’s HollywoodYeah, it’s Hollywood all right
Here Hollywood, here’s a quarter
Go buy yourself some, ah, continental pants
Ascot, cigarette holder etc, etcSource: MusixmatchSongwriters: John D. Loudermilk.

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In the same year as the Gary Newman Track I heard Automobile by John Prime. It really could not of been any more different. The album Pink Cadillac blew my mind ..

John Edward Prine (October 10, 1946 – April 7, 2020) was an American country folk singer-songwriter. He was active as a composer, recording artist, live performer, and occasional actor from the early 1970s until his death, and was known for an often humorous style of original music that has elements of protest and social commentary.

Born and raised in Maywood, Illinois, Prine learned to play the guitar at the age of 14. He attended classes at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk Music. After serving in West Germany with the U.S. Army, he returned to Chicago in the late 1960s, where he worked as a mailman, writing and singing songs first as a hobby, and then becoming a club performer.

A member of Chicago’s folk revival, Prine credited film critic Roger Ebert and singer-songwriter Kris Kristofferson with discovering him, resulting in the production of Prine’s eponymous debut album with Atlantic Records in 1971. The acclaim earned by this LP led Prine to focus on his musical career, and he recorded three more albums for Atlantic. He then signed with Asylum Records, where he recorded an additional three albums. In 1981, he co-founded Oh Boy Records, an independent record label with which he would release most of his subsequent albums.

Widely cited as one of the most influential songwriters of his generation, Prine was known for humorous lyrics about love, life, and current events, as well as serious songs with social commentary and songs that recollect melancholy tales from his life. In 2020, he received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Information from Wikipedia

February morning my car won’t start today
I turned the key at 8: 03
And the battery passed away
Inside a’ my automobileI want my automobile
I want my automobile
I want to drive it
All around this worldBride’s gettin’ married in the springtime
Widow’s gettin’ married in the fall
I got married in high school
Or I wouldn’t of got married at allI’d be drivin’ my automobile
Be drivin’ my automobile
Be drivin’ my automobile
I wanna drive it all around this worldEverybody said to the new groom
Groom, what ya gonna be
I said, I’m gonna be a symphony
Just as soon as I find a keyTo my automobile
I want my automobile
I want my automobile
All around this worldLet’s take a rideColumbus sailed the ocean
Moses parted the sea
Dolores left me yesterday
Well, I think she took the keyTo my automobile
I want my automobile
I want my automobile
Wanna drive it all around this worldNow, I held a little bitty baby
I held a woman all night
Whenever I get the hiccups
I hold my breath ’til my head gets lightThen, I drive my automobile
Yeah, I drive my automobile
I drive my automobile
I’m want to drive it all around this worldFebruary morning, my car won’t start today
Yeah, I turned the key at 8: 03
And the battery passed away
Inside a’ my automobileI’m drivin’ my automobile
Wanna my automobile
Wanna drive it all around this world
Go onIt is a beautiful day for a ride
Hey, get your head down I can’t see anything
Someone give me a cigarette
I don’t want to take my hands off the wheelWe ought to take the air filter off this sucker
So we can see what it will really do
Uh oh, it looks to me like a hospital zone
Everybody get quiet, shhDon’t wake the dead up
We’re almost out, hang on, uh, oh here we go
Well, you can just hold it until we get to the next townSource: Musixmatch.

Finally as I go here is Tracy Chapman with Fast Car for no other reason than I love it soooo much.

Tracy Chapman (born March 30, 1964) is an American singer-songwriter, known for her hits “Fast Car” and “Give Me One Reason“, along with other singles “Talkin’ ’bout a Revolution“, “Baby Can I Hold You“, and “Crossroads“. She is a multi-platinum and four-time Grammy Award–winning artist.

Chapman was signed to Elektra Records by Bob Krasnow in 1987. The following year she released her debut album, Tracy Chapman, which became a worldwide success. The album earned Chapman six Grammy Award nominations, including Album of the Year, three of which she won: Best New Artist, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance for her single “Fast Car”, and Best Contemporary Folk Album. Chapman released her second album, Crossroads, the following year, which garnered her an additional Grammy nomination.

Since then, Chapman has experienced further success with six more studio albums, which include her multi-platinum fourth album, New Beginning, for which she won a fourth Grammy Award, for Best Rock Song, for its lead single “Give Me One Reason”. Chapman’s most recent album is Our Bright Future, released in 2008.

According to Metro Weekly critic Chris Gerard, “Fast Car” tells a grittily realistic story of a working poor woman trying to escape the cycle of poverty, set to folk rock music.The song’s arrangement was described by Orlando Sentinel writer Thom Duffy as “subtle folk-rock”,while Billboard magazine’s Gary Trust deemed the record a “folk/pop” song.Dave Marsh said it was perhaps an “optimistic folk-rock narrative”, whose characters are in a homeless shelter. Information from Wikipedia

Happy Sunday EVERYONE.💜💜💜