Category Archives: Music

Clearly the all-time greatest story-telling song is “Paradise by the Dashboard Light” by Meat Loaf, featuring Ellen Foley as the girl. It was from his 1977 album Bat Out of Hell and was written by Jim Steinman, who wrote most … Continue reading →

The Shirelles were, along with the Supremes, probably one of the two best girl groups of all time. Their song “Will You Love Me Tomorrow?” is beautiful, sad, forlorn, and longing all at the same time. It seems to me … Continue reading →

Harry Chapin was a great storyteller, as he wrote many narrative-type songs, the most famous of which is “Cat’s In the Cradle.” Maybe I’ll do that one next time. It was raining hard in ‘Frisco. I needed one more fare … Continue reading →

I’m not gay, but I do apparently like this Coldplay song. I heard it on Ann Arbor’s local pop/rock station, the same one where I first heard “Alive and Kicking” (twice, now) and “Dreaming” by OMD. The middle of “Violet … Continue reading →

I could promise you I’d start posting some narrative songs that aren’t totally corny, but we both know that would be just silly. Little did you know (possibly), the “Piña Colada Song” is actually a song that tells a story … Continue reading →

So says Steven Hyden of the Milwaukee Decider, and he’s totally right, isn’t he? I don’t just agree because I hate most music made after the ’80s; late-’90s music was incredibly obnoxious, soulless, talentless, and bland. Now, it’s true that … Continue reading →

Everything surrounding Bob Dylan seems to have a good story behind it. I think the story of the Traveling Wilburys and their song “Tweeter and the Monkey Man” is pretty interesting. You can get most of what you need to … Continue reading →

I like songs that tell stories. Songs that have an actual plot with characters and a beginning, middle, and end. I’ll write a series of posts about these narrative songs that I like, with a link to the audio/video of … Continue reading →