In an interview on the fantastic Word Podcast last year, the Louisiana songwriter Mary Gauthier said that she doesn’t try to write good, or even very good songs; she simply isn’t interested. ‘Good is the enemy of the great. The world doesn’t need any more good songs.’
At the time, I wasn’t sure if she was being merely bombastic and I cynical, but I did not read much more into this. After all, good songs are, by their definition, better than bad ones, and infinitely better than bland ones. However, I did agree on one point: there are plenty of good songs in the world. It’s remarkable just how easily one can discover good music these days. Sites like Daytrotter, Hearya, KEXP, and many others present good new music in an accessible way. In 2010, I made great efforts to discover good new music, and did.
But it was the discovery of new music which brought me back to Gauthier’s quote. Yes, there is a lot of good music knocking about, and that’s fantastic, but after a while it can be a bit underwhelming. You become blasé about it. Good songs are, well, a good thing, but music should be engaging, compelling, and at its best, utterly transformative. And there is a difference between a merely good song and one that really makes you stop in your tracks. More than that, it starts you thinking – immediately – that you’ll have to find some way of hearing it again.
Mary Gauthier is right. Surely the ultimate is to write a song that makes the listener (or hearer – can’t assume anyone is actively listening) drop everything. This does not happen very often. In the past year (or so), I can recall it happening only once.
I was at a Steve Earle gig in Dublin in November 2009. Myself and my friend arrived later than we normally might, arriving as the hitherto unknown support act had three or four songs left. His name was Joe Pug. He was pretty good, he really was, but I must admit that I wasn’t paying the closest attention. I was waiting for Steve Earle.
Then he played his final song, called Hymn #101.
Immediately I knew that it was a fantastic, wonderful, great piece of songwriting. Hearing this song for the first time, I felt that there was nothing subjective about my reactions whatsoever: this was a demonstrably great song.
My thoughts went something like this:
- This is really frickin’ good.
- Must listen really closely so I can try and remember the melody and some of the words for post-gig humming.
- Must also try to disengage and just enjoy it.
- Shit, this is really good.
- What was the title? Will he repeat the title? I need to hear this again. What’s his name again?
It’s not so hard to track down songs now with Youtube. Once I had, I listened to Hymn #101 on a loop for days on end (there may have been a hangover involved). I devoured any available downloads within a few days. The song really held up. And as I have since learned through his album and a wonderful solo performance in Whelans in October 2010, Joe Pug is a fantastic artist.
Good songs are, well, good. And great songs are rare. When you hear one, you know it.
