Fifteen Songs about Work (that work for me)

Now for something really serious. There are thousands of pop songs with the words "love" and "loving" in the titles. Of the 48,500 songs in my iTunes, almost 1600 have one of the two words in the title. But songs with "work" and "working" or "labor" are a bit harder to come by; I have less than eighty. The plus side is that it takes much less work to select some favorites:

• "I've Been Working" by Van Morrison, originally on the outstanding album, "His Band and The Street Choir", and live on at least two other releases. Lyrically simple, but a really fun song live, as this 1979 video indicates.

• "Working On The Highway" by Bruce Springsteen. From my favorite Springsteen album, "Born in the U.S.A.".

• "Working on a Building" by Cowboy Junkies or John Fogerty. The CJ version of this gospel classic has been covered by numerous artists. The CJ version, from "The Trinity Sessions", is muted and haunting; the JF verision, from his criminally-underrated "The Blue Mountain Rangers" album, is a stompin', raw bit of swamp magic.

• "Working Late" by Lone Justice. If you don't think the term "cowboy punk" makes sense, you've never heard the great Maria McKee ripping it up with Lone Justice.

• "Working for the Weekend" by Loverboy. A slice of mid-1980s power pop-rock nonsense. But fun, sing-along nonsense.

• "Working For The Man" by Roy Orbison. One of many classic cuts by the great Orbison, whose unique vocals were equally dramatic and melancholy.

• "Working Man" and "Workin' Them Angels" by Rush. The first cut is from the first Rush album, with basic working man blues set to a Led Zep/prog vibe; the second is from the recent "Snakes and Arrows" CD. Bonus fact: Geddy Lee, lead singer of Rush, had a song titled, "Working At Perfekt", on his solo album, "My Favorite Headache". It seems rather fitting as Rush is one of the hardest-working bands of the past thirty years.

• "Nice Work If You Can Get It" by Frank Sinatra/Count Basie, or Mel Tormé. Another song covered by numerous artists, but it's hard to get better than Sinatra and Tormé. Sinatra's version, which is live, is upbeat, while Tormé's rendition is a more leisurely, coy take, from the fabulous 1956 album, "Mel Tormé Sings Fred Astaire".

• "This Woman's Work" by Kate Bush (covered by Maxwell, Greg Laswell; new version by Bush for "Director's Cut"). A gut-wrenching, beautiful song about labor—as in childbirth. One of Bush's most emotionally direct songs, from "The Sensual World".

• "We Work The Black Seam" by Sting. From the Police's frontman's first solo album, "Dream of the Blue Turtles," a dark but beautiful tune about the 1984-5 United Kingdom miners' strike.

• "We Can Work It Out" by The Beatles. A Lennon/McCartney hit with "work" in the title that is actually about love, recorded and released in 1965.

• "Worked It Out Wrong" by Chris Isaak. Another working song about love, from "Always Got Tonight". Gorgeous vocals by Isaak, an underrated songwriter.

• "Worksong" by Avishai Cohen. From the the Israeli bassist's just released album, "Seven Seas", based heavily on Yiddish folk melodies. Quite lovely.

• "Labor Day" by John Patitucci, from the album "Now". A fitting song for the day, from another great jazz bassist. Here's a live version on YouTube.

Speaking of love and work, country singer and songwriter Radney Foster gets special mention for having the only song (in my collection, that is) with both words in the title of a song:  "Labor Of Love", by the album of the same name.