Sail Away – Randy Newman

Year: 1972

Label: Reprise

“Everybody knows my name/ But it’s just a crazy game/ Oh, it’s lonely at the top”

‘He sounds like the guy that sings the Toy Story song!’, is the stock answer when you play a Randy Newman song to anybody under the age of 30. Or 40. Scrap that, 50.  Well, he is that guy who sings the Toy Story song. Newman’s 1995 hit, ‘You’ve Got A Friend In Me’, bought him front and centre stage for the first time in a long time.  He has since become a Disney darling, writing scores for Monsters Inc, Cars, A Bugs Life, and many more. In fact, Newman has twenty Academy Award nominations for Best Score and Best Original song. TWENTY!? In your face Spielberg..

But before the movies. Before the Oscar nominations. When Pixar was still just a word on a sheet in a filing cabinet, there was just Randy Newman.  A seminal figure in the LA musical movement of the 1970’s, he carved himself out a niche. Quirky, poignant, beautiful, on the point. Randy offered the world something that The Eagles, Jackson Browne and other legendary artists of the day couldn’t. He laughed at the ridiculousness of it all. He laughed at himself. Hardly blessed with the looks of JD Souther or the heavenly vocal range of Crosby, Stills and Nash, what else could he do?

As a songwriter in the late 60’s, Newman had pumped out hits for the likes of The Everly Brothers and Art Garfunkel, all the way to Dusty Springfield. As the decade turned, so did Randy’s focus – to himself. After a critically lauded self titled debut, came his first real dent into popular culture – ‘Sail Away’.

You recognise instantly the Randy from Toy Story. Every track could find itself as the title song on an animation hit. Albeit, some would have to be considerably darker than others. The album shares it’s title with it’s first track.  It oozes irony, with an overbearing melancholic pathos. Being able to “sing about Jesus and drink wine all day”, genuinely defines what is great about being an American to vast swathes of the populus. The orchestra may make you believe Newman is one of those, but his voice suggests otherwise. In a nutshell, it pleases the lovers, and the doubters. Interpret as you will.

‘Lonely At The Top’ transports us to 1950’s New York. Originally written for Frank Sinatra, the song begs us to be careful what we wish for.  Against a musical back drop which wouldn’t find itself amiss in ‘The Aristocats’, Newman continues to focus on the darker side of the American dream, and could make the most ardent status hunter rethink their game plan.

‘He Gives Us All His Love’ is an ironic nuclear bomb. It’s a beauty of a song which can bring a boy to tears.  It’s a poem portraying Randy’s continued criticism of religion. “He hears babies crying/ He hears old folks dying”, ‘he’ sees all types of misery in the world, but it’s OK, because ‘he’ loves you. I let you decide who ‘he’ is. ‘Last Night I Had A Dream’, under different circumstances, and if it were ten minutes longer, could have been a Pink Floyd song.  ‘Simon Smith And The Amazing Dancing Bear’ could have been on The White Album.  This exemplifies the musical genius of Newman. It could have been Floyd, it could have been the Beatles. But thank fuck it wasn’t. He takes an amalgimation of influences and places an irreversible spin on them. It could have been them, but it’s undeniably him.

‘Old Man’ is a lullaby, a farewell, to a dying father. Randy is the only one by the man’s side, and the song is a beautiful serenade to someone who may already have gone.  Like Neil Young (in his song of the same name), he sees himself in his older counterpart.  But whereas Neil almost goads the old man in the light of his impending doom (“Doesn’t mean that much to me/ To mean that much to you”), Newman hauntingly promises his that he will live on through him.

‘Political Science’ was written 44 years too early. If the world is unfortunate enough to be burdened with a President Trump (at least ‘he’ gives us all his love..), do not be surprised to see this farcical prophecy come true. Randy assumes the voice of the patriotic American, sick of the vitriol they receive from the rest of the world (“We give them money, but are they grateful?/ No, they’re spiteful and they’re hateful”). The only feasible option, of course, is to drop the bomb and “pulverise them”. Nobody escapes the tyrannical President Newman’s devastation. Asia is destroyed on account of being to crowded. “Boom” goes London and Paris.  As he says, “They all hate us anyhow, so let’s drop the big one now”.  It’s funny. But, in 2016, it’s scary too.

‘Burn On’, is again a song about destruction and pain, accompanied by a ditsy show tune. It is a perfect marriage. Telling the tale of the Cuyahoga river fire in Ohio, one of the biggest environmental disasters of the 1960’s. It’s a historical piece, which would not be out of place written about tragic environmental destruction we still see today. ‘Memo To My Son’ reverses ‘Old Man’. Newman sings to his baby.  He wants the baby to love him, and nothing the baby could ever do would make Randy not love them back.

‘Dayton, Ohio 1903’ was, nay, is, a Pixar classic in the making. It’s heartbreaking but in a subtle way.  Like much of Newman’s songs, you get to the end, and you’re tearing up, but you aren’t entirely sure why.  Granted, this probably isn’t true for the next track on the album. ‘You Can Leave Your Hat On’ has been covered by the world and his dog, most notably Joe Cocker and Tom Jones.  It identifies what men, ESPECIALLY Tom Jones, find most attractive in a women – them being naked. Men, to this day, are a perverse people. Looks mattered then.  Looks matter now.  Randy only professes his love for the women when she’s dancing wildly (with only her hat on), on a chair for him.  Then, and only then, she gives him “reason to live”.  Randy, you old dog.

Newman finishes as he started – at his ironic, satirical, anti-religious establishment best. God is asked a question, and he replies with full disdain, making clear his dislike for mankind. God openly laughs at his hoards of followers. He can’t believe what he get’s away with, but he keeps getting away with it (“I burn down your cities/…You must be crazy to put your faith in me/ That’s why I love mankind.”).  No matter what he does, the people need him, and that and only that, is why he loves them.  Sound like a certain Republican candidate for the US Presidency?…

Randy Newman is a amongst a small group of musicians who can incite a full rainbow of emotions across an album.  He laughs at himself, at America, at us. The hypocrisy of it all. His epic songs, so masterfully put together, provided a relief from the drug fuelled pain and heartbreak tracks his fellow artists of the 1970’s were creating.  You know him for his Pixar masterpiece. Now it’s time to know him for his other masterpiece too.  Yes, the guy who sings the Toy Story song, is a genius.

The French Inhaler