"Under the Water" by Jewel

Hey Dialophiles! 

Today, the Dial gives thanks for friends, family, food, and fun… and of course, forgotten songs. Tonight’s featured addition to our jukebox of the quirky, is a tune that we’ve just recently rediscovered, Jewel’s “Under The Water”.

“Under” is an atypical recording for the sweet Alaskan songstress, far removed from her pop and adult contemporary material for which she is primarily known. The track is driven by a mid tempo hip-hop/ funk beat, is layered with alternative rock styled keyboards and guitars, and features eccentric lyrics about bees, blood, noise and toys (and that’s just in the first stanza!)

Jewel even raps here (and holds her own rather well), although her performance is less LL Cool J and more Debbie Harry as in Blondie’s classic “Rapture”.

Featured on the original soundtrack to the 1996 film “The Craft”, which was comprised largely of covers, such as Love Spit Love’s treatment of The Smiths’ “How Soon is Now”, “Dangerous Type” by Letters To Cleo (a Cars remake), and the Beatles cover “Tomorrow Never Knows” by Our Lady Peace, Jewel’s original self-penned track stood out from the rest in it’s vibe and lyrical unfamiliarity. “Under” was never released as a single, so it never charted on the Billboard singles charts.

 

Everybody enjoy your holiday, and a happy Thanksgiving to all!

 
“Under the water, the total is more than the sum. Under the water, I hear who’ll I’ll become”

"Veteran of the Psychic Wars" by Blue Öyster Cult

Hey Dialophiles!

Tonight, the Dial cuts through the static to bring you a classic rock signal from 1981, a track providing an exploration of a person’s fragile mental and emotional state after years of abuse from an unstated antagonist. Allow us to present Blue Öyster Cult’s “Veteran of the Psychic Wars”.

Appearing on their 1981 release Fire of Unknown Origin, “Veteran” melds elements of progressive rock (think ‘70s era Genesis and Styx) and hard rock (ala Black Sabbath and Nazareth), with brutally honest lyrics detailing a mind weary of constant conflict.

It never charted as a single, which is typical of the output of B.O.C. In fact, they only reached the American top 40 twice… first with 1976’s iconic “Don’t Fear The Reaper” (#12), and next with the rock standard “Burnin’ For You” (#40), which was also extracted from the Fire of Unknown Origin LP. However, despite their limited chart impact, BOC’s songs have influenced legendary acts as diverse as Metallica, Guns N Roses, Nirvana, and fIREHOSE.

Now it’s time for a little personal history…

Back in the early 90s, I stumbled across an arresting vision of an animated gigantic smiley-faced spaceship hovering over the Pentagon on cable TV around 1am. Now, when you see something like that, you owe it to yourself to stick with it, and I quickly found myself mesmerized by the second half of “Heavy Metal”, a movie I was only vaguely familiar with prior to that point, but once the end credits rolled, I made it a priority to seek out and watch the entire film.

Shortly thereafter, I visited my local Blockbuster, and was informed that Heavy Metal wasn’t available for rent or purchase… something about legal issues surrounding the music on the soundtrack. However, not to be thwarted, I snagged a professionally packaged VHS bootleg from a record show (recorded off of a late 80s Showtime airing), which allowed me to finally view the entirety of this genius, surreal, “chock-full-of-rock”, sci-fi anthology masterpiece.

So what’s the connection here? BOC’s “Veteran” is featured prominently in an early segment in Heavy Metal, a futuristic film noirish piece entitled “Harry Canyon”. A tale about a cabbie that gets tangled up with gangsters, a mysterious woman, and an ancient artifact of pure evil, Harry Canyon’s story ended up providing the basic plot line for the 1996 live action sci-fi thriller The Fifth Element.

So if it were not for that chance encounter on cable TV two decades ago, we here at the Dial may never have discovered Blue Öyster Cult’s rockin’ 1981 ode to being on the verge of insanity… whether in an animated world, or not.

You see me now a veteran of a thousand psychic wars…

I’ve been living on the edge so long, where the winds of limbo roar

And I’m young enough to look at, and far too old to see

All the scars are on the inside…

"A Trick of the Night" by Bananarama

Hey Dialophiles!

Sit back and relax this fine Thursday night, as the Dial beams a forgotten track to your speakers, and thus, your mind. May we introduce London’s own Bananarama, and their 1987 masterpiece “A Trick of The Night”.

Featuring their “classic lineup” of Sara Dallin, Keren Woodward, and Siobhan Fahey, (later of Shakespeare’s Sister, known for their 1992 U.K. #1 and U.S. #4 hit “Stay”) the ladies cobbled their name together via the tropical vibe of their earliest recordings (“Banana”), and the Roxy Music track “Pyjamarama” (“-rama”)

Extracted from the True Confessions LP, “A Trick of the Night” was a minor hit in the U.K., peaking at #32, but criminally stalled in the States at #76, despite receiving exposure on the soundtrack to the Whoopi Goldberg film “Jumpin’ Jack Flash”.

I’ve always enjoyed songs that capture that “nighttime vibe”. Those tunes which evoke images of walking down city streets, noting the neon signage glowing from the storefronts, even as the dark sky above twinkles with stars. Hall & Oates’ “Maneater”, Phil Collins’ “In the Air Tonight”, Wham’s “Careless Whisper”, and Glenn Frey’s “You Belong To The City” all possess this relaxed, slightly forlorn quality, as does this breathtaking pop classic by our girls from London. Due largely, of course, to the breathy, seductive vocals sung in unison, the overlapped choruses and verses near the outro, and Keith Thomas’ saxophone interludes which elicit mental imagery of smoky rooms and whispered promises.

Give it a spin, and see if you don’t agree with us here at the Dial that this British track deserved to be a top 10 smash, on both sides of the pond. 

“Whatcha doin’, hey, whatcha doin’? Walking through danger, can’t see the wrong or the right.

Whatcha doin’, tell me whatcha doin’, can’t be a stranger… must be a trick of the night.”