brent johnson digs up three lost treasures this week, in an effort to prove a point …
Pixar ruined Randy Newman.
That’s what I thought Sunday as I sat among friends at a lovely Oscar party. It was a night of good food, good laughs, good times. But when the TV panned to Newman, playing yet another one of his cheerful yet colorless Pixar theme songs, my fellow partygoers started to whine.
They called him lame. Annoying. Slight. Cheesy. They referenced Family Guy‘s famous riff on the piano-playing composer.
I got angry.
“This isn’t the real Randy Newman,” I implored.
Pixar, of course, has given a lot to Newman. Sunday, his theme from Toy Story 3 scored him a Best Original Song Oscar. It was the second time he won the category since becoming the famed animation studio’s resident songwriter in the mid-1990s.
But to most people my age — i.e., anyone in their 20s — that’s all Randy Newman is: a hokey, hum-drum, cartoon-movie singer. Which is a shame.
The rest of his work is more biting and complex — sinister even. Throughout the ’70s and ’80s, he churned out albums filled with twisted storytelling. He infused pop music with rolling, ragtime-inspired piano lines. He utilized satire better than anyone this side of Dylan. And he was a master of telling tales from the viewpoint of an unreliable narrator — one who lures you in with charm but really is scoundrel.
Hence, this week, I give you three lost songs to prove it. The first is the title track of Newman’s best record, 1972’s Sail Away. It’s satire at its most cutting — a slave trader welcoming new African imports to the U.S., telling them of the glories their new country has to offer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chaP4MCXp4w
The second, from the same album, is ‘Political Science,’ in which Newman presents the leaders of Vietnam-era America with a proposal: Destroy the rest of the world and take over.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wx-7THEZ6xk
And the final song, ‘Texas Girl At The Funeral Of Her Father’ proves something else about Newman: When he gets serious, his music is not only lilting but aching.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzXODq41j6A
