%%USERNAME%%    %%ACCWORDS%% %%ONOFF%% |
 |
A math guy's random thoughts. |
| A math guy's random thoughts. |
| The Mammas and the Pappas covered "California Dreamin" in December of 1965. Initially, it didn't get much attention until a Boston radio station started featuring it. It peaked in March at number four on the USA Billboard 100, but was the top single in the Billboard end-of-the-year survey for 1966. The song was a collaboration between Michelle Phillips and Barry Maguire, who were friends at the time. Phillips wrote the lyrics and Maguire the music. Originally, Maguire was supposed to be the lead vocalist on the release with Phillips' group, The Mammas and the Pappas, just providing backup vocals. However, the producers didn't care for Maguire's rough voice and instead released a recording with Dennis Doherty, a founding member of the Mammas and the Pappas, as the vocalist. The song had enormous impact. For one thing, it introduced the "California Sound," innovated by the Beach Boys, to folk music and helped to initiate the "folk-rock" combination. But the song's lyrics became a powerful metaphor for an entire cultural movement--a movement that built on and expanded the "California Dream" and accelerated migration to the state. The Gold Rush in the nineteenth gave birth the "California Dream" of a place where success depended less on the dreary Puritan values of personal deprivation and hard work and more on freedom and good luck. The California Sound, on the other hand, originatied with beach culture, centered on youthful innocence, surfing, and hot rods. The fusion of the California Sound with the social consiousness of the folk music, a fusion launched by "California Dreamin', transformed both the California Sound and the California Dream. Today, we can see the lyrics as a metaphor for a new "California Dream," the dream of a place that is at once free, politically aware, diverse, and prosperous. I personally know countless people who migrated to California motivated, at least in part, by this song. One can surely argue that Phillips had none of this in mind when she wrote the lyrics. Indeed, she has said her only motivation was nostalgia for better weather when she wrote the song while enduring a New York winter. But once she wrote it and the group performed it, the lyrics and the song became art. It's axiomatic that people take their own meanings from art. I see I've rambled, a hazard of old age. This particular blog series is supposed to link songs to stories I've written. I do have a song that features "California Dreamin," but doesn't reference any of the ways that make this song so important to me personally. Instead, the story is a minor exercise in irony and attempt at humor. It turns out, I'm humor impaired, so it's not a very good story. The story itself was written for a holiday party with some author friends. It was also written to a prompt. An intro to the story, included in the link, explains this background. The story itself references at least a dozen songs. See if you can find all twelve.
|
View Portfolio
Visit Notebook
Send Gift Points
Awards
Badges
Send Email
Community Newsfeed
General Discussion
Sponsored Items
Book of Trinkets
Static Items
Books
Groups
Interactive Stories
Audio
Campfire Creatives
Community Notes
Crossword Puzzles
Documents
Folders
Images
In & Outs
Madlibs
Photo Albums
Polls
Product Reviews
Quizzes
Survey Forms
Web Pages
Word Searches
Take on me is an excellent choice.
