Stevie Wonder is amazing. There, blog entry finished...
No, you want me to elaborate? Okay, here goes nothing...when I was a kid in the Eighties, Stevie Wonder was a big deal already. He was the guy behind the song that, in the title alone, captures everything that was at once so right and so wrong about the decade: "I Just Called to Say I Love You." As famously opined in High Fidelity the book and movie, no one could possibly consider that their favorite song. I recall exercising in elementary school to some of his other early-Eighties hits, and of course there he was in the all-star recording of "That's What Friends Are For," the kind of song that makes you kinda glad John Lennon didn't live to see it.
But like the man says in The Dark Knight, either you die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain, or at least "not as good as you once were." It's a sad fact that age-ism is a part of rock music, but it is; the older your favorite artist gets, the less likely he or she or they are to release anything that stands up to whatever put them on top in the first place (or, when they do, get "re-discovered" by an audience that might not have once embraced them, like the late-career resurgence of Johnny Cash). Some of my favorite artists are people whom I consider to have "lost it" at some chronological date in their careers, and whether they regain it or not is hard to say. Miley Cyrus ain't gonna be near as controversial in her seventies as she is in her twenties, I guess it would be fair to say.
But of course, Stevie in the Eighties could afford to slack off, for as I discovered later on he had a boatload of hits in the Sixties and Seventies. Enough really to excuse the treacly sentiment of "I Just Called" and perhaps even enough to point out that, if one chose to view it as such, said song was actually a clever take-down of the kind of sappy songs that Stevie's contemporaries Lionel Richie and Kenny Rogers (among others) were putting out in roughly the same time period. This is the man who gave the world "Signed, Sealed, Delivered," Innervisions, "Higher Ground," "I Was Made to Love Her," and so on and so forth. If he wanted to record an absolute piece of crap and release it on an unsuspecting public, why the hell couldn't he? In this way, you could almost say it was Stevie's Metal Machine Music.
But back to the Seventies, when Motown was in a bit of a culture change and Stevie released the album Talking Book. Marvin Gaye had thrown off the light, poppy sound that made his duets and made him a star, embracing a raw, funky sexuality that was at odds with Berry Gordy's insistance on appealing to the widest (and whitest) possible audience. Stevie was liberated from recording what the label wanted him to do and could now flex his artistic muscle. Talking Book, which has my all-time favorite "spooky song used in John Carpenter's The Thing" ("Superstition"), is loaded with great, great damn songs. But on listening to a mix CD I made a while back and coming across "Tuesday Heartbreak," I have to give it up for that track in particular.
Looking at the title alone, without knowing the song, you'd think "oh, I know what that's about." You'd be wrong. It's a funky, almost celebratory song about heartbreak. It's a joyful ode to the woes of seeing your woman in the arms of another man and the fact being that you can't do a damn thing about it. So just dance, you miserable bastard, dance.
Seriously, though, on an album full of songs that could be standards if they're not already ("I Believe (When I Fall In Love)," "You and I," "Blame It on the Sun"), this is a great, great song. Because when you have had actual honest-to-God heartbreak, you can only do the Joy Division, slashing-my-wrists emo stuff for so long (and believe me, JD and the Cure are perfect for just-broke-up or never-gonna-hear-from-her-again pain). You kinda have to embrace the possibility of change, but you're not blasting James Brown's "I Feel Good" just yet. "Tuesday Heartbreak" is a good reminder that, even when your heart is breaking, the dawn promises a new day. One good thing about getting older is the realization that, for as painful as it can be to get your heart broken, you will eventually learn to love again, and maybe even get it right this time around. But in the meantime, go ahead and shake your ass a little, you deserve it.
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