Seasons in the Sun
I’ve always had a special place in my heart for Seasons in the Sun, that ultra-cheesy seventies tune by Terry Jacks. (The song was actually a remake of an old Belgian song, written by Jacques Brel. The English lyrics were by beat poet Rod McKuen.)
In my hopelessly mixed up world, certain songs are so incredibly bad that they’re actually rather good. It’s difficult to explain how this works, but it seems to take a weird combination of catchy pop music, horrible lyrics, bad taste, drippy sentimentality, and unapologetic sincerity for a song to make this delightful leap from bad to good.
Maybe it was just the times, but many seventies songs fall into this category. Convoy. I Think I Love You. Kung Fu Fighting. Dancing Queen. Torn Between Two Lovers. Rhinestone Cowboy.The Night Chicago Died.
The list goes on and on. King Tut. The Streak. Y.M.C.A. Telephone Line.
Curiously, some bad seventies songs were never quite able to rise above their inexplicable awfulness. They were bad then and they just stay bad, forever. Songs like Disco Duck, The White Night, Having my Baby, You Light Up my Life, Love Will Keep us Together, Escape, Muskrat Love, Reunited, and I Write the Songs. (By the way, as a general rule, all songs by Air Supply, Andy Gibb, Hall and Oates, Helen Reddy, and Barry Manilow fall into this category.)
Speaking of Andy Gibb, the string of pop hits by his famous brothers, the Bee Gees, are not so easy to categorize. Anything pre-Saturday Night Fever is potentially on the hurt-so-good list, songs like Fanny be Tender, Nights on Broadway, and I Started a Joke. But anything after Saturday Night Fever is pretty much bad. Tragedy and Too Much Heaven, for instance.
And what of the songs on the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack? Well, they are forever on the bubble, it seems. We could debate their worth into infinity.
One of the best ways to move over from the bad list to the so-bad-it’s-good list is to actually have someone die in the song. That’s why songs like Billy Don’t be a Hero, Run Joey Run, The Night the Lights Went out in Georgia, and Rocky all qualify without any great argument. I’ll even throw The Blind Man in the Bleachers in, although it’s a little shaky. Even Copacabana, a Barry Manilow song, sneaks in under this exception.
Seasons in the Sunis probably the greatest of all the cheeseball seventies song, especially those dealing with death. It is wonderfully catchy, weepy, and, well, awful. I love it! It is pure pop music, yet it deals straightforwardly, almost happily, with one of the toughest subjects of all. It contains some of the worst lyrics and in-your-face sentimentality of all time. And yet, it can, at times, seem almost wise, even profound. (”but the wine and the song like the seasons have all gone.”) The really good bad ones have this sneaky tendency.
In the song, the songwriter is dying. We don’t know why, because he never tells us. The only hint we have is that “it’s hard to die, when all the birds are singin’ in the sky, now that the spring is in the air” repeated thrice, which, if I’m not mistaken means our tragic protagonist won’t be seeing summer.
So from the outset Seasons in the Sun requires listeners to suspend disbelief and just accept the fact that our hero is a dead man walking. We can argue about alternative therapies, magic potions, medical trials or prayer all we want, but this would be beside the point.
Interestingly, the singer chooses three people to whom he would like to say a final farewell. Why three? Well, this is pop music, after all, and a three minute song has no more room for goodbyes.
The first goodbye is bestowed upon the protagonist’s “trusted friend,” a person he had known since the two were “nine or ten.” We don’t know if this trusted friend is male or female or whether their friendship ever moved beyond that point to something more scandal-worthy, but there are certainly a variety of interesting interpretations. Be that as it may, the pair had apparently sewn their wild oats together, for beyond climbing hills and trees (these are possible metaphors, by the way), they had ”learned of love and ABCs” (but hopefully not in that order). Later, we get a bit more of the picture, when the protagonist admits the pair had shared physical and emotional pain (”skinned our hearts and skinned our knees”), before parting with a not-so-random observation that “pretty girls are everywhere,” even as he is about to die. Ouch! No matter what interpretation you take, that hurts.
After saying goodbye to his trusted friend, the protagonist moves on to “Papa,” with the emphasis on syllable two rather than syllable one. Our dying hero has a lot of guilt and regret pertaining to his father, apparently, for he immediately asks Papa to pray for him, before describing himself as the “black sheep of the family.” Papa had tried in vain to teach our protagonist right from wrong it seems, but like the Prodigal Son our young man had chosen “wine and song” instead. It’s possible, then, that he is dying of liver failure, but that’s only conjecture. However, if true, it might explain the rather cruel suggestion our hero makes when he tells Papa to revisit his death over and over each time he sees a small child, for they at least are unspoiled and have not succumbed to the enticements of the grape.
We move on then to our third goodbye, which is saved for “Michelle, my little one.” Michelle could be a girlfriend or she could be a daughter. We’re not entirely sure, but for purposes of the song it doesn’t really matter. (By the way, I refuse to examine those lingering Alice in Wonderland theories that keep surfacing. Have you no shame?) Michelle, whoever she was, reportedly gave our hero love and helped him “find the sun,” which is pop music code for overcoming clinical depression. Indeed “every time” our hero was down, Michelle would apparently appear out of thin air and help him get his feet “back on the ground.” I guess it is possible, then, that Michelle is a guardian angel, a fairy godmother, a wood nymph, or a licensed psychiatrist, but my gut says she’s a girlfriend with a rather small frame.
Anyway, beyond all this silliness, Seasons in the Sun asks a very probing question, the only one that has any relevance to this series: If you were dying who would your trusted friend, Papa, and Michelle be?
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Comments
Looking forward to seeing you again tomorrow night.
Would it be possible to have Ford do a little rendition of the song for us?
Frankly, my friend, I am floored once again by your insight. You have articulated things I have only thought, very personally, for over 30+ years. I have always been interested in studying how music affects us emotionally. What is it that does that?! Anyways, hold that thought and we will start to figure this out…Terry Jacks would want it that way.
YES!!!! My favorite word!!! I’m so excited that you will soon get to experience the miracle of these little magic beads!! Prayers for a successful procedure and quick recovery surrounding you. Suzanne
I am so amazed how you can take something as simple as this subject and point out such depth. I love reading your writings.
I love the Seasons in the Sun was one of my brothers favorite songs growing up (like young, elementary age when all we had was our am clock radio to listen to.) 2 or 3 days after he was killed, I remember John Cunningham, Jeff Tribble, and some other guy I can’t remember taking Lori and me to Sunset Lake one evening to get us out of the house….We were driving in an old truck, all squashed into the front and that song came on…I had not heard it in years…and we both just started bawling. I’m with ya on cheezy songs, but that one has always made me sad, even when I was little.
Don’t stop writing…I love reading it.
Dana
It isn’t strange at all how so many of these 60’s-80’s lyrics and music stick with us forever becoming almost part of our DNA…many reverb in our heads that are so poignant and meaningful as you point out.
Then there are those like…”well we shot the line we went for broke with a 1,000 screaming trucks and 11 long-haired friends of Jesus in a shartruce micro-bus”…that actually mean nothing at all…or do they???
Oh, man—you just about named every 45 I still have in my basement! Great post. Don’t forget “Alone Again, Naturally” and “Touch Me In the Morning” for more of the sad stuff, and for pure 70’s bliss—drumroll, please—”Afternoon Delight!” (Some would
say this one takes a dive into the “cheesy-bad” bin, but for me it’s still sitting safely on the edge, though teetering just a bit!)
You ask who our trio of loved ones would be – now that strikes a more serious chord. I don’t have any kids (“Michelle” was always his kid to me) and my folks are also gone, so mine would simply be my husband, my brother and a friend. A small circle of loved ones, but loved well.
Jim, you’ve got a knack for being funny and stirring up the deep thoughts at the same time. I enjoyed reading, as usual. I’m going out now to have a “Saturday In the Park” day (even though it’s Sunday.) Peace.
Great post, Jim! Definitely food for thought. Plus, you made me laugh when I read some of those song titles, like “Disco Duck”…what a stupid/silly song…that, unfortunately, I remember very well. But, hey now! I actually really liked Hall and Oates…don’t be too hard on them!