Lazy Sunday: Andy B On Sunday Morning Albums

With the stresses of everyday life throwing me a football in the groin the last few weeks, I’ve been under strict orders to chill out. More than one person has given me that piece of advice, and so over the past weekend I figured I’d try adhering to it.

Sunday was my day to do it. With the Queen off at work for the majority of the day, I was left to my own devices. The first order of business was book reading. The novel in question was Charlie Huston’s novel, The Shotgun Rule (for those of you not familiar with Huston, he’s the author of the Joe Pitt Casefiles, the Hank Thompson Trilogy, and the resurrected Moon Knight comic series). So I had the book; the next thing I needed was the soundtrack. After a quick perusal of my cd collection (which I now easily admit to being far too large; I keep talking about a garage sale and I think I mean it), I grabbed the debut album from Fleet Foxes, which was a Christmas present from my friend known as The House That Rock Built. While I’ve had the album on my iPod for months, I had never actually spun the cd until this Sunday morning, which means that in my world I’d never really given it a real listen. I can’t believe I’d waited this long.

I finally heard what all the critics were talking about in their constant raving about Fleet Foxes. The overdubbed vocals, the orchestration. It was the sound of mellow and happiness and today, all combined in one, 39 minute album that I could just chill out to.

In the debut album from Fleet Foxes, I’d found another quintessential Sunday morning record. Some albums are just made for the breakfast/brunch hours on the day the Lord rested. Now, everyone’s ears have different requirements for that time of the day, but I bet you’ve got some cds/vinyl/8-tracks that fit that time. For me, there’s a few albums that I think of when it comes to Sunday mornings:

The Doors – Self-Titled Debut Album
The Velvet Underground and Nico – Self-Titled Debut Album
The Velvet Underground – Loaded
Neil Young – Harvest
The Beach Boys – Pet Sounds

It’s quite clear that these albums are from a fairly specific era, but they’re the ones that I feel make the perfect Sunday morning soundtrack. You might be surprised to find The Doors 1967 debut on my list, but to me that album feels like the morning after. The morning after what, you may ask? I couldn’t tell you, but that’s the vibe I get when I listen to it. It’s as close to a perfect debut as you’re going to find out there, and it sounds so sweet when you’re trying to get your day started.

Neil Young’s Harvest is a little bit more of an obvious Sunday morning treat. It was Neil’s big breakthrough back in 1972, the one that has “Heart Of Gold”, “Old Man”, “The Needle and The Damage Done”. Harvest was the album that made him into an icon, the guy that kid’s parents started listening to, which was never cool. It was the album that’s success inspired Neil to, as he put it, go into “the ditch” rather than continue on as a radio friendly superstar. Of course, none of this backstory really makes a difference once the music is playing. Put on Harvest in Surround Sound (a DVD-Audio version was released a few years ago) and it feels like you’re in the room with Neil and his backing band, the Stray Gators. Sunday morning, the band playing just for you. The opening song, “Out On The Weekend”:

Out On The Weekend (Young)

Think Ill pack it in and buy a pick-up
Take it down to L.A.
Find a place to call my own and try to fix up.
Start a brand new day.

See the lonely boy, out on the weekend
Trying to make it pay.
Can’t relate to joy, he tries to speak and
Can’t begin to say.

Country rock. Alt-rock. Folk-rock. I don’t think there’s any accurate way to categorize Harvest. But whatever it is, the album takes on more resonance, more feeling, when I’ve got in turned on in those early morning hours.

Are we more introspective on Sunday mornings? Is there more to think about? Maybe. Maybe because the world is supposed to be in church, but more people than not are just getting going. Recovering. Wondering what it was they did last night. Why they did it. Wondering what today, Sunday, will hold.

The debut album from the Velvet Underground And Nico actually opens with a song called “Sunday Morning”. On an album produced on a dime, this was the one song that was tailor-made to be radio friendly. Didn’t work, but they tried. And while you may think its paranoid production and lyrics wouldn’t fit your morning, believe me, my friend, when I tell you that it would indeed.

Sunday Morning(Reed, Cale)

Sunday morning
Brings the dawn in
It’s just a restless feeling by my side
Early dawning
Sunday morning
It’s just the wasted years so close behind
Watch out the world’s behind you
There’s always someone around you who will call
It’s nothing at all

Sunday morning
Sunday morning
Sunday morning

Listen to the way Nico does her “la-la-la’s” in the background. Could she be any less committed? Did she even have a clue? Doesn’t matter, does it? It just sounds right. It sounds like Sunday morning.

And so that was my morning. Finding music that fit the mood, that fit the moment. This past weekend, it was Fleet Foxes. It was a good discovery, and one that finds itself in some solid company. And I haven’t even told you what my Sunday afternoon listening selection consisted off. Another time.