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One nice thing last week was having so many people come together to share favorite adam schlesinger songs. I thought it'd be nice to celebrate incredible songwriters while they're still with us too. Every day this week I'm gonna do a thread, and I'd love you to contribute as well
Today I want to talk about Burt Bacharach. Every time I listen to any of his songs I get extremely frustrated because I know there's no way I could ever do anything as incredible and magical as what he does on every song he's written in the past 6 decades
when I was on tour with @skylar__spence, @youngyeller_ and @___declan___ in 2015, we bought a used copy of the album he did with Elvis Costello at a bookstore in Atlanta to listen to in the van. Every song is fucking great, but this one really destroyed us
I think it was Jesse who pointed out this really clever thing they do with the lyrics: "But now I see/I see you share your cake with him" The rhyme should be "share your cake with ME" but he's not there, and neither is the rhyme. it's so so good
If you've got the time, there's a full tv special of them doing the whole album with a live orchestra on youtube (make the time)
Herb Alpert - This Guy's In Love With You
His songs with Hal David are just so emotionally complex and well written they work in any style but it's hard to imagine a better version of this than the Luther Vandross
which is not to diminish how good the dionne warwick version is
Dionne Warwick - (They Long To Be) Close To You
Richard's arrangement for the Carpenters version, though...
surely this was my introduction to Burt Bacharach, and i'm not ashamed of that
and, of course, the sequel
but like, aretha franklin doing I Say A Little Prayer
