SOD: Patti Smith "Because The Night"

Once in a while, my father asks me to burn a mix cd for him. I used to do it more frequently, but he kindly asked me to stop. I would try to update his listening by giving him new music I thought he might like, mixed with some old classics I knew he liked. You know, expand his horizons and what not. He wasn't biting. He got sick of some of the "crap" I was wasting space on the cd's with, even if once in a blue moon I gave him something he actually enjoyed.

So now, he gives me "lists." About twice a year, I'll get a call from him and he'll say, "Ok, I've got my list, you got a pen? Make sure you put them in this order on the CD, ok?" And I will proceed to write down the songs he has selected for his next mix. Yesterday, the summer mix came in. Much of it was typical (Rolling Stones, The Animals, Springsteen, Warren Zevon), but some of it was a bit surprising (Band of Horses, White Stripes, Phil Collins, The Troggs). But neatly squeezed between two of my own original pieces he asked me to include (one he helped write), was a real choice cut. Patti Smith, "Because the Night." Track #9 on Big Fat's Summer Playlist.

Granted, this song is no hidden gem. It peaked at #13 on the Billboard Hot 100, and propelled Smith's  album Easter, into the mainstream. But I must say, I haven't heard the song in quite some time, and I'm a bit ashamed to admit that when I listen to it, I usually listen to the 10,000 maniacs version or the Bruce Springsteen Live version. After all, he co-wrote the song. But after putting it on my fathers mix, I gave it a once over, and I have to say, Patti's version is how the song was meant to be played. It's painfully beautiful both in that opening piano lick, and in it's lyrics. But its gains a forceful momentum, and a strength in music and character that only Patti can do as well as "The Boss" himself. The woman is truly a rockstar.

Springsteen originally wrote and recorded the song during sessions for Darkness on the Edge of Town, and I can absolutely see this song fitting into that album somewhere. But Bruce wasn't satisfied with it, and because Jimmy Iovine was apparently producing both Bruce's and Patti's albums in adjacent studios, he brought the song next door to her. After re-writing some of the lyris, Smith released it as the first single off Easter, and propelled the song to stardom. Bruce occasionally played it on the Darkness tour, and continued to play it live thereafter, with his own lyrics of course. Both versions are undeniably amazing, but I will definitely be giving Smith's version more air time now.