"E" is for "Eclectic"

      I've been walking through my iPod's playlist letter by letter, and although "E" is the most common letter in the English language, it's not necessarily the most common first letter of song titles, at least according to my small sampling. Of the 3,401 songs currently loaded on my iPod, 85 of them start with the letter "E"--less than 2.5% of the total (if all 26 letters were represented equally, "E" should begin about 3.8% of the song titles). But those 85 songs seem to represent a little bit of everything from everyone in my music collection, including 16 songs that begin with the words, "Everything" or "Everyone." That makes "eclectic" today's watchword, and I've decided to feature the most disparate collection of "E" songs that I can concoct, a truly jarring playlist of great--but incongruous--music.

1. "Easter Parade" by The Blue Nile--Mellow synth-pop Glaswegians The Blue Nile may not be prolific (they've produced only four albums in their 20+ years as a band), but what they lack in quantity they make up for in quality (or clichés to that effect). Their sweet, soothing melodies and languorous rhythms are simple enough for easy access, but reward repeated listenings with surprising nuance. In "Easter Parade," lead singer Paul Buchanan talk-sings his way through a nostalgic picture-poem, apparently inspired by a found photograph.
2. "Eat Steak" by The Reverend Horton Heat--This song isn't the best example of the Rev's manic "psychobilly" brand of raucous, adrenaline-fueled rockabilly, but it definitely reflects their unapologetically irreverent sense of humor. Although Boston Market restaurant briefly made "Eat Steak" their theme song, they carefully left out the lines, "Look at all the cows in the slaughterhouse yard, gotta hit 'em in the head, gotta hit 'em real hard; first you gotta clean it then the butcher cuts it up, throws it on a scale, throws an eyeball in a cup." It's like when Levi's or whoever used a ruthlessly bowdlerized version of CCR's anti-establishment anthem "Fortunate Son" to sell jeans. Further proof that irony is, in fact, alive and well.
3. "Electra Made Me Blind" by Everclear--I can never recommend Everclear without equivocation; they miss as often as they hit for me. "Electra" is definitely one of the "hits," though. They're also one of those bands whose music suffers at moderate volumes--you've got to PLAY THEM LOUD. The straight-up jangle and holler of "Electra" is no exception and is about as far from the sweet pop of "Easter Parade" and the cornpone country of "Eat Steak" as you can get.
4. "Everything is Everything" by Lauryn Hill--There's not one but three songs that start with "E" on Hill's outstanding "The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill," but "Everything is Everything" is clearly the best. Even the video is cool, as all of New York City becomes a giant disc on her DJ's scratch platter, with Empire State as the spindle. My paper-thin collection of hip-hop may be hopelessly whitebread and devoid of gangsta cred, but an appreciation for Lauryn Hill requires no explanation or apology.
5. "Effect and Cause" by The White Stripes--A high hat, a snare, a tambourine, and an acoustic guitar are all The White Stripes need to flesh out this witty three-chord romp about getting the wrong end of the stick. I don't really need 85 songs from dozens of different bands to put together an eclectic playlist--I could just grab a handful of White Stripes tunes at random and likely come away with some hard rock, some blues, a little country or bluegrass, or some unclassifiable business featuring Jack on ukelele.
6. "The Electric Version" by The New Pornographers--I have to confess that the only reason I originally sought out The New Pornographers when I heard about their debut album "Mass Romantic" was because I knew that Neko Case was part of the ensemble that formed from various, mostly Canadian pop and rock outfits (ahhhh, Neko). It quickly became clear that TNP were a very different kettle of fish from the sort of things that Neko does on her own, but when they come together periodically from their other musical projects, the impressive collection of talent, led by main songwriter Carl Newman, produces track after track of infectious, hooky power-pop tunes that put 98% of the crap in commercial radio's heavy rotation to shame. If "The Electric Version" doesn't make your head start bobbing, then there's just no bob in you.
7. "Evidence" by Susan Tedeschi--My introduction to the straight-from-the-diaphragm electric blues sound of Susan Tedeschi came via my favorite radio station, WYEP in Pittsburgh, who featured her second album "Just Won't Burn" when it came out in '98. I loved the songs, but I truly fell in love with Tedeschi when I bought the album for myself and saw the picture on the cover. It wasn't so much that she was totally hot (she is). What really won my heart was the revelation that her guitar was festooned with Colorforms™ stickers (remember Colorforms?), including Eeyore and Tigger, my personal spirit guides, yin and yang. "Evidence" comes off her most recent album "Hope and Desire," and features her in full Koko Taylor voice, covering a great soul song by George Jackson and Raymond Moore. I swear it was the Colorforms. Not the hotness.
8. "Prelude in E" by Frédéric Chopin, performed by Vladimir Ashkenazy--OK, this one is a bit of a cheat because the "E" doesn't come first, but I figured that the "E" is essential enough to the work to count. I enjoy classical music and have quite a few classical CD's, but for whatever reason, only a few have made it to my iPod, including Chopin's exercise in creating short piano preludes in every key of the musical scale. Maybe I have a short attention span, or maybe Chopin tapped into something elemental with these eclectic fragments. Whatever the appeal, I never tire of them. Even if you think you don't know anything about classical music, you'd likely recognize at least three or four of the preludes if you heard them--including the "Prelude in E"--that's how much popularity and presence they've maintained.