Marie - Randy Newman
Song of the Day #22
Apple Music link: https://music.apple.com/us/album/marie/51957158?i=51957175
This is a repost of an old essay of mine I wrote back in June of 2021 on the song. I wrote it at a very difficult time in my life, where a series of personal crises led to everything falling into disarray. In that turbulent summer, Good Old Boys and Sail Away were the two albums that kept me afloat, helping me sort out my feelings and keeping me in a stable mental state to make it through. This song in particular is irreversibly tied to that period in my life: I had some personal things going on that made the lyrics strike me even harder than the rest. Because of this, I'll always have a special relationship with this song, and I'm happy to see that not only do I still agree with my old review but also still find this to be a songwriting masterpiece. Anyways, here is the original post with some minor edits.
The tragedy of Randy Newman is that getting into Pixar soundtracks has obscured his legacy as one of the greatest singer-songwriters of his day. He was widely recognized as a phenomenal songwriter by countless musicians, from Paul McCartney to Brian Wilson. Yet, "You’ve Got A Friend In Me" (a great song, no doubt) will always tower over his catalog as his most popular song, and 90% of his most popular songs on Spotify will be from movie soundtracks, and there’s no pretentious whining from people like me that’s gonna change the reality. Classics like Sail Away and Good Old Boys, as incredible as they are, will just be known to music enthusiasts and not the general public.
Well, I’m gonna do my part and advertise it as one of the most heartbreakingly sincere love ballads I’ve ever heard. In a way, this song could be pretty generic (and even the melody, while very good, is still pretty sappy), but the genius of the song lies in its arrangement and performance. Too many love songs have the male singer acting too tough or becoming too sentimental, so while they can often be great, they still lack the sincerity to make them devastating. The way to make a love song really genuine is not to overdo anything and focus more on the vulnerability that loves brings out. Plenty of men act tough or flirty on the surface, but like all people, every one of them at their core is sensitive people with insecurities and soft spots of their own. What makes love beautiful is that it presents the real you, warts and all.
That's what makes "Marie" so special. Randy sings the song as a weak, drunken man, who rarely shows his feelings about his love but is in such a broken state that they just come flowing out. It's almost heartbreaking to hear him sing lines like "I'm drunk right now baby, but I've got to be. Or I never could tell you what you mean to me" or feel his regret and pain when he sings " I'm weak and I'm lazy and I've hurt you so and I don't listen to a word you say when you're in trouble I just turn away." The arrangement he gives is also perfect. Randy clearly is influenced by the "Hollywood string" sound, but his unique gift is never making the arrangements overwrought. In this song, they never take away from the heart-on-the-sleeve confessional mood, and if anything, they make him seem more introspective and sincere. The song is not about love on its own: it’s about how love can bring even the most flawed and broken men warmth and sanity.
I can understand struggling with the song. Randy's creaky and rambly vocals and direct personality can take some adjustment. But if you do get into this song, it's overwhelmingly beautiful. Even recently when hearing the song, I had to fight to hold back tears because I was in a public place (and I don't tear up over ANY love song I hear, mind you). Just go hear this small masterpiece, you won't regret it.
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