Song Lyric Sunday – Night and Day

For this week’s Song Lyric Sunday the prompt is from our friend Di at Pensitivity101. She has tasked us with find a song or songs with the words night, evening, dusk, twilight, day, sunrise daybreak or dawn. I have picked two just to share two very different songs. My first one is “Here Comes The Night” by Them. A great song featuring my favorite artist Van Morrison and a very 60s sound. The second is a more recent, beautiful song, “Don’t Know Why” by Norah Jones. It refers to the break of day. Enjoy!

The Song – Here Comes The Night

This song was written by Bert Berns and was released as a single in 1965 with “All For Myself” as the B-side. It was the biggest hit for Them, who were from Belfast, Ireland but still considered part of the “British Invasion.”

Van Morrison was Them’s lead singer. He left the band in 1966 to pursue a solo career, and Them changed their name to The Belfast Gypsies and released one album before reverting back to their original name. They released four more albums before splitting.

Bert Berns (a.k.a. Bert Russell) was a talented songwriter and producer whose life was tragically cut short in 1967 at the age of 38 by a fatal heart attack. Among his writing credits are “Twist And Shout” (Isley Brothers, The Beatles), “Hang On Sloopy” (The McCoys), “Piece Of My Heart” (Erma Franklin, Janis Joplin), and “Tell Him” (the Exciters). His production credits include Morrison’s “Brown Eyed Girl” and “Under The Boardwalk” by The Drifters.

Lyrics

Whoa, here it comes
Here comes the night
Here comes the night
Whoa whoa whoa yeah

I could see right out my window
Walkin' down the street, my girl
With another guy

His arm around her
Like it used to be with me
Whoa, it makes me want to die
Yeah yeah yeah

Well, here it comes
Here comes the night
Here comes the night
Whoa whoa whoa whoa yeah

There they go
It's funny how they look so good together
Wonder what is wrong with me
Why can't I, accept the fact she's chosen him
And simply let them be
Whoa whoa whoa

Well, here it comes
Here comes the night
Here comes the night
Whoa whoa whoa yeah

She's with him he's turning down the lights
And now he's holding her
The way I used to do

I could see, her closing her eyes
And tellin' him lies
Exactly like she told me, too
Yeah yeah yeah

Well, here it comes
Here comes the night
The long, the long and lonely night
Night, night, night, night, night, night

Whoa, here comes the night
Writer/s: JAMES MC CULLOCH, NICK GILDER
Publisher: Sentric Music, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Lyrics licensed and provided by LyricFind

The Song – Don’t Know Why

“Don’t Know Why” was Norah Jones’ first single and the song that launched her to stardom, but she didn’t write it. It was written in 1999 by a New York City-based songwriter-guitarist named Jesse Harris. A few weeks after he wrote it, he recorded it with a violinist and released it under the name Jesse Harris and The Ferdinandos. He sold the album on his website.

Harris had met Jones a year earlier when he travelled to Texas with a group of other musicians to put on a clinic at the University of North Texas, where Jones was a student. They stayed in touch, and at his urging she moved to New York City to pursue music in 1999.

Many have enjoyed a latte at a coffee shop or filled in a crossword puzzle while this song plays as a mellow backdrop, but the lyric is anything but soothing. The singer is left catching teardrops in her hand when her lover is a no-show. According to its writer, Jesse Harris, it’s not autobiographical – he often writes songs about loss that have nothing to do with his personal life.

A more lyrically uplifting song is the title track, which is one of three songs Jones wrote on the album.

After Jones came to New York City, she started performing this song with Jesse Harris, who thought it was a good fit for a female voice. Jones changed the key to fit her voice, added a drum beat, then recorded a demo of the song with Harris in October 2000. That demo got the attention of the jazz label Blue Note, which signed Jones and sent her to the studio to record with a group of session musicians. The results were too convoluted, so Jones was assigned to a different producer, Arif Mardin, who had worked with many famous artists, including Aretha Franklin. He was brought in to capture Jones’ distinctive sound, which he did by keeping the original demo take and adding some guitar and a vocal harmony, making Jones harmonize with herself.
Jesse Harris played guitar on the original demo, which ended up being used on the final recording. He almost stopped the take because he didn’t like the mix in his headphones. He kept going and was glad he did, since that was the keeper. Jones and her band were willing to do another take, but the engineer, Jay Newland, thought it was perfect and wouldn’t let them.

The Come Away With Me album was released in February 2002. It found a following in the jazz community, but didn’t land a bigger audience until that summer, when “Don’t Know Why” was issued as a single and picked up by US public radio stations, which typically have a very mature and upscale audience. This helped get it played in coffee bars, bookstores, and other retail venues. Jones was just 21 when the song was recorded (22 when the album was released), but she appealed to the older crowd because of her sound and her father. Her dad is Ravi Shankar, an Indian musician famous for teaching George Harrison how to play the sitar. Most of the MTV generation had no idea who he was, but the public radio audience did, and it made a great logline.

Lyrics

I waited 'til I saw the sun
I don't know why I didn't come
Left you by the house of fun
I don't know why I didn't come
I don't know why I didn't come

When I saw the break of day
I wished that I could fly away
Instead of kneeling in the sand
Catching teardrops in my hand

My heart is drenched in wine
But you'll be on my mind
Forever

Out across the endless sea
I would die in ecstasy
But I'll be a bag of bones
Driving down the road alone

My heart is drenched in wine
But you'll be on my mind
Forever

Something has to make you run
I don't know why I didn't come
I feel as empty as a drum
I don't know why I didn't come
I don't know why I didn't come
I don't know why I didn't come

Thank you
Thank you
You guys are nice, thanks
We all need a little love, right?
Thanks for giving us lots of love
We love you
Writer/s: Jesse Harris
Publisher: Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Lyrics licensed and provided by LyricFind