Confessions of a Fanboy

It was a light day at work, as far as these things go. I had plenty to do and there was no chance it would all get done today so I stumbled my way through it. My companion today? Counting Crows. Again. Still.

I listened to Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings twice before queuing up New Amsterdam Live. I haven’t listened to that one as much as I’ve listened to the studio albums and I’m so glad I decided to give this another listen. As often happens, a song I’d heard many times before and thought nothing of emerged as a new favorite.

I didn’t pay much attention to “Richard Manuel is Dead (If I Could Give All My Love To You)” when I first bought Hard Candy. I didn’t dislike the song in any way, but it never grabbed ahold of me and demanded my attention. Today, the live version of the song did and now I’ve listened to the live and studio version of that song repeatedly.

For those of you who don’t know, Richard Manuel was a member of The Band, a group that has been hugely influential on Duritz and Counting Crows. The influence of The Band on Counting Crows’ sound can be heard on any number of songs over the course of the band’s career, perhaps none more so than “Richard Manuel is Dead.”

As always Duritz wrote the lyrics, but the rest of the Crows are credited with helping to write the music. You can tell when you listen to the track because there are just so many great things happening. The bass line isn’t one of those impossible-to-replicate exercises in dexterity, but it creates a deep pocket and gives the song an anchor. CC aren’t known as a “guitar” band, but the lead on “Richard Manuel” is fantastic and easily one of the most memorable in the band’s catalog. Add to that some cool piano figures that are occasionally pushed into the foreground and you have a contemporary piece of classic-sounding rock and roll.

With all of that, we still haven’t gotten to my favorite part of the song: the vocal arrangement. Adam Durtiz’s ability to write a great chorus with a great hook is one of his underappreciated gifts. It’s one of the great strengths of the songs in their catalog and “Richard Manuel is Dead” is one of my favorites. The chorus isn’t an intricate 8-part harmony, but the vocal arrangement and the backing vocals are so damn catchy.

That gift is also one reason I don’t always catch the meaning in the songs. How can anything this catchy be about something so dark and depressing? When I interviewed Adam Duritz, he referenced the song and what it meant to him.

There’s a lot on that album — even ‘Richard Manuel is Dead’ is about the death of someone that was important to you. The lesson I got from that was that nothing matters, nothing lasts, and that’s the way life works.

Despite a sentiment that’s not the most life affirming, I can’t get enough of the song because it’s so rich and textured on a sonic level. It’s one of the best things on Hard Candy and it translates really well live. It’s a little less catchy and loses some of the pop gleam on New Amsterdam, but it’s still skillfully presented. Charlie Gillingham, David Bryson, David Immerluck, Matt Malley, Jim Bogois, and Dan Vickery aren’t household names, but these guys can flat out play. Adam Duritz is far more visible and famous than those guys, but Counting Crows is unquestionably a real band. That’s evident on the Hard Candy version of “Richard Manuel,” moreso on the live version.

Filed under: Tags: Counting Crows, Music of the Moment