Shine, Shine, Shine

I was working at RCA in London. It must have been the second part of the 70's or maybe even into the 80's - it doesn't really matter. I was involved with the copyright on recordings we issued - getting the right credits on the records, making sure we paid the right copyright owners when we sold records into stores.

I had an opportunity to visit our 'own' publisher - the publisher that was part of RCA - Sunbury Music. I was in central London and so was Sunbury Music, so I walked down Oxford Street to their offices down there. I met with some of the staff - there weren't many as it was a small operation.

When I was about to leave I was told I could take a record or two if I wanted. If my memory serves me well, I took two vinyl records - a Guy Clark record and one by Steve Young. The songs that Sunbury Music represented were marked on the label or packaging with a pencil mark, but I think the song I'm coming to wasn't one of theirs.

I understood that both records were 'country' records but not much else. There were songs on the Steve Young that were country, country 'standards' in fact such as Willie Nelson's 'It's Not Supposed To Be That Way' and 'Tobacco Road' by John D. Loudermilk, but the song that bit pleasantly deep, and I needed to hear over and over was a song by Steve Young himself called 'Light Of My Life'. 

Then I lost the record! Possibly in a house move, or what did I do with it? Anyway, it was gone. Gone, Gone, Gone.

Then I thought about it again recently, and bought the double CD pack of Renegade Picker & No Place To Fall. 

Would 'Light Of My Life' sound as good, or was it just  the mood I was in 30+ years ago?

No, it was just as good!

To me it goes likes this: sounding like a thud of drums on bare-backed horse propelling the song in. At the same time a swooping hurtling guitar marks the rhythm, and after some bars in comes Steve's beautiful & powerful voice. It chugs away swaying  ... and then look out for the lyric "hurricane" with the delayed "force wind" to go with it. The song rides along with 'Neil Young - Southern Man' type guitar, with guitar and voice purring and pleading that the relationship would survive. Steve hopes the relationship will "shine, shine, shine".

Is it 'Country', is it 'New Country' is it 'Americana' - it doesn't matter. Just listen to 4 minutes of sonic brilliance, and put the labels aside.