“The Trick [Album Vesion]” Playlist

Originally written in 1993, “The Trick” is one of the oldest tracks on the MEMOIRS OF A MANWHORE: THE REELING WALTZ OF A DRUNKEN LOTHARIO album. The first official recording, however, is the MEMOIRS rendition, for which Adam Silverstein devised an arrangement so perfectly Billy Joel that you’d have thought that it was a lost track from the Piano Man’s Turnstiles album.

Consequently, there’s not a whole lot surprising about this playlist, but there is an awful lot of great music, not just from Billy Joel (and particularly his TURNSTILES album). There’s Elton John, Janis Ian, Jackson Browne, and Carole King for the 70s songwriter crowd, but there are the jangly 90s bands whose narratives heavily influenced what I was writing at the same time I was writing “The Trick,” such as the Gin Blossoms and Counting Crows. Furthermore, you have the more left-of-center takes on the singer/songwriter role that a little Warren Zevon provides, and the harmonics of Hall and Oates and Fleetwood Mac. There’s the exquisite production value of Electric Light Orchestra and early solo Stevie Nicks, and the more contemporary songwriting of Ben Folds, Keane, and Marc Cohn.

Here’s the playlist itself AT THIS LINK. It’s on Spotify, and you can listen for free as often as you like, so please do. An share the link with your friends as it’ll help bring one of my songs to people in a milieu in which all the other music is familiar and often beloved.

P.S. The image above comes from a home safety article which you can find here, just to give credit where credit is due.

THE TRICK LYRICS

I couldn’t give myself over to your idea of love. I woke up one too many times hung over in the tub.

The trick is learning not to bleed or wear your heart upon your sleeve, Not to care enough to grieve for a world gone wrong without redress. You give your mind to too much thought and realize what you haven’t got ’Til the bottom of the barrel is the only thing that blurs this mess.

Maybe I’ve reduced my prospects. Maybe I’ve incensed my bile, But misery’s an art form and I suffer with such style.

Afraid of life and bored with death, a generation sleeps and sluts. Philosophy’s a waste of breath and Plato died of paper cuts.