Last week I gave you eight heart songs, and mentioned that there were many more I could have chosen. I avoided many of the obvious usual suspects last time but decided I should do a follow up to include some of the more familiar ones, so there may not be as many surprises for you this time. But for anyone expecting to see and hear Blondie: nope, still not going there! Maybe a part three is needed? So, what does make the cut this time around?

I always like to start with something lively, and this one fits the bill – the first of two songs by artists I haven’t played before. It was one I bought in the early days of the family owning a record player, and I still love it:

This Old Heart Of Mine was released in January 1966, and gave the Isley Brothers a #12 hit in the US. It crawled up to #47 in the UK by April, but was re-released here in late 1968 and peaked at #3 that November. That was when I bought it, I think. It was also the title track of an album the band released in May 1966, which only reached #140 in the US but did much better in the UK, getting to #23. The album’s track listing reads like a collection of classic Tamla Motown songs, many of which were hits for other bands, such as The Supremes. The label could never be accused of not getting the most mileage out of their acts’ music, could they! Rod Stewart covered the song on his 1975 album Atlantic Crossing, and it was released as a single, getting to #4 in the UK and #81 in the US. I much preferred the original version to his, though.

If I said that my next choice for today is from Bruce Springsteen, I guess that many of you might be expecting Hungry Heart, right? No, I’m not that obvious, great song though that is. I’m going with this one:

That is a fantastic live performance, and you kind of get two songs for the price of one with it. That version is from the album and concert film Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band: Live In New York City, which was recorded in June 2000 as part of the band’s reunion tour, and released as a DVD and CD in January 2001. In the music charts, it peaked at #5 in the US and #12 in the UK. The song was originally released in October 1980 on the double album The River, which peaked at #1 in the US and Canada, and at #2 in the UK. Apologies to fans of Hungry Heart, but I really had to go with this one!

I’m slowing things down a bit with this next one. The phrase ‘voice of an angel’ gets bandied around a lot, and I think this is a deserving candidate for the title:

I have played this one before but it is so beautiful that I think it is worthy of another airing: the first time was in Tuesday Tunes 43 if you’re interested. Linda Ronstadt released the album Heart Like A Wheel, of which this is the title track, in November 1974. It was a US #1, made #7 in Canada, but didn’t chart in the UK, though it spent 51 weeks in the US chart. The British record buying public has generally been very unkind to her, and her chart career here can best be described as sporadic. Given some of the rubbish that sells by the truckload here I find that simply inexplicable. I’ve always thought her voice was amazing and have many of her albums, and she has to be one of the most beautiful women ever to grace the music stage. It is so sad that she had to retire from performance in 2011, having been diagnosed with progressive supranuclear palsy and, in her own words, being ‘unable to sing a note’ now. A footnote to this one: in case you were wondering, the pianist in the video is Andrew Gold, who in addition to playing in Linda’s band produced the album from which this came. He has also featured in this series, in episode 22 if you’d like to see it again.

This next one is from a guy who I’ve played several times before, whose music I really enjoy:

Straight From The Heart was released on Bryan Adams’ third album, Cuts Like A Knife, in January 1983. The album reached #8 in both the US and his native Canada, and made it to #21 in the UK. This song was released in February as the lead single from the album, and peaked at #10 in the US, #20 in Canada, but only #51 in the UK. We were a little slow off the mark with him! It is one of his most recognisable songs and is still a concert favourite nearly forty years on, as you can tell from this video.

I wanted to include Neil Young in this post. The obvious choice would be to go with Heart Of Gold but I’ve already played that twice in this series. Luckily, he has another lovely heart song:

Only Love Can Break Your Heart was a track on Neil’s third album, After The Goldrush, released in September 1970, which made #8 in the US and #7 in the UK. Over time it has been rather overshadowed by the massive success of his next album – that Heart Of Gold one – but if you don’t know this album I can recommend it highly: there are several really great songs on it. This song was supposedly written for Graham Nash after Nash’s split from Joni Mitchell, though according to Wikipedia Neil “has been somewhat tentative in admitting or remembering this” in interviews. It was released as a single in October 1970, and gave him first top 40 hit as a solo artist, peaking at #33 in the US, but it didn’t make the UK chart.

John Mellencamp is another long time favourite of mine and has featured here several times before, most recently in Tuesday Tunes 95. He has given us a couple of heart songs, and this is probably my favourite, even if it has to be an audio only clip:

As the video shows, Void In My Heart was a track on his Big Daddy album, which was released in May 1989. I think that is probably my favourite of his albums, though I have them all and it is a difficult choice to make! It has a nice, rootsy feel throughout, and this song is typical of that. The album peaked at #7 in the US and is his highest ranked here in the UK where it got to #25, though that was later matched by one of his compilation albums. This track wasn’t released as a single, hence the absence of a video for it, but it is part of a fine album – another that comes highly recommended by me.

Looking back over previous posts I was a little surprised to see that I have never played anything by Buddy Holly. He has a couple of well-known heart songs – Raining In My Heart is one, and this is another:

Heartbeat was released as a single in November 1958, when it reached #30 in the UK but only got to #82 in the US, though it did make #4 on their R&B chart – which I guess was defined differently in those days. It was included on the first compilation album of his music, The Buddy Holly Story, released less than a month after his death in February 1959, which reached #11 in the US and #2 in the UK. There have been many cover versions of the song, perhaps most notably for British readers the version by the actor Nick Berry, which was used as the theme tune for the long-running Heartbeat tv series. Berry’s version made it to #2 over here on the strength of the tv show’s popularity. Other covers include those by the rock band Humble Pie, which is very good, and Cilla Black, which isn’t. The long list also includes The Hollies, who named themselves after him, P.J. Proby, Tommy Roe, and Cliff Richard (bloody hell, not him again!).

I’m leaving you today with a piece of real class, and a song which means a lot to me personally – I played it a lot after my divorce. Not that there were three people in our marriage, it was just that the lyrics speak of the need to move on, and to forgive. This live performance is, not to put too fine a point on it, exceptional:

Having said that about the video I’m hoping that you will be able to see it, given Don Henley’s record company’s stringent policing of his and The Eagles’ songs on YouTube. In case not, here is a link to an audio-only official live performance from 1993 – I hope it works, as a previous attempt didn’t! I have also found another video of a live performance: here is the link and again, I hope it works for you. Don Henley released Heart Of The Matter as the closing track on his third solo album, The End Of The Innocence, in June 1989. It reached #8 in the US and #17 in the UK, and in my view it is utterly wonderful, and includes four of the best 5+ minute tracks ever recorded. Listen to this one, the title track, New York Minute, and Last Worthless Evening and tell me you disagree if you dare! This one was also released as a single, peaking at #21 in the US and at #9 in Canada, but it didn’t make the UK chart. It is interesting that the audio link is to The Eagles, as this video was recorded on 30 March 1990 in a show which MTV billed as being a solo Don Henley effort, rather than a band show: they had yet to reform at this point after their 1980 break up. The song was, as I said, the closing track on its album, and I think it is a suitable closing piece for today’s tunes too.

That’s all for my second set of heart songs. There are still so many I could play so I may well return to this theme at some point. But not next week: I have something different in mind for that. Watch this space! In the meantime I expect I’ll be back with another post later this week to fill the gap until next Tuesday, if I could decide what it will be. I have several ‘occasional series’ that I have neglected for quite some time, so maybe I’ll return to one of those. Who knows? I certainly don’t! Until then, I wish you well and I hope that you are getting ready for a lovely Easter weekend. Take care 😊