Cowboy Songs...

It took me forever, but I finally got around to seeing Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid. This was sparked largely by my current obsession with all things Brill Building (and related 60s pop), and my curiosity over said film's much-heralded Burt Bacharach-scored musical sequences.

Anyhow, it didn't disappoint on any level. Great well-paced film, and the tuneful sequences were every bit as great (and innovative) as I'd heard. Obviously I was familiar with "Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head", and was pleased to discover that I actually enjoyed it in the context of pretty moving pictures... But there was another tune that seemed really familiar. It centers around this little five-note motif, a kinda wistful little thing thing, and it nagged at me for all of thirty seconds before I figured out why I knew it- because it's virtually identical to the opening of The Eagles' "Desperado".

Which is both fitting, and kinda awesome. I mean, if you're gonna write a sad cowboy song, you may as well steal from the best... A relatively recent film that redefined the bandit-as-hero archetype is a great place to start. Plus, you can't go wrong cribbing from Bacharach.

And this isn't in any way to disparage "Desperado". After the opening notes, it takes off in a direction all its own; a killer melody coupled with a lyric that sketches a maximum of mood and surrounding while leaving the character at the center a near-total enigma. (Which is a oddly effective trick, allowing the listener to identify with both the subject's and the narrator's perspective.)

And of course, I would be hugely remiss if I didn't now point you towards the definitive version of "Desperado"... As performed by a nine-year-old girl in 1977, delivered with absolute earnestness and conviction, heartbreaking in a way that Henley-Frey-&-Company couldn't imagine.

Listen to the gunslingin' goodness here.