COWBOY

Listen to COWBOY by Harry Nilsson.

It may be that I have the best, most successful blog on the internet...but what I would really like is to have the best, most successful blog on the internet about Harry Nilsson. Unfortunately, that market has been pretty well covered. If you click over here, you'll see what I mean.

So, it may not make sense to do the whole blog about Harry, or even a two week series, but that doesn't mean we can't post one of his songs every now and then. Today, I wanted to share one of the tunes from "Nilsson Sings Newman," which, on most days, is my favorite Harry Nilsson album.

At the end of the day, I picked Cowboy. And I picked it solely for what this recent review of the album called the only anachronistic moment on the record. Let me quote: "'Nilsson Sings Newman' is 30 years old, and, with the exception of the Incense-and-Peppermints-style harpsichord during the fadeout of Cowboy, it sounds like it could have been recorded last week."

That harpsichord fadeout simply blows. me. away. I don't know why. Something about the song, about Harry's vocal, about how the part comes out of nowhere, about how the player (Randy Newman, presumably) pauses an instant just after starting.

I don't know. Obviously, it leaves some people on the internet cold (see above). But it's one of my favorite musical moments.

Photo: Grey units (1).