PZ's Picks - S&H Mar/Apr 2005
Why do I keep going back to Hal David? You know, he was the lyricist for most of Burt Bacharach’s top hits, which have “come back,” by the way, ever since Austin Powers. But why the everlasting attraction to Hal David? Well, Dionne Warwick said it in her introduction to his book of lyrics: Hal David believes in God.
It comes across again and again, that spiritual feeling. Listen again to “Alfie,” to “What the world needs now,” to “I say a little prayer (for you).” I even think there’s a reference to Mount Sinai in “What the world needs now” — not to mention the New Covenant. There is depth, in other words, to these timeless songs. Then there is “Windows of the world,” the most easylistening anti-war song that was ever recorded. And the writer meant it that way.
Oh, and I almost forgot, “Raindrops keep fallin’ on my head.” That is an explicit take on the Providence of God. Absolutely no kidding. When you and I first heard the B.J. Thomas version, it was the background to a touching little scene in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Listen to it now! It is a heartbreaking meditation on the de Caussade theme of self-abandonment to divine Providence.
I recommend Ron Isley’s 2004 release entitled “Isley Meets Bacharach,” which includes almost all of the great ones, produced by Bacharach and performed movingly by Ron Isley, who acknowledges in the liner notes his “Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” There is nothing sweeter than these songs.
On a high brow note, did you see that the 1985-86 season of The (new) Twilight Zone has just been released on DVD by CBS? Check out the episode “Little Boy Lost,” one of the few consciously “pro-life” dramas ever done on big-time TV, through the back door; and the bizarre Christmas episode by Arthur C. Clarke, of all people, entitled “The Star.” Sometimes in the genre side of life, i.e., in westerns or detective stories or sci-fi, something can be just slipped in — like Christianity, for example.
Finally, did you ever catch the Billy Graham movie entitled A Vow to Cherish? I caught it on TBN, land of the big hair, in a hotel in Florida recently — and could not believe my ears and eyes. It is a stunning movie of conversion and repentance — in the setting of a husband’s coping with his wife’s Alzheimer’s — and truly captures the way millions of us live. Total realism, interestingly enough, and total Gospel. You can buy it from his evangelistic association and it is worth five times the price.
