She was only sixteen, only sixteen But I loved her so But she was too young to fall in love And I was too young to know

Hip to be Square

“Only Sixteen” by Sam Cooke 1959

John Cougar Mellencamp’s “Ain’t Even Done With the Night” says, “You got your hands in my back pockets, and Sam Cooke's singin' on the radio”. There is a mystique about Sam Cooke.  He is a legend: a dream-like spirit of something past. His influence was deep and strong. His life was short and brilliant.

Known as the ‘King of Soul’ Sam Cooke had a profound influence on people like Aretha Franklin, Al Green, Stevie Wonder, Curtis Mayfield, and Marvin Gaye and many to follow  His soaring voice and delivery – smooth as silk; vulnerable yet strangely strong and able to take you away with it.

We sing about beauty and we sing about truth at ten thousand dollars a show

Songs Everyone Should Know

“The Cover of the Rolling Stone” by Dr. Hook & The Medicine Show (1973)

Whenever I hear Terry Jacks “Seasons in Sun” or “Cover of the Rolling Stone”, I always think of my friend Brad, who died of a brain tumor when we were 15 years old. He liked Dr. Hook and liked to sing this song.

Brad played guitar a bit and tried to show me, but I really did not have the patience for it yet, (although I would later, and his influence was definitely at work there). He liked country-influenced music mostly, like Gordon Lightfoot, Murray McLachlan, the Eagles, and Stompin’ Tom Connors. He was the one that decided that faded jean jackets looked better and that the way we would ‘fade them’ was to put our jackets in a big mud puddle in the alley and ride our motorcycles over them till they were ‘good’. It actually worked, once your disgusted Mom washed them; well except for a couple of crooked buttons.