To a large swath of people, Randy Newman is known as the man responsible for the bouncy soundtracks of famous animated movies like Toy Story and many others. And there’s no doubt that his work on films, both scoring them and providing individual songs, has been substantial and impactful. But Newman is also one of the most influential singer/songwriters of his generation. Even though he didn’t churn out hit singles (with one odd exception, which we’ll get to in a bit), he built a massive legacy as a songwriter’s songwriter and a critical darling. Here are eight songs, which span from the beginning of his career to his most recent releases, that are crucial to that legacy.
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1. ”Mama Told Me Not to Come” (from the album 12 Songs, 1970)
Many Newman songs had been covered by others throughout the ‘60s. On his second studio album, 12 Songs (1970), Newman, with his sly vocal stylings that tended to hone in on the irony and satire inherent in many of his lyrics, demonstrated he was the best delivery system for those songs. But that didn’t stop others from covering him, and when Three Dog Night did their version of “Mama Told Me Not to Come,” about a party gone horribly awry, and made it a massive hit (also in 1970), Newman’s profile rose significantly as a result.
2. “Political Science” (from Sail Away, 1972)
Sail Away was the Newman album that really set the critical world ablaze. It characterized his willingness to write from the perspective of narrators who were often unlikable. In the case of “Political Science,” he used his disarming humor to make the case for, well, disarming-ness. To make his point about the folly of nuclear weapons, he sings the song from the perspective of a warmonger. It showed his fearlessness with topical material, a trait he’s carried ever since.
[RELATED: 4 Songs You Didn’t Know Randy Newman Wrote For Other Artists]
3. “Louisiana 1927” (from the album Good Old Boys, 1974)
Newman had initially intended Good Old Boys to be a concept album about the American South, replete with a narrative running through it. Although he scrapped that idea, several of the songs on the record were still about the region, including this stunner about a historic flood. It works as history, but it wouldn’t be a Newman song without some social commentary, as he makes clear that the damage was felt much more acutely by the poor. Not to mention that it’s one of the most achingly beautiful songs you’ll ever hear.
4. “Short People” (from the album Little Criminals, 1977)
Newman took a lot of heat for this tongue-in-cheek track. People took the lyrics at face value and thought he was making fun. In actuality, the song is a satire aimed at anyone who would knock a group of people for being different in any way. In any case, it is the one undeniable hit single released under his own name, which means that his exposure as an artist wouldn’t have been quite the same without it.
5. “I Love L.A.” (from the album Trouble in Paradise, 1983)
People criticized “Short People” because they missed the underlying message. A lot of those same folks likely heard the gleaming production and booming chorus of “I Love L.A.” and missed some of the irony hidden in the song’s nooks and crannies. For example, there’s nothing too anthemic or celebratory about a line like Look at that bum over there, man, he’s down on his knees. You get the feeling Newman relishes sneaking in that subtext any time this song comes blaring out of Tinseltown sports arena speakers.
6. “It’s Money That Matters” (from Land of Dreams, 1988)
Newman was back in the vein of “I Love L.A.” with this track, using an accessible rock arrangement to draw listeners in to his acerbic message (and it worked, in that the song did well on rock radio.) Mark Knopfler provides the lead guitar wending its way through the track (and also sings backing vocals with Jeff Lynne and Tom Petty). Newman’s point might not be revelatory, but just the fact that he’s willing to build a song around such a non-romantic notion says a lot about his guts as a writer.
7. “I Miss You” (from Bad Love, 1999)
Newman has taken on a lot of different off-kilter topics through the years, but he has generally reserved some space on each record for matters of the heart. On Bad Love, which brought him back from an album-making hiatus of 11 years, he tackles that subject on “I Miss You,” one of the most affecting and honest songs about divorce, and more specifically, the way most exes might be out of sight but never quite out of mind.
8. “Wandering Boy” (from Dark Matter, 2017)
Get out your handkerchiefs before listening to this one, which shows that Newman hasn’t lost either his way with a piano melody or his knack for simple yet cutting lines. “Wandering Boy” borrows a title from an old hymn but tackles a very modern problem: how even kids born into fortunate circumstances can lose their way, and how such a circumstance absolutely devastates the families of those kids.
Photo by RB/Redferns
