Happy Mother’s Day from the Daily! Here are a few songs we in the music beat will be listening to this weekend as we reflect on all the mothers in our lives. Enjoy.
“Hey Mama” by Kanye West
Benjamin Sorensen
Now I’ve never met Kanye West, but I like to imagine that in person he’s not the paparazzi thrashing, award show crashing, George Bush bashing colossal asshole that he’s made out to be by the media. It’s easy to dismiss his shameless antics and self-aggrandizing lyrics as childish and, well, you wouldn’t be wrong. But I think you’d definitely be missing the bigger picture.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2r2Fgdpj3E
Check out Kanye performing the debut of “Hey Mama” from his 2005 album “Late Registration” on the Oprah Winfrey Show. It’s not an anthem for moms, no — it’s a love song for the one and only Ms. Donda West, the woman who raised him alone, helped him get to college and who still supported him when he became music’s most famous dropout. Take a listen, watch his dorky dance, reconsider your previous notions of Kanye the megalomaniac and meet Kanye the mama’s boy.
Now, if you’re feeling brave or need to let out a few tears, move onto his performance at the 2008 Grammy Awards, featuring new lyrics, a new arrangement and a new Kanye. Just months earlier, Donda West passed away due to complications from a cosmetic surgery paid for by her son. Imagine finally being able to give your mother everything you promised during the tough times, and imagine finally being able to start repaying her sacrifices and selflessness. Now imagine all of that being taken away, suddenly and without reason. Yeah, I’d act out, too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqHxOC_kCP0
Kanye may be childish, but there’s something beautiful about the unconditional love between mother and child. “Hey Mama” is the perfect expression of that beauty and an endearing look at the best side of Kanye’s inner kid. So listen to what he has to say about Mama West as you think about what all the mothers in your life have done for you. And remember, “It don’t gotta be Mother’s Day, or your birthday, for me to just call and say… Hey Mama!”
“Fourth of July” by Sufjan Stevens
Tyler Dunston
Not to bum out your Mother’s Day, but Sufjan Stevens’ “Fourth of July,” a quietly beautiful lament for his mother in the wake of her death (from his stunning and most recent release “Carrie & Lowell”) is one of the best songs about mother and child that I’ve heard in a long time. The narrator in this song shifts from Sufjan to his mother’s voice, starting out with the startling opening line, “The evil it spread like a fever ahead / It was night when you died, my firefly / What could I have said to raise you from the dead?” Sufjan’s mother, who suffered from drug abuse and schizophrenia, who drifted in and out of Sufjan’s life, sings in turn to him, “Did you get enough love, my little dove / Why do you cry? / And I’m sorry I left, but it was for the best / Though it never felt right / My little Versailles.” Though the echoing refrain of “We’re all gonna die” announces the somber tone of the song with painful clarity, one has to admit that Sufjan Stevens’ “Fourth of July” is nothing if not a testament to the love between a mother and her son.
Whether you’re looking for a beautifully tragic depiction of the important connection between mother and child or simply a good Mother’s Day cry, Sufjan Stevens’ new album “Carrie & Lowell” (and in particular“Fourth of July”) is definitely the way to go. A departure from the impressive electronic freak-out that was 2010’s “Age of Adz,” “Carrie & Lowell” is a return to the folk roots exhibited on his earlier records like “Seven Swans” and “Michigan.” Much like the record as a whole, “Fourth of July” is not about complex arrangements or orchestral flourishes (though it is complex in its own right) – it is about personal reconciliation. Or, as Sufjan told Pitchfork Media in an interview: “It feels artless, which is a good thing. This is not my art project; this is my life.”