I can’t get a certain song off my mind – a tune from the just-released CD “Balm in Gilead” by the extraordinary and oddball Rickie Lee Jones, a totally original singer-songwriter-instrumentalist who’s been discovered, lost, and rediscovered several times (by critics, not us devotees) during her three decade career.
The new-ish song I’m luvin is ”The Moon is Made of Gold”. Jones’ signature vocal combination of whispers, mumbles, and wails comes together beautifully in this buoyant tune written by her late father Richard, a hard-drinking itinerant musician whose dreams of success didn’t include his family. His lyrics for “Moon” are cotton-candy, space-case greatness, though.
Jones has been singing “The Moon is Made of Gold” off and on in her live shows for many years now. Here’s an arguably superior live version from back in the early ‘90s.
