Poisoned Hearts….

No one ever thought this one would surviveHelpless child, gonna walk a drum beat behindLock you in a dream, never let you goNever let you laugh or smile, not you.Well, I just want to walk right out of this world,'Cause everybody has a poison heartI just want to walk right out of this world,'Cause everybody has a poison heart. I know that it’s only mid October but I am going to go ahead and say it, Poison Heart is my song of the year. It’s not a recent song by any means, especially when you consider that it’s author Dee Dee Ramone has been dead a couple of years along with one of it’s early singers, Stiv Bators. I first heard this song on the Plan 9 Rock Show Podcast early in the year and have been listening to several versions of it for the past several months; it’s become an anthem for me. It’s one of those songs, along with; Legal Weapon: Time Forgot You, Radio Birdman: I 94, The Stooges: Search and Destroy and the Deadboys: Sonic Reducer that touches me in some real way that most music doesn’t these days. First off it’s a great song, it’s just so filled with emotion, and an emotion that I have come to understand more and more in this past year with things that have happened in my life. Secondly it’s one of those songs that defies genre, I have heard of course poppy punk version of it but also heavy metal takes on it (HIM anyone?) and even a Psychobilly version by The Meteors. I am waiting for the country version, cause this song is screaming out to be covered by someone with a voice like Johnny Cash’s. Johnny’s no longer with us, so Nick Cave if you are reading this… head to Nashville and do this one up right. As I said Dee Dee Ramone wrote this tune, and the it was recorded and released the first time just after his stint as a resident of my hometown, Ann Arbor MI and like the afore mentioned Stooges and Radio Birdman tunes it has something of the life in that place in the song. It’s like I know the people he’s talking about, I was growing up around them and seeing the world he wants to walk right through first hand. One last thought about Poison Heart, what is it with Finland and the song. I have come across no less than three Finish bands that cover it? HIM, The Mean Idols and a band called Private Line…So there is it my song of the year for 2006, one of the great songs from later in the Ramones career… I can’t imagine that any other tunes are going to invade my brain in the next 2 and a half months and take its place….