Amy Lu's View

“I Am Woman” is undeniably a classic anthem.

But my favorite Helen Reddy song, in fact, one of my all-time favorite songs, will always be “You and Me Against the World.” Maybe “favorite” isn’t the right word–it’s a song that always breaks my heart and makes me cry. So “song that makes me feel many deep feels” is more accurate but rather clunky.

Twenty years ago when I found out that my mom was dying, that song immediately popped in my head. Growing up in the 70’s, it was easy to think of that song as our theme song. I never minded that it was a titch cheesy or that all the lyrics didn’t quite fit (I’ve never been scared by a clown).

And now that “one of us is gone and one of us is left to carry on” the song gives me comfort and strength. It reminds me that’s how the world works–we lose people we love but we keep going.

It’s not surprising that “You and Me” is so affecting because it was written by Paul Williams and Kenny Ascher, the song-writing geniuses behind many Muppet hits (I learned this from Wikipedia, of course). It’s also not suprising the song is a little schmaltzy because, also according to Wikipedia, they wrote it as a “gag” song about a romantic couple. Helen apparently thought that was dumb (it would have been way sexist) and changed the perpsective of “You and Me” to a mother singing to her daughter.

In the wake of Helen Reddy’s death, I was suprised to realize (thanks Facebook!) how important her music also is to many of my friends. I guess it makes sense–I’m not the only child of the 70’s. Helen’s music was a primary topic of conversation recently for our church lunch bunch (via Zoom, of course). More specifically, we were discussing (continuing a discussion started on Facebook) about the feasibility of performing Helen’s songs for our weekly Saturday night coffee house (also via Zoom).

It turns out, Helen’s hits are harder to play and sing than I would have expected. I actually discovered this earlier this summer when I was considering learning “I Am A Woman.” The chorus is pretty straighforward, but the melody line for the rest of the song just doesn’t stick with me and there are funky bridges and whatnot. (That’s my highly technical description). And let’s face it, the line “I’m still an embryo” would be hard to sing without laughing. (However, our friend Jamie pulled the song off beautifully–tricky melody and challenging lyrics and all!)

Luckily, I also learned that Helen performed another beloved 70’s song from my youth, “Delta Dawn.” I am embarassed to say that I always thought that song was only made famous by Tanya Tucker. Not that I don’t still love Tanya’s version, but now that I know that Helen also sang it, I was able to honor Helen by attempting to perform “Delta Dawn” at our most recent coffee house. Again, I actually had been thinking about singing “Delta Dawn” at church coffee house earlier this summer, but I wasn’t sure it would be a hit with the coffee house crowd. How wrong I was! Our friend Pat brought the idea forward and it was met with enthusiastic response.

“Delta Dawn” is another “interesting” song, also not written by Helen (she did write “I Am Woman” and other hits). Why did I love it so much as a kid? Is it simply because it’s so catchy, and basically consists of the chorus over and over? (with key-changes for dramatic effect!) I don’t think I got the poignant story of a woman pining away for “days gone by.”

I thought I basically knew all the lyrics to “Delta Dawn,” but this one struck me:

“…until a man of low degree stood by her side”

–“Delta Dawn”

Huh? What is “low degree”? Try as I might “ill-repute” keeps coming out of my mouth instead. (Although I DID get it right at coffee house!) And “stood by her side” has to be the tamest euphemism ever.

That’s the power of music: Sometimes it makes sense, and sometimes it’s beyond reason. Something goofy touches us deeply.

One of my favorite lyrics is from the Hold Steady song “Stay Positive”: “The sing-along songs will be our scriptures.” I’ve never thought about that song as a description of “Delta Dawn” before, but after our most recent church virtual coffee house, I now realize it is the epitome of that. Okay, I don’t know if anyone actually sang along with me as I sang “Delta Dawn” (everyone in the audience has to be muted during a Zoom performance) but that makes it even more of an act of faith.