A Song for Each Letter of My Name Because It’s a Challenge!

This challenge from Pierce McIntyre is pretty easy for me because I have only four letters in my name. But that first letter… Instead of making it complicated, I decided to do it the easy way by using the only song with my actual name in the title.

J for “Judy in Disguise (with Glasses)” — Great romantic love songs have been written about girls with names ranging from Michelle to Sherry to Angie. My name? I’m stuck with this. John Fred and His Playboy Band reached number 1 on the U.S. charts with this thing in 1968. It’s a parody of the Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” which John Fred reportedly misheard as “Lucy in Disguise with Diamonds.” When mistakes get you a gold record, I guess it’s okay.

U for “Unison” — This Bjork song really speaks to me. It’s about an introvert who is doing just fine, thank you, but then she meets someone who she realizes she wants to allow into her life, and she freaks out about it a little. It has one of the greatest introvert lines in the history of the universe, “I thrive best hermit style.” Tell me, introverts, that you’re not going “THIS!” when you read that.

D for “Dreams” — This Fleetwood Mac hit from 1977 was the 45 I’d play over and over (and over) as a kid. What was it about this song? The hypnotic lyrics that didn’t seem to make much sense, crystal visions, heartbeats driving you mad, inaccurate meteorological statements… It turns out Stevie Nicks wrote this about her broken relationship with Lindsay Buckingham (and it’s far from being the only Fleetwood Mac song about that subject matter.) But for the rest of us, that’s merely a MacGuffin that launched one of the most memorable songs of the 70s.

Y is for “Yellow” — Whenever I mentioned Sheila E. to anybody back in the day, I’d shortly thereafter have to correct them: “No, that’s Sheena Easton. I’m talking about SHEILA E.” Escovedo is the name, she’s a percussionist and singer, and a protégé and one-time girlfriend of Prince. In the 80s she had hits with “The Glamorous Life” and “A Love Bizarre.” Most of her songs were dance tunes with lyrics about love and sex (with Prince’s influence what would you expect?) “Yellow” is from her second album and while it’s not much to dance to, it has memorable (but generally clean) lyrics you won’t soon forget.