Weekly Finale: Hazy Shade of Winter

With the long July 4th weekend upon us, welcome to this week's musical finale. Note that I will not be blogging until Wednesday (July 5th) of next week.

For this week's, I am offering up one of the great songs in rock history, Simon & Garfunkel's "Hazy Shade of Winter":



While Simon & Garfunkel's version only made it to number 13 on the billboard charts, the Bangles' cover for the 1987 movie Less Than Zero made it all the way to number 2. This is one case where the charts got it right, because the Bangles' cover kicks up the rock aspect of the song to maximum:



However, there is one aspect about the Bangles' cover that most people don't notice. It omits five lines from the fourth verse (omitted lines are in red bold):

Ahhh, seasons change with the scenery
Weaving time in a tapestry
Won't you stop and remember me
At any convenient time?
Funny how my memory skips
While looking over manuscripts
Of unpublished rhyme
Drinking my vodka and lime
I look around
Leaves are brown now
And the sky is a hazy shade of winter

It is a credit to the arrangement that this goes unnoticed.

Overall, "Hazy Shade of Winter" is one of those songs which is hard to screw up, and I am surprised more people haven't done covers of it. Even the worst covers I've heard were at least easy on the ears.

That is all for me this week. Enjoy the 4th of July weekend with your vodka and lime, or whatever your drink of choice is, this weekend. I will return Wednesday.