THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE: He'd Be A Diamond

Adapted from a couple of  earlier pieces, I prepped this as a chapter for my long-threatened book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). It's not in the book's current blueprint; I've tweaked it a bit here, and I may return to it at some future point.

An infinite number of tracks can each be THE greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Today, this is THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE!

THE BEVIS FROND: He'd Be A Diamond
Written by Nick Saloman
Produced by Nick Saloman
From the album New River Head, Woronzow Records [UK], 1991

What a truly awful feeling: that sick, twisted ache inside when we realize we've messed things up beyond any possible hope of redemption.

And we know every last miserable bit of it is our own stupid fault.

I discovered the music of British singer, musician, and songwriter Nick Saloman (dba the Bevis Frond) through the Dana half of This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl. The Bevis Frond did a benefit for our overlords Syracuse Community Radio in the '90s, and the Frond's been a perennial TIRnRR pick over the two decades and change of whatever the hell it is we do. 

"He'd Be A Diamond" is the most powerful post-breakup song I know. Its heartbroken storyline is devastating, delivered casually in the third person, but no less harrowing, no less desperate, no less striking in its depiction of a faithless ex-lover who has seen the error of his ways far too late to make one damned bit of difference.

As an observer of the human condition, Saloman writes and sings with wry, weary understanding of this guy we all know (and have occasionally been), the schmuck who fell from grace because he screwed up, screwed around, or otherwise just thwarted his own best interests in scorched-earth fashion. No woman in her right mind would take that guy back again.

And yet still he pleads, and he swears by all the saints, that if he had his chance again, he'd be a diamond. You wanna feel sorry for him...but he has no one to blame except his own chuckleheaded self.

When you turn your back
You still see what's behind you
And when you start afresh
You still think of days gone by
And when a heart is broken
It still goes on pumping
And he told me just last night
That if he had his chance again
He'd be a diamond

The lyrics. Y'know, I'm primarily a melody guy, a song and dance man, slave to the rhythm and the feel and the hook. I generally sing along with snappy tunes as if all lyrics were la la la showaddywaddy shamalama ping pong. But these lyrics? I wish to God I had written them. I can't imagine a more eloquent expression of longing and regret. A diamond indeed.

But diamond or not: it's too late.

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Carl's new book Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones is now available, courtesy of the good folks at Rare Bird Books. Gabba Gabba YAY!! https://rarebirdlit.com/gabba-gabba-hey-a-conversation-with-the-ramones-by-carl-cafarelli/

If it's true that one book leads to another, my next book will be The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). Stay tuned. Your turn is coming.

This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, streaming at SPARK stream and on the Radio Garden app as WESTCOTT RADIO. Recent shows are archived at Westcott Radio. You can read about our history here.

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