Snapshots #212: A Top Ten Songs About Famous Painters

All yesterday's songs were about famous artists. Let me paint you a picture of the answers...

Special mention must go to the amazing Jonathan Richman who has written more songs about famous artists than anyone else. But he's featured here recently, and I'm running out of clues that link back to him...

Jonathan Richman - Pablo Picasso

Jonathan Richman - No One Was Like Vermeer

Jonathan Richman - Salvador Dali

Jonathan Richman - Vincent Van Gogh

10. Wilson & McDonald.

Brian Wilson & Michael McDonald!

A song about L.S. Lowry...

Brian & Michael - Matchstalk Men & Matchstalk Cats & Dogs

9. Davina, Holly, Dermot.

They're all Television Personalities.

And these guys love artists almost as much as Jonathan Richman...

Television Personalities - Salvador Dali's Garden Party

Television Personalities - David Hockney's Diaries

Television Personalities - Lichtenstein Painting

8. What if Emma & Richard were identical?

Emma Thompson & Richard Thompson are not twins.

The Thompson Twins - Salvador Dali's Car

7. A wee riddle, and jailhouse singer.

A Jimmy Riddle, and Webb Pierce (who sang In The Jailhouse Now).

Jimmy Webb - Paul Gauguin In The South Seas

6. George C. Scott & Joanne Woodward.

George C. Scott & Joanne Woodward appeared together in the film They Might Be Giants.

They Might Be Giants - Meet James Ensor 

5. Is Len nine?

Anagram!

Neil Innes - I Like Cézanne

4. Tearjerkers.

The Weepies - Painting By Chagall

3. Piano slum.

Anagram!

Paul Simon - Rene and Georgette Magritte with Their Dog After the War

2. Supporters of angst, kicks and wasteland.

Fans of teenage angst, teenage kicks and the teenage wasteland...

Teenage Fanclub - Escher

1. Mafia boss is spotless host.

The Don is a clean M.C.

No need to be a moaner, Lisa... Snapshots will be back next Saturday. Don't cut your ear off before then.

My Top Ten Famous Artist Songs

Inspired by a recent blogpost by Kellogsville, here's my Top Ten songs about people who were good with a paintbrush...


10. Dar Williams - Mark Rothko Song

Dar Williams wanders around a gallery with a friend, admires the Renoirs and muses on the sad death of Mark Rothko. Some folks were born with a foot in the grave...

9. Counting Crows - When I Dream Of Michelangelo

And I dream of Michelangelo when I'm lying in my bed
I see god upon the ceiling I see angels overhead
And he seems so close as he reaches out his hand
But we are never quite as close as we are led to understand

8. Manic Street Preachers - Interiors (Song for Willem de Kooning)

From the album that made them household names... and yet, still they wrote songs like this.

7. Teenage Fanclub - Escher

And I don't know if I'm
going up or down, with you
Don't know if I'm coming
going up or down with you
But I don't mind

6. David Bowie - Andy Warhol 

Apparently, Warhol didn't approve. Which is kinda fitting.

See also Andy Warhol's Dead by Transvision Vamp.

5. Brian & Michael - Matchstalk Men & Matchstalk Cats & Dogs

Manchester's most beloved artist, L S Lowry, gave local lads Brian & Michael (aka Michael Coleman and... erm... Kevin Parrott) an unexpected Number One at the height of punk in 1978. The charts used to be SO much more unpredictably interesting than they are now.

4. Jimmy Webb - Paul Gaugin In The South Seas

I make no secret of the fact that I consider Jimmy Webb one of the greatest songwriters to ever walk the earth, although his songs are usually more famous when performed by others. This one's all Jimmy though. Lovely.

3. Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers - Pablo Picasso 

In which Mr. Richman finds a truly wonderful rhyme for the name of one of the art world's most famous sons...

Well some people try to pick up girls
And get called assholes
This never happened to Pablo Picasso
He could walk down your street
And girls could not resist his stare and
So Pablo Picasso was never called an asshole

Jonathan Richman also wrote a song about Van Gogh. But someone else beat him to that...

2. Don McLean - Vincent

How you suffered for your sanity...

1. Paul Simon - Rene & Georgette Magritte With Their Dog After The War

I always thought that was a funny name for a dog.

A beautifully evocative tribute to not only the Belgian surrealist painter, his missus and their dog... but also a host of 50s doo-wop bands Simon imagines might populate the Magritte's record collection.




I also found songs about Dali, Hopper and Toulouse Lautrec... but which one is hanging on your wall?