Moms Music- Rod McKuen

My moms record collection (#momsrecords) is inevitably divided into two categories- artists that I love (Dylan, the Who, Donovan, etc) and artists that I hate (I will avoid naming names in case they might be some of your favorite artists). Really until recent years, I would have happily included Rod McKuen in the latter. But that is no longer the case. I attribute the Specials 2021 covers records as the catalyst (they cover the Vietnam era “Soldiers who want to be Heroes”) and so I am frankly excited to have more McKuen in my life. Now, I probably should like McKuen. I do like “Seasons in the Sun” among his most famous songs, a perennial contender for worst song of all time as made famous by Terry Jacks. I am a huge Marc Almond fan and one of his biggest influences is the Belgian singer Jacques Brel (Brel has been claimed as an influence by David Bowie, the Divine Comedy and the Manic Street Preachers to name a few of many). It was McKuen of course that brought Brel to an English speaking audience. So I should recognize “If You Go Away” as a song covered by both McKuen and Almond. McKuen compiled his Brel compositions in an compilation in 1972. Almond recorded an album of all Brel covers during some of his most fruitful solo years in 1989. McKuen’s history is an interesting and surprisingly non traditional one. He was for a time the biggest selling poet in the world. In so much as McKuen would become a LGBT+ trailblazer, that wasn’t a particularly lucrative profession (in fact of course, quite the opposite.). In hindsight, we respect that, but it wouldn’t have been much of a career benefit at the time. I suspect that as many came along and saw the many McKuen albums in garage sales and secondhand shops, they had the same impression I had. McKuen may have been popular but he was increasingly less hip as time went on. His Wikipedia entry has an entire section on how much critics hated his work) But that may be too easy, in a Slate feature on the rise and fall of McKuen, the author suggests he sees McKuen influences in artists like Richard Hell, Nirvana, and Ween. Really being surprised how much I am enjoying listening to these songs, I would say my journey into McKuen is still very much at the beginning.