Photo Credit – Gretchen Pellaton
When you cue up a song titled “Highway 1”, you probably anticipate a great driving song. Greg Connors delivers with his new single, which if you let it, will take you on a journey to both your own bitter end and recreation.
“Highway 1” manages to relentlessly unbalance and rebalance its discord and flow. The lyrics have that signature Connors flair, the mercurial duplicity and winking turns of phrase.
Listen to Greg Connors’ “Highway 1” while reading the text.
I asked Connors about the deeper undercurrents, and he told me the song idea started over a Chinese dinner with friends and how they laughed about the fortune cookies. “But ultimately,” Connors says, “it’s about the paradox in each of us, how we drive to reconcile the conflicts within, and between us. It’s the crazy psychiatrist, the temporary guru, the poison pen. Whatever form it takes, THAT conflict is in all of us and how we meet it is who we are.”
The violin by Lisa Dodakian blends and surges like waves, adding to the brutal pull and thrust of the song. Like the crashing waves at Big Sur, the song becomes the parallel and perpendicular, the in-sync and oppositional, the endless chaos and slow revelation of human experience.
So if you are planning a long solitary ride anytime soon, bring Greg Connors with you! “Highway 1” may be the perfect driving song in the era of Covid-19, for rarely has it been more clear how “our fortunes match.”
greg connors music
Charming guitars over a heavenly bed of instrumentation bringing the essence of his voice to life, leaving no stone left unturned. Greg Connors shows his skills as a songwriter and performer, and a lyrical master as well.
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