"This song is about Vincent van Gogh," he told me, one sunny Lake Powell day during one of our McLean marathons. It was also my dad who first informed me that McLean's most popular song, 'American Pie', was about a plane crash that killed three of his favorite artists. Sadly, I have no personal associations between my dad and those artists, but I think it's just as well. The singer/songwriters that are included here have a much more realistic view of things than those '50's and early '60's artists: those songs are all just too damn happy.

I thought about including 'American Pie' itself but didn't for a few reasons. Firstly, the song is fairly cliché as some sort of patriotic celebration song (even though it, at least to me, clearly has nothing to do with either of these notions). Secondly, the song holds meaning for me as a piece of sad poetry in its own right and I didn't want to confuse and compound my various sadnesses. Thirdly, it is less about the death of a man (or men, even), and more about the death of a (lacking for a better term) movement. That is--and forgive me if this seems inappropriate--'American Pie' is, I think, bigger than any one man. And finally, it talks about Chevrolet in a positive light, and I don't think my dad much approved of that!

So, 'Vincent' it is. It strikes me as quite possible that if 'American Pie' didn't actually mention the word 'American' that its success would be much lessened. To gauge the quality of 'Vincent' based on the two song's respective popularity, therefore, would be fallacious: they are both poetic masterpieces. It's just that we Americans don't much care about Vincent van Gogh and, as the song says, "Perhaps we never will."

At any rate, it is not a stretch--quite the opposite, in fact--for me to think about my dad when I listen to 'Vincent', and that alone justifies its inclusion here. I can only hope you enjoy it as much as I do.