The 500 - #93 - Sign O' The Times - Prince

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by New York-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

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Album: #93

Album Title: Sign O' The Times

Artist: Prince

Genre: Funk, Soul, R&B, Rock, Avant-Pop

Recorded: Multiple Studios

Released: March, 1987

My age at release: 21

How familiar was I with it before this week: Several songs

Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, at #45 - rising 48 spots

Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Sign O' The Times

As an educator, I am always chasing the perfect school year. I suspect most teachers do the same. Perfection in the classroom, however, is not necessarily defined by the highest grades or the fewest challenges.

It is the year when everything seems to click. The curriculum feels alive, students are excited and engaged, relationships are strong and the classroom becomes imbued with creativity, laughter, curiosity and growth through learning.

In this ideal environment, students all get along, avoiding the social drama that often befalls adolescents; they collaborate respectfully and productively. The teacher leaves work exhausted, but it is the satisfying kind of exhaustion that comes from knowing he or she is doing exactly what they were meant to do.

Of course, teaching rarely unfolds according to plan. External factors can quickly alter the trajectory of a promising year. Contract disputes, difficult parent interactions, administrative changes, staffing reorganizations, or even a global pandemic can derail momentum.

Sometimes, the obstacles come from within. Lessons that looked brilliant on paper fail to connect. Classroom dynamics never quite develop as hoped. A teacher can spend months refining a series of engaging, creative lessons only to have them met with unimpressed, blank stares. Sometimes it takes months to connect with a group of students, and a few "Negative Nancys" can steer others away from success, torpedoing lessons and activities with their resistance, cynicism and disengagement.

Even so, most teachers can identify a few years that stand above the rest. For me, one of those years was 2004-05 with a Grade 8 class at Lorne Avenue Public School in London, Ontario. Another was 2016-17 at Eagle Heights Public School. That year actually began with considerable uncertainty. I started with a Grade 5/6 split class before a school reorganization in October forced everyone to start over.
In many ways, it felt like building a classroom community twice within the span of a few months. Yet the class that emerged from that upheaval was exceptional. The students were funny, adventurous, creative and eager to learn. Looking back, it remains one of the most enjoyable years of my career.

The challenge with a year like that is not surviving it but surmounting the obstacles. Once you have experienced a truly satisfactory year, it becomes the measuring stick for every year that follows. Whether admitting it or not, with the onset of the following school year, teachers hope lightning strikes twice. We are encouraged by memories of spontaneous moments of humour, class discussions that took on a life of their own, and the projects that exceeded every expectation. We become convinced that if we work hard enough, plan carefully enough, and bring enough energy to the classroom, we can recreate the experience. However, the bar is set quite high -- perhaps unfairly for the new group.

The reality, however, is that every class has its own personality. The conditions that made one year magical can never be perfectly duplicated. Different students bring different strengths, interests, and challenges. What worked beautifully with one group may leave another group completely unmoved. Teachers know this intellectually, but emotionally we often find ourselves comparing new experiences against our personal high-water marks.

I imagine entertainment legend Prince faced a similar challenge after 1984.

With the release of his sixth studio record, Purple Rain (#76 on The 500), Prince became one of the biggest stars on the planet. The album generated massive hits including When Doves Cry, Let's Go Crazy, and the explosive title track. The accompanying narrative concert film of the same name was a commercial success, and Prince found himself occupying a rare position in popular culture: He was not simply successful; he was defining the musical landscape of the mid-1980s. For many artists, a project of that magnitude would have represented the unquestioned peak of their careers.

His next two albums, Around the World in a Day and Parade, were also hits by any reasonable standard. They contained memorable songs, showcased Prince's expanding musical interests, and sold well. However, they existed in the enormous shadow cast by Purple Rain. Critics and fans inevitably compared them to the album that had turned Prince into a cultural phenomenon. Fairly or unfairly, there was a growing sense that Prince's greatest work might already be behind him.

Then came Sign O' the Times. Rather than attempting to recreate Purple Rain, Prince took a different approach. He broadened his creative scope, embraced experimentation, and produced an album that showcased every facet of his artistry. Across its 16 tracks, he moved effortlessly between funk, rock, soul, pop, psychedelia and gospel influences, infusing the whole with social commentary. The title track examined AIDS, gang violence, poverty, drug addiction and the threat of nuclear annihilation with a seriousness rarely found in mainstream pop music. Elsewhere, songs such as If I Was Your Girlfriend, U Got the Look, The Ballad of Dorothy Parker and I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man, demonstrated an artist operating at the height of his creativity and confidence.

Many Prince fans and music critics now consider Sign O' the Times to be his masterpiece. It lacks the commercial footprint of Purple Rain, but it offers a more complete portrait of the artist. It captures Prince at his most adventurous, ambitious and fearless. Instead of trying to repeat a previous triumph, he pushed himself into new territory and created something even more enduring.

There is probably a lesson there for teachers. The goal is not to recreate our perfect year. The conditions that produced it no longer exist, and the students who made it special have moved on. Our task is to bring the lessons we learned from those experiences into the present and remain open to fresh possibilities. If we spend all our energy chasing the past, we risk missing the unique opportunities sitting right in front of us. I thought about that a lot over the summer shutdown as I began preparing for the new Grade 7 students I will work with in the 2026/27 school year.

Sometimes, the years we remember most are our Purple Rain years. Sometimes, however, our greatest work arrives only after we stop trying to repeat old successes and face the challenge of creating something new. Sign O' the Times is the sound of Prince doing exactly that.

The 500 - #105 - Modern Sounds In Country And Western Music, Volumes 1 & 2 - Ray Charles

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by New York-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

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Album: #105

Album Title: Modern Sounds In Country and Western Music, Volumes 1 &2

Artist: Ray Charles

Genre: Country reimagined as soul, gospel, R&B, Countrypolitan

Recorded: Capital Studios, New York City, and United Western, Hollywood U.S.A.

Released: March, 1962

My age at release: I was not born

How familiar was I with it before this week: Not at all, although I did know many songs as country standards.

Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, at #127, dropping 22 spots

Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: You Are My Sunshine

This week’s post may be shorter than most, though not for lack of material. If anything, it’s the opposite. June has arrived in that familiar blur that every teacher recognizes, bringing with it the convergence of deadlines, celebrations, and the steady hum of unfinished work. It is an annual rite as the school year ends with a torrent of urgency and anxiety that need to be dealt with. Report cards are being finalized, major projects are arriving in quick succession, and my desk has become an archaeological site of rubrics, feedback sheets, and half-drunk coffees.

My workspace - captured Saturday, June 6 at 1:40 pm.

In Science, my Grade 7s have been building cardboard arcade games as part of our Form and Function unit. The Makerspace is filled with ramps, levers, targets, and the constant classroom  negotiation over design ambition and structural reality.

One of the cardboard arcade games.

Upstairs, my Grade 6s have been writing standardized tests set by the provincial government of Ontario. When students get downtime from these mandatory assessments, I keep them busy with a unit based on Star Wars. It connects to their Science unit on the principles of flight. All of this in preparation for our year-end trip to see The Mandalorian and Grogu.

Poster for The Mandalorian and Grogu.

At the same time, the class has zig-zagged across the globe through Season 35 of The Amazing Race, using each leg of the reality show race as a springboard into geography and social studies. The Grade 6's, in particular, have been digging into Canada’s trading partners, trying to make sense of how goods  and resources move across borders, building international relationships. Balancing two curriculums simultaneously is always a challenge at this time of year. It feels like trying to keep multiple spinning plates on sticks while someone adds more.

Promotional poster for The Amazing Race.

In the middle of all this, life beyond school continues. This weekend,  my dad and his wife visited  to attend my nephew’s wedding. The pace was different, with the usual domestic routines subjugated to conversation, shared meals, car juggling and the small rituals that come with having family nearby. In that environment, It’s in that space, somewhere between a cluttered table of school reports, assignment marking,  blog writing, and formal wear preparation, that this week’s album found its place to shine.

Album cover for Modern Sounds - Volume 1.

Ray Charles’ Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music played in the background throughout the weekend, fitting this moment in a way that last week’s record could not. As much as I appreciated Rocket to Russia, it’s not exactly built for easy conversation over dinner. Ray Charles, on the other hand, perfectly suited the mood. It’s the kind of music that doesn’t demand your full attention, but satisfies it when you give it. More importantly, it’s the kind of record my dad and his wife genuinely seemed to enjoy.

Album cover for Modern Sounds - Volume 2.

Released six months apart, but now available as a single album set, Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music, falls into a category that was new to me: "Countrypolitan". It’s a style that sits at the intersection of country and pop.

Poster for a Countrypolitan Radio Station
Orlando, Florida, 1965.

A helpful overview on Wikipedia traces this shift back to the early 1960s, when the polished Nashville sound began to face serious competition from two very different directions. On the country side, the raw, stripped-down Bakersfield sound pushed back against established country music's slickness, while on the pop front, the British Invasion reshaped music tastes entirely. These developments were deeply affected by the tragic deaths of two of Nashville’s leading voices -- Patsy Cline and Jim Reeves, both lost in separate plane crashes.

Record cover for Nashville Sound, featuring Cline and Reeves.

In response, Nashville doubled down on refinement. This new sound evolved into countrypolitan, a smoother, more commercially minded style characterized by lush string arrangements, full orchestras, and frequent adornment of  rich background vocals often provided by choirs. The goal was clearly to appeal to mainstream audiences.

A Countrypolitan Record from 1966.

Enter Ray Charles, who prized these Country and Western music standards for their melody and directness of their lyrics. However, it is important to note that Charles was not asked to create a Countrypolitan sound. He chose to reimagine these songs by replacing "fiddle and steel" arrangements by adding strings, horns and backing vocals. He also infused elements of gospel, R&B and soul into these orchestrations. It was textbook Countrypolitan, but Charles got there independently.

Ray Charles performing live with an orchestra.

Listening to Charles' Modern Country now, in the middle of a chaotic June weekend, it’s striking how effortless it feels. One wouldn't think this was a record that was challenging expectations. It sounds natural and comfortable; as if it has always belonged.  It is another reminder that makes working through The 500 so compelling. I came into this project thinking I’d be revisiting familier and discovering new artists. What I didn’t expect was how often I’d be reframing what I thought I already knew. An album I had never listened to before this week turns out to be a bridge, between country and soul, between markets, between generations, and, in a small way, between my classroom chaos and a weekend spent with family.

I guess the post wasn't that short after all. Regardless, it is back to report cards and family visits.

The 500 - #107 - Portrait of a Legend - Sam Cooke

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by New York-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

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Album: #107
Album Title: Portrait of a Legend (1951-1964)
Artist: Sam Cooke
Genre: Soul, R&B, Gospel
Recorded: Multiple Studios

Released: June, 2004
My age at release: 39, but songs were recorded before I was born
How familiar was I with it before this week: Fairly
Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, at #307, dropping 200 spots

Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: A Change Is Gonna Come

There are songs we attach to artists. These are the signature pieces that feel inseparable from the person who recorded them. You hear the opening notes and you don’t just think of the song, you think of them. A few that immediately come to mind for me...(and are also, unsurprisingly, on The 500 list) include:

• Born To Run - Bruce Springsteen
• Purple Rain - Prince
• Bohemian Rhapsody - Queen
• Stairway To Heaven - Led Zeppelin
• (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction - Rolling Stones

And then there are few, legendary songs that don't quite stay put. They still belong to an artist, but they outgrow him or her. They become something else...something that doesn’t feel locked to a single moment or a single voice.

It is often said that "history repeats itself". I’ve never been sure that’s true and  believe it is more accurate to say that "history echoes". The same shapes return, the same tensions surface, but never in exactly the same way. Some songs work like that, too. They don’t just mark a moment, they wait for the next one. Such is the case I will make for A Change Is Gonna Come, the 29th track on the 30 song anthology from Sam Cooke, Portrait of a Legend (1951-1964).

Label to the 45 RPM single for A Change Is Gonna Come.

The story of this song began on October 8, 1963. Sam Cooke and his entourage of musicians and family members arrived in Shreveport, Louisiana for a pre-booked reservation at the local Holiday Inn. They had just finished performing as the headliners at the Municipal Auditorium on a bill that included many other African American artists.

A battered poster from the October 8th show.

When they reached the front desk, they were told there were no vacancies. The explanation rang hollow and Cooke immediately recognized what was happening. He refused to accept the situation quietly and demanded to see the manager, standing his ground even as those around him, including his wife, urged caution. Eventually, the group left, but frustration spilled out as horns blared and words were shouted into the night. By the time they reached another motel downtown, the police were already waiting. Cooke and others were arrested for disturbing the peace.

Postcard for the Holiday Inn at 1906 North Market St. in Shreveport, Louisiana.

The next day, a New York Times headline reduced the incident to something easily dismissed...and woefully myopic: “Negro Band Leader Held in Shreveport.”

However, within Black communities, the reaction was anything but placid. There was outrage born from the understanding that this wasn’t an isolated incident, but part of a larger, familiar pattern in the Jim Crow South.

Jim Crow laws were a system of state and local laws
in the American South that enforced racial segregation
and denied Black Americans basic rights.

After his release, Cooke reflected on the protest song Blowing In The Wind, which had been released by Bob Dylan that autumn of 1963. Cooke was moved by Dylan's lyrics, but also wondered how such a poignant anthem for civil rights had been penned by a white musician. He would later say he was ashamed that he had not written something so important himself.

Lyrics to Blowing In The Wind - Bob Dylan.

Cooke was further influenced by the message in the now-famous I Have A Dream speech that had been delivered earlier that summer in Washington by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  As winter approached, Cooke sat down to write A Change Is Gonna Come, reportedly completing it in less than an hour on his guitar. Not content with his initial, stripped down version, Cooke wanted it to be recorded with a full orchestra with each verse presented as a different movement. The string section would carry the first, the horns the second and the timpani delivering the bridge. In the final movement, it all comes together However, instead of swelling to a big crescendo, it remains restrained. It is the sound of waiting...waiting for the change that is "gonna come".

Lyrics to A Change Is Gonna Come.

A Change Is Gonna Come delivered the cultural gut-punch Cooke intended and it was embraced by the Civil Rights Movement and audiences in general, placing well on contemporary music charts. However, it is a song that was not tied down by that generation. It has continued to resonate for more than 50 years.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivers his I Have A Dream speech.

Wisely, Cooke speaks in general truths and not specifics. He does not name a place, a law, an event or a protest. He has penned a song that seems to hold hope, anger, defiance and uncertainty in equal measures. Consequently, the line "it's been a long time coming" can fit any generation. In 1964, it sounded like a promise and in each subsequent decade it echoed like a necessary reflection.

Sam Cooke recording in a smoky studio, 1960s.

In the 1970s, the song settled into an era still grappling with the promises of the ’60s. By the 1980s, when I first heard it, it was appearing in documentaries and biopics, becoming a kind of shorthand for unfinished business. In the 1990s, as contemporary black artists recorded their own versions, the recording took on an educational role, offering moral clarity as the century closed. In the 2000s, it surfaced again, aligning with the optimism of the Obama era. And in 2020, it returned once more, sounding as relevant as ever during a summer marked by the deaths of young black men at the hands of police.

More than half a century later, Shreveport finally atoned for the blatant racism with an apology delivered from a festival stage, offered to Cooke’s daughter, Mary. The world was very different from the one her father had stood on that fateful night in 1963.  And though the events could not be undone, the city’s acknowledgement of a big social wrong was a sure sign that change had indeed come.  Hopefully, similar gestures will continue in order to craft a better world.

Mary Cooke accepting the key to the city and an apology
on stage in Shreveport, June 22, 2019.

The 500 - #119 - At Last! - Etta James

 I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by New York-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

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Album #: 119
Album Title: At Last!
Artist: Etta James
Genre: R&B, Blues, Pop, Jazz
Recorded: Chess/Argo Studios in Chicago, Illinois

Released: November, 1960
My age at release: Not born yet
How familiar was I with it before this week: A few songs
Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, at #191, dropping72 places
Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: At Last!

One night recently, I was sitting in the half-light of the Hyland Cinema, London, Ontario's beloved little repertory and art film house. As the trailers played, my wife and I quietly whispered about the upcoming movies and made tentative plans to see a few selections that we have never seen on the big screen. Two grabbed our attention -- Spirited Away, Hayao Miyazaki's dream-like, Japanese animation film, and Dirty Harry, the Clint Eastwood blockbuster from 55 years ago.

Posters for Spirited Away and Dirty Harry.

Then the feature started and we settled in to watch True Romance, a gritty, 1993 romantic-thriller, written by Quentin Tarantino and directed by Tony Scott. It was a movie my wife and I loved in the ‘90s, but had never seen on the big screen. This version was the Director's Cut, restored in stunning 4K resolution.

It’s still an engaging and enjoyable movie, even with the troublesome language that felt edgy in the ’90s but land more uncomfortably today. In fact, prior to the screening, an employee offered a "trigger warning" to our audience. The cast is a who’s who of Hollywood A‑listers, including Patricia Arquette, Christian Slater, Brad Pitt, Gary Oldman, Samuel L. Jackson, Christopher Walken, Val Kilmer and Dennis Hopper. Watching it again, after at least 20 years, I couldn’t get over how young everyone looked. Sure, many of them were in their twenties when the movie was filmed, but even Dennis Hopper, who seemed ancient to me in 1993, was only 57. Younger than I am now.

Dennis Hopper as Cliford Worley in a powerful scene from
True Romance - one that features triggering language.

The age factor lingered long enough to follow me home, where I ended up reading about Etta James for this record, At Last!, her 1960 debut. I’ve always imagined her as a woman from another era, impossibly older, carved out of time. But, I was surprised to discover she was born only a year before my mom and was only 73 when she died in 2012. In fact, she was just 21 when she recorded this legendary record. People just looked older than their years back then and they seemed even older when viewed from a teen-age or 20-something perspective.

Etta James in the recording studio, circa 1960.

Born Jamesetta Hawkins, her professional career began in 1954, performing in Nashville clubs and touring in the Chitlin' Circuit, a loose collection of venues located in the eastern and southern U.S.. They provided safe havens for African-American performers and audiences during the time of segregation.

James (she jettisoned Hawkins and switched around Jamesetta to form her first and last names) performed in a wide range of genres, from gospel to blues to jazz and rock. She had many hits, the biggest being the title track from this record, At Last!. However, she struggled with several personal battles, including addiction, physical abuse and incarceration.

She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1993, the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999, and the Blues Hall of Fame in 2001. She also received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2003. Rolling Stone magazine ranked her number 22 on its 2008 list of the 100 Greatest Singers of All Time; she was also ranked at 62 in the magazine’s list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.  Multiple artists and bands, including Diana Ross, Janis Joplin, The Rolling Stones, Amy Winehouse, and Adele, asserted they had been influenced by her.

James' grave marker in Inglewood, California.

I only really knew the big hits, so spending time with the whole album felt like discovering a hidden room in a house I thought I already knew. The lush, orchestral arrangements wrapped around her voice in an almost physical way -- warm, enveloping, unmistakably intimate. And that voice! That powerful, smoky, earthy contralto, carrying the weight of a lifetime. Which is why it stopped me cold upon realizing how young Etta James was when she recorded it. I’d always imagined her as older, someone who had lived through decades of heartbreak and hard fought wisdom. But she was barely more than a kid, singing about timeless romance and deep sorrow -- emotions seemingly far beyond her years. It’s astonishing how convincingly she harbored  experiences she hadn’t yet lived.

The 500 - #121 - Stand! - Sly and The Family Stone

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by New York-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

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Album #: 121
Album Title: Stand!
Artist: Sly and The Family Stone
Genre: Psychedelic-Soul, Funk Rock, Progressive Soul
Recorded: Pacific High Studios, San Francisco, California

Released: May, 1969
My age at release: 3
How familiar was I with it before this week: A couple songs
Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, at #119, rising 3 places
Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Everyday People

This week’s choice for my Spotify Playlist, is Everyday People from American band Sly and The Family Stone. It is one of  those catchy, earwormy-tracks that never fails to make me feel better about life. Released in 1968, months before the group's fourth studio record Stand! hit the shelves, the song is a catchy two-minute and 21-second ditty that delivers a simple message: All people are fundamentally the same, despite their differences. It promotes equality, unity and empathy by calling out the ways humans divide themselves by race, class, appearance and ideology, and then dismantles those divisions with messages of shared humanity.

It was an important message in 1968 when the United States was reeling from the assassinations of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Senator Robert F. Kennedy, Those tragedies and the deepening societal upheaval over the Vietnam War sparked riots in cities across the country. In that climate of grief, division, and uncertainty, Everyday People offered solace, and a reminder that equality, empathy and shared humanity was possible.

A photo snapped moments after Martin Luther King was
shot in Memphis, Tennessee. April 4, 1968.

Unfortunately, the lesson of Everyday People is no less urgent today. As Russia continues its brutal assault on Ukraine, as violence and polarization persist across the United States, and as Gaza struggles to recover from devastating bombing campaigns, the need for compassion and unity remains as pressing as ever. The world continues to fracture along lines of ideology, nationality, and fear.  But, the song’s core truth endures -- we must find ways to live together, or tear each other apart.

ICE agents deployed in Minneapolis gunned down protester
Alex Pretti in January, 2026.

This week, I found myself in a strange emotional juxtaposition, needing Everyday People more than I could ever have imagined. On one hand, the Winter Olympics filled my screens with images of nations coming together in shared celebration. In contrast,  my country of Canada was left reeling from a horrific mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia, where eight people, most of them children, were killed and more than 25 were injured. Trying to process the contrast between the two events -- unity on the world stage and heartbreak at home -- left me a little unmoored.

Police tape outside the Tumbler Ridge School, one of two sites
for the shootings.

Talking to my students about the random shootings was designed to help them feel safe and ensure they understood that their emotions were valid. However, they also had to be made aware of  the harmful narratives that quickly began circulating, especially the cruel backlash directed at the trans community after the shooter was identified. In that difficult space, Everyday People served as my personal ballast. The lyrics and music were a gentle reminder that compassion, acceptance and shared humanity are not relics of the past but values that require repeating over and over again. I didn't play them the song, but I might do so in the days ahead to affirm what I want them to understand -- that we, as Canadians...as humans...as everyday people, are capable of something better than fear and division.