“Another Day” by Bruce Hornsby and the Range from Night On The Town (1990)
During a recent discussion of Bruce Hornsby’s 1990 album on my podcast, I mentioned how much I loved the fact that Night On The Town was the first and only proper group album Hornsby did with the Range. Yes, it's the third, and so far final album credited to the moniker Bruce Hornsby and The Range, but the prior album, Scenes from the Southside, and the debut album, The Way it Is, were mostly Hornsby on piano, synthesizers and bass and drum programming with occasional contributions by George Marinelli, Pete Harris, and David Mansfield on guitars and mandolin.
The Don Gehman-produced Night On The Town changes all that with Marinelli being involved in the arranging and playing in the studio with bassist Joe Puerta and drummer John Molo.
The album also saw significant guest contributions from Bela Fleck on banjo, Jerry Garcia on guitar, Wayne Shorter on tenor sax, and Charlie Haden on double bass.
The song, “Another Day” comes the closest to the rock feel that the band was training to achieve. It's Leon Russel style rhythm, and piano intro are unmistakable. A drum machine instead of Molo sets the initial pace, however, the drummer provides accents and fills to fortify the pace. Joe Puerta gets into the act, too, with his best bass contributions in 3 albums.
Arnold McCuller and the late David Lasley provide appropriately soulful backing vocals.
Hornsby handles all the music and lyric writing on the song, not seeking a contribution from his brother John. This fact may contribute to the causal directness of the theme. However the song fits the significant themes of the album which revolve around life in a small southern town.
“Turn off the lights honey then turn off the set
Life around here don't make a lot of damn sense
As I closed my eyes I saw in my mind
Somebody selling me a nickle for a dime
Here we go
What do you say, what do you know
You've got your life and you watch it away
It's just another day in this old town
So get down, ain't no big thing so let it ring”
No highfalutin themes here, just a man sitting on his porch sharing his observations while guitarist George Marinelli lets it ring.
What a rocking way for The Range to go out.