In addition to the Newman demos performed by unidentified cover artists, a number of acetates exist of song demos where Newman performs his own vocals over solo piano. While predictably rougher sounding than later studio covers, for most fans, an opportunity to hear the author's own piano and vocals on a previously unreleased song makes these originals far more collectable than subsequent covers. Among some demos traced of previously discussed songs ("Happyland," "I Wonder Why," "A Boy Like You"), a few stand out: "Vine Street," infectiously sung and played with a raucous piano intro; Newman's dark, dry delivery on "Wait Till Next Year;" an affectingly clenched vocal on "I've Been Wrong Before;" and his unusual turn to narrative on "La Campanilla." Sadly, "Just One Smile" falls short of its later covers, due to Randy's wandering pitch and strained vocal. Among the remaining acetates are a number of songs that, like the "mystery demos" above, have yet to be traced to any commercial release or cover.
"What Will You Do When All Your Friends Are Gone" links a wordy title to the fastest shuffle in Newman's song catalogue. A furious pounding chord progression nearly detracts from its curiously vengeful-sounding lyric: "Get on board the train 'cause it's leavin'.../Can't stay here 'cause all your friends are gone/What will you do now all your friends are gone?" Newman's gently wheezing delivery lightens the tone considerably.
Unique among Newman's demos in its use of a piano-and-electric guitar combo backing, the traditional blues approach of "Don't Ruin My Happy Home" extends to its mumbled lyrics, warning a suitor to back off: "I been good to my baby/She been good to me/Ain't the same ol' mess around/The way I used to be/Go an' find someone of your own.." One of Newman's most uncompromising blues-based demos, it's hard to imagine any artist transforming this song into a radio-friendly pop arrangement -- hence, its exile in Newman's library of lost recordings.
Perhaps the most Newmanesque song among these demos is "Little Man," which repeats an insinuating piano melody under one of his most emotionally raw vocals. "See the little man/ Dangling on a string/With remote concern/Watch his dead eyes burn/See them smoldering." The lyrics, among Newman's most incisive, are charged with such controlled venom that any self-pity read into the lines ("Just a little man/With a little soul/Who will spend his little life shut up in a little hole/..Don't waste your sympathy/On one so shattered and small/You know it's only me") is steamrollered flat with each syllable Newman spits out. It's impossible to conceive of another artist pulling off a cover of this song. Dark stuff.
Even as "Our Love Lives On" begins: "She grew weaker/Weaker with each passing day/ One cold morning/She gently drifted away/But I know'/It's not the end/I'm sure I'll see her again/ 'Cause although she may be gone/Our love lives on," set to a pretty, cascading chord pattern, the black comic possiblities begin to stir near the back of one's mind. Given Newman's spiritual bent (or lack thereof), surely he's not suggesting reincarnation or an afterlife? "Oh, it hurt me/Hurt me more than I can say/To sit beside her/Watch her wastin' away..." No, necrophelia would be too much, but the peacefully morbid tone remains unresolved at song's end. Pleasantly disturbing.
One of Newman's most amusing songs of this period was a poke at the '60's activists titled "We're Gonna Save The World." In simpathetic deadpan he sings "Here we come/Sweeping all this wrong before us/Gentle people/With bird's nests in our hair/Here we come/Singing out in righteous chorus/If it's not fair, babe/We'll be there, babe/To protest..." While hardly the most difficult of targets, Newman keeps his shots quick, to the point, and escapes unscathed.
Building on a few random chords, "Brand New World" gradually gains momentum as Newman races through some rapid wordplay: "All of your life you've been pushed and driven/To do all the things people say you should do/Livin' their way/If you call it livin'/..Standin' in line/ Line's goin' nowhere/Wastin' your time on people who don't care/Girl, that's not enough for me.." Essentially a call for self-determination, Newman's impatient vocal verges on turning a decent song into a Young Republicans' anthem. Justice awaits a better-produced cover.
Words of consolation from a nice guy to a recently dumped girl, "Snow Job" links a wispy melody with lyrics sensitive enough to make Alan Alda cringe, despite a cute twist in the bridge: "You're not the first who's been lied to and taken in/Fooled by somebody who didn't love you/But baby I must confess/I envy his success/...I want you to love me too." As the cycle begins again.
Described in Newman's spoken intro as "a girl/boy" song shared by a "sweet" girl and "lecherous" boy, "A Real Nice Guy" has a vague ragtime feel spiked by some clever banter. Boy: "I bring you presents when you didn't feel well/And I didn't even worry what I'd catch from you/ Doncha think you owe me something/More than just a little kiss or two/Don't come on so bright and breezy/You can't buy me off that easy/I'd expected something more from you.." Punctuated by some lusty Cab Calloway-like "yadda-yadda's", the song deserved a better fate.
Sung by an unsmitten girl to her potential suitor, "Until You Hear From Me" is a warning to cool it: "When you put your arms around me/You seem so sure that love has found me/Well, I'm not sure at all/Why don't we wait and see/Just sit tight, boy/Until you hear it from me." Set to a bland melody, this is not one of Randy's keepers.
"Junkman" begins as an ode to a park sweeper ("You'd think he'd feel bad/With the job that he had/But not the junkman") that unexpectedly turns into a dance craze instructional: "Bend your knees and keep in time with the beat/Shake your shoulders and shuffle your feet/Bend your back and put the trash in the sack/Just like the junkman.." No doubt pressed by Metric to turn out a dance hit along the lines of the Jerk or the Twine, Newman's response has tongue so deep in cheek it nearly hurts. But for one of his more inspired early spoofs, here's where to turn.
One of Newman's shortest ditties, "Springtime"'s music sounds like an outtake from some '60's stage production; complemented by casual lyrics ("Hey baby, take it easy/You don't have to work to please me/Springtime -- and it's time to play"), it makes for a unique not-quite-throwaway.
Set off by a dramatic piano intro/outro, "Someone Nice Like You" puts Newman inside a cad's skin ("I'd say I'm sorry, but I never apologize/Go on and cry/I don't mind the tears in your eyes/Just forget me/I won't remember you/Too bad you let me/Hurt someone nice like you.."); in a rare case of heartlessness, he makes his character simply too one-dimensional to care about.
Dragging behind a slow piano shuffle, Randy's snail's pace demo vocal on "I Wish I Knew" is drawn out almost to the point of self-parody; whether the opening line ("Is this fun/Or just a game I'm playin'?") is intended in the song's context of a questioned romance, or is a more subtle poke at the "churn 'em out" music factory mindset, Newman alone may know. Pretty perverse.
A musically facile three-chord knockoff, "I'm On My Way" boasts an unusually aggressive edge to its lyrics ("I ain't gonna let anyone/Slow me down until the job is done/So out of my way/ I've got no time to play/'Cause I'm a-rollin'..girl, I'm on my way"), but suffers from such recycled notions about "making it" as to be have inspired by, oh, a hit record? Or dreams of having one...
Strung together from bits of received wisdom, the lyrics for "Somebody Always Gets Hurt" offer few new insights ("Think you've found someone to rely on/You end up with your face in the dirt/With no hand to hold and no shoulder to cry on/Somebody always gets hurt"), though some simple piano and Randy's relaxed vocal makes it tolerable to sit through another time.
Saved from just another wallow in self-pity by Newman's ferocious vocal, the lyrics of "Doesn't Anybody Know My Name" revisit the theme of "Little Man" from a first-person view- point: "Look out my window/And I'll tell you what I see/A street full of people who don't care a thing about me/And no one knows I'm living/Doncha think that's kinda sad/Sometimes I want to give in/'Cause the pain 'most drives me mad.." Though not as affecting as "Little Man," the song benefits from a driving beat, a hooky melody, and a committed reading by Newman.
Led by impressively unsteady piano that sounds as if it were recorded during a late-night drinking binge, "Magic In The Moonlight" is one of Newman's tragically unreleased gems. A heavily slurring narrator teeters on the brink ("Something about a June night/There's a strangeness in the sky/There's magic in the moonlight/And madness in my eye.."), contemplating suicide by hanging or gunshot before sobering up to one fact: "I can't see past my sorrow/I can no longer stand the strain/I'd kill myself tomorrow/But I couldn't stand the pain." A wonderful live take of this song (performed for a baffled Bitter End audience) was later left off 1971's Randy Newman/ Live LP.
Approximately a dozen other Metric-period Newman compositions have been traced, either through Chappell sheet music titles or file records, although no actual demos have been confirmed to date. Regrettably, recordings of such intriguing titles as "Life In A Sugar Bowl," "Hard Hat Blues (Goodbye)," "God Bless Us All," and a song written with Dick Glasser, "Watching The Candle Glow," may never be heard in their demo glory. A full demo discography follows this article.