Few female jazz singers matched the hard-swinging and equally hard-living Anita O'Day for sheer exuberance and talent in all areas of jazz vocals. Her improvising, wide dynamic tone, and innate sense of rhythm made her more than just another big-band canary. At a time when most female vocals tended to emphasize the sweet timbres of their voice, she chose to emphasize a path blazed by the one major jazz singer who emphasized message over medium - Billie Holiday. Like Holiday, O'Day combined the soaring freedom of jazz instrumentalist with the storytelling lyricism of a poet.
After making her solo debut in the mid-'40s she incorporated bop modernism into her vocals and recorded over a dozen of the best vocal LPs of the era.
During the late Forties, she recorded two dozen sides, mostly for small labels. The quality of these singles varies: O'Day was trying to achieve popular success without sacrificing her identity as a jazz singer. Among the more notable recordings from this period are "Hi Ho Trailus Boot Whip", "Key Largo", "How High the Moon", and "Malaguena". O'Day's drug problems began to surface late in 1947, when she and husband Carl Hoff were arrested for possession of marijuana and sentenced to 90 days in jail. Her career was back on the upswing in September of 1948, when she sang with Count Basie at the Royal Roost in New York City, resulting in five airchecks. What secured O'Day's place in the jazz pantheon, however, are the seventeen albums she recorded for Verve between 1956 and 1962.
Her first album, Anita O'Day Sings Jazz (reissued as The Lady Is a Tramp), was recorded in 1956 for the newly established Verve Records (it was also the label's first LP). The album was a critical success and further boosted her popularity. In October of 1952 O'Day was again arrested for possession of marijuana, but found not guilty. The following March, she was arrested for possession of heroin. The case dragged on for most of 1953; O'Day was finally sentenced to six months in jail. Not long after her release from jail on February 25, 1954, she began work on her second album, Songs by Anita O'Day (reissued as An Evening with Anita O'Day). She recorded steadily throughout the Fifties, accompanied by small combos and big bands. In person, O'Day was generally backed by a trio which included the drummer with whom she would work for the next 40 years, John Poole.
As a live performer O'Day also began performing in festivals and concerts with such musicians as Louis Armstrong, Oscar Peterson, Dinah Washington, George Shearing, Cal Tjader, and Thelonious Monk. She appeared in the documentary Jazz on a Summer's Day, filmed at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival which increased her popularity. The following year O'Day made a cameo appearance in The Gene Krupa Story , singing "Memories of You". Late in 1959 she toured Europe with Benny Goodman; according to her autobiography, when Goodman's attempts to upstage her failed to diminish the audience's enthusiasm, he cut all but two of her numbers from the show.
After the Goodman fiasco, O'Day went back to touring as a solo artist. She recorded infrequently after the expiration of her Verve contract in 1962 and her career seemed over when she nearly died of a heroin overdose in 1968. After kicking the habit, she made a comeback at the 1970 Berlin Jazz Festival. She also appeared in the films Zig Zag (1970) and The Outfit (1974). She resumed making live and studio albums, many recorded in Japan, and several were released on her own label, Emily Records.
O'Day spoke candidly about her drug addiction in her 1981 memoir, High Times, Hard Times.
Her version of the standard, "Sing, Sing, Sing" was remixed by RSL and was included in the compilation album Verve Remixed 3 in 2005.
2006 saw her first album release in 13 years, entitled Indestructible!.
There's a Lull in My Life
Anita O'Day Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
It's just a void and empty space
When you are not in my embrace
Oh, there's a lull In my life
The moment that you go away
There is no night, there is no day
The clock stops ticking
The world stops turning
That keeps burning, burning
Oh, oh, oh
There's a lull In my life
No matter how I may pretend
I know that you alone can end
There's a sense of loss and emptiness that permeates the lyrics of Anita O'Day's song "There's a Lull in My Life." The singer describes a feeling of hollowness, a void left in the absence of the person she loves. The metaphor of a "lull" further emphasizes this concept of quiet motionlessness, a stagnant space in which everything has come to a standstill. The lyrics paint a picture of a world that is incomplete without her lover, where time itself seems to have frozen in the wake of his departure.
The singer's deep emotional attachment to her lover is emphasized through the imagery of the beating heart that continues to "burn" with passion despite the stillness all around. It's a testament to the intensity of her feelings that she cannot shake off even the faintest memory of her lover. The chorus brings the full weight of this emotion to the fore, as the singer admits that no amount of pretense or distraction can fill the void left by her lover's absence. Only he has the power to end the "lull" and give her world back its sense of motion and purpose.
Overall, "There's a Lull in My Life" is a melancholy ode to the pain of heartbreak and the profound sense of loss that it can engender. Its dreamy, haunting melody serves as a fitting backdrop to the wistful lyrics, capturing the sense of longing that lies at the core of the song.
Line by Line Meaning
Oh, there's a lull in my life
My life feels quiet and empty without you
It's just a void and empty space
I feel like something is missing without you here
When you are not in my embrace
Being held by you is the only thing that makes me feel complete
Oh, there's a lull In my life
My life feels incomplete and dull without you
The moment that you go away
I feel lost and alone when you're not here
There is no night, there is no day
Time no longer matters or even exists when you're not here
The clock stops ticking
Time stands still without you
The world stops turning
My world stops moving without you here
Everything stops but the flame in my heart
My love for you is the only thing that remains constant
That keeps burning, burning
My love for you never fades
Oh, oh, oh
Expressing the depth of emotion I feel when you're not here
There's a lull In my life
My life feels incomplete and boring without you
No matter how I may pretend
I can't hide or ignore the fact that I need you
I know that you alone can end
Only you have the power to make me feel whole again
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: HARRY REVEL, MACK GORDON
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
Aceiseverywhere
on Who Cares?
Let it rain and thunder
Let a million firms go under
I am not concerned with, stocks and bombs that I've been burned with
I love you and you love me
And that's how it will always be
And nothing else can ever mean a thing
Who cares what the public chatters?
Love's the only thing that matters
Who cares if the sky, cares to fall
in the sea
Who cares how history rates me?
As long as your kiss intoxicates me
Oh why should I care?
Life is one long jubilee
As long as I care for you
And you care for me!
Who cares if the sky, cares to fall
in the sea
Who cares what banks fail in Yonkers?
As long as you've got a kiss that conquers!
Oh why should I care?
Life is one long jubilee
So long as I care for you
and you care for me!
(These lyrics might be wrong, sorry)