Angel In Blue (1981) – The J. Geils Band

I found today’s featured track – Angel in Blue while researching Centerfold, The J. Geils Band’s most famous hit – and I’m glad I did. Musically, the two tracks are worlds apart: Centerfold bursts with playful energy, a cheeky, upbeat romp, while Angel in Blue is a taut rock’n roll ballad which teeters on the emotional precipice by leaning into narrative depth. Centerfold tells of a high school crush who reappears – shockingly – as a magazine pin-up, while in Angel in Blue, the singer becomes enamoured with a troubled table-top dancer he meets at a bar. The girl in Centerfold is idealised from afar, forever out of reach. The woman in Angel in Blue, on the other hand, is heartbreakingly real, as her dreams fade and her spirit frays.

I can see why Critic Joe Viglione praised Angel in Blue as “arguably the smartest lyric in the J. Geils Band catalogue“. It’s just such a well written song. She never had dreams / so they never came true. You could read the lyrics as a stand alone-short story and find them poignant and tender. Classic Rock History critic Brian Kachejian noted influences from Bruce Springsteen and Tom Petty in Angel in Blue. The song was written by the band’s keyboardist and songwriter – Seth Justman who wrote or co wrote most of the group’s songs and also sung lead after Peter Wolf’s departure from the band in 1983.

The band wanted Angel in Blue to be the album’s first single from their 1981 record Freeze Frame, but they were dissuaded by their record company and Centerfold was chosen. That reached No. 1 on the U.S. Billboard while Angel in Blue was released as the third single and peaked at No. 40. The album itself peaked at No 1.

We met in a bar
Out on Chesapeake Bay
With her white patent boots
And her blouse red lame
A table top dancer
She would smile on cue
Those lips of an angel
Angel in blue

She’s been dancing for ages
Through cities of bars
She was kickin’ the habit
Of scoring in cars
She’d been drained of her spirit
All caged up in this zoo
A wildcat angel
Angel in blue

And as she stared out into nowhere
I thought, yes, I thought she might break down and cry
When I whispered I thought I could love her
She just said “Baby, don’t even bother to try”

And I watched as she spoke
Her words chilled my bones
All her friends did her favors
That were really just loans
And she never had dreams
So they never came true
The palest of angels
Angel in blue

And the bees they had stung her
The birds they had flown
There were guys she could number
But none had she known
And she never had dreams
So they never came true
My fade away angel
Angel in blue

References:
1. Angel in Blue – Wikipedia

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“The more I live, the more I learn. The more I learn, the more I realize, the less I know.”- Michel Legrand