Fathers Day Songs

In the annals of rock and roll, perhaps no other group has been as maligned as fathers. The same goes for other forms of music, with the patriarch usually being a drunken, abusive lout at worst or at best. Dads have been portrayed as grumpy haters of anything fun.

Not even country music has been immune from this trend with songs like A Boy Named Sue. The picture that comes to mind is of a beer-bellied redneck wearing a "wife-beater" shirt or no shirt at all, with a beer in one hand and a cigarette in his mouth.

Either that, or the father has long since abandoned the family, like my Grandpa on my mother's side. Unfortunately, these scenes have been played out all over this country, but there are millions of fathers who do not fit this stereotype. This is for the fathers who have done right by their families.

With a little research I was able to find ten songs that to some extent or another celebrate Dads for Fathers Day. I did not include Harry Chapin's Cats In The Cradle as that tune is more a lament of a distant father who didn't find time for his son.

10. Butterfly Kisses/Bob Carlisle
While a little schmaltzy for my taste, this song is an ode to the father/daughter relationship as the dad looks back on his little girls' life as she prepares to marry.

All the precious time like the wind the years go by, precious butterfly spread your wings and fly is how one line goes. The song wraps up with a line: oh with all that I've done wrong, I must have done something right...

Even I can't help but be touched by these lyrics.

9. Leader Of The Band/Dan Fogelberg
Another schmaltzy tearjerker kind of song for fathers day. The late Dan Fogelberg pays tribute to his Dad's love and discipline as he sings: my life has been a poor attempt to imitate the man, I'm just a living legacy to the leader of the band.

8. My Fathers Eyes/Eric Clapton
In this song, Clapton seems to be calling on his own father in dealing with his own son and anticipating a reunion in the afterlife. Clapton lost a young son who fell from a window, the subject of the song Tears In Heaven.

Then the light begins to shine, and I hear those ancient lullabies, and as I watch the seedling grow, feel my heart start to overflow.

7. You've Got To Stand for Something Or You'll Fall For Anything/Aaron Tippin
This is a Fathers Day song in which Tippin talks about his dad, a man who didn't look for trouble but didn't let anyone walk on him either. Sort of like Clint Eastwood, maybe.

The chorus went: he'd say you've got to stand for something or you'll fall for anything, you've got to be your own man, not a puppet on a string, never compromise what's right and uphold your family name, you've got to stand for something or you'll fall for anything.

6. My Old Man/Ian Dury & The Blockheads
The British "new wave" of the late 70's brought Ian Dury, Nick Lowe, Elvis Costello and other British artists to our shores as bands like The Who and the Stones were seen as having become "establishment". Unlike punk bands like the Sex Pistols, these guys could actually play and offered an alternative to more commercial acts,

The gravel-voiced Dury, who died in 2000, pays tribute to his working class bus driver dad in his extreme British cockney accent, which some British singers left behind to appeal to U.S. fans.

5. Father And Son/Cat Stevens
This song for Fathers Day is the story of a young man telling his father that he is leaving to go out on his own. The Dad doesn't feel the son is ready.

Father: take your time, think a lot, why, think of everything you've got, for you will still be here tomorrow, but your dreams may not.

Son: all the times that I cried, keeping all the things I knew inside, it's hard, but it's harder to ignore it, if they were right, I'd agree, but it's them they know not me, now there's a way and i know that I have to go away..

4. The Living Years/Mike And The Mechanics
This song is about a man who had a testy relationship with his father and wishes he'd patched things up before his Father's death.

I wasn't there that morning when my father passed away, I didn't get to tell him all the things I had to say, I think I caught his spirit later that same year, I'm sure I heard his echo in my baby's newborn tears, i just wish i could have told him in the living years.

Which is worse, reconciliation with someone who you have problems with, or wishing you had reconciled when it is too late?

3. Wild World/Cat Stevens
This is not necessarily about a parental situation, but it works great as a Fathers Day song as well, especially a father daughter relationship.

Oh baby, baby it's a wild world, and it's hard to get by just upon a smile, oh baby, baby it's a wild world, and I'll always remember you like a child girl..

The song serves as a warning of what awaits anyone entering a world in which no one gets through unscathed.

2. Daughters/John Mayer
This ballad is as much a lament as anything, but still contains good advice for fathers on Fathers Day.Fathers be good to your daughters, daughters will love like you do, girls become lovers who turn into mothers, so mothers be good to your daughters, too.

1. Oh Very Young/Cat Stevens
This song from 1974 is my personal favorite. That was the year I turned 18, voted for the first time and achieved other milestones in my life. On the soundtrack of the 1996 Farrelly Brothers film, Kingpin, this song is featured as a father instructs his young son on bowling on the screen. The young man looks so much like my son a couple of years ago and my son was born in 1996.

Oh very young what will you leave us this time, you're only dancing on this earth for a short while, and though your dreams may toss and turn you now, they will vanish away like your dad's best jeans, denim blue fading up to the sky, and though you want them to last forever you know they never will, you know they never will, and the patches make the goodbye harder still..

and will you carry the words of love with you, will you ride the great white bird into heaven, and though you want to last forever, you know you never will, you know you never will, and the journey makes the goodbye harder still.

Even though Cat Stevens is now known as Yusuf Islam and some claim he supported the fatwa on Salman Rushdie and radical muslims, there is no evidence to support that. The man still performs occasionally and has a new CD that just came out, I believe. Whatever name he is known by, he can still perform and his music holds up to this day. www.last.fm/music/Cat+Stevens/_/Oh+Very+Young

Happy Fathers Day to the Dads who are doing the right thing for their children. It wasn't easy to find enough songs to fill out the list, enjoy your day! These songs can be listened to or downloaded at: www.last.fm/.