Overworked and Undersaxed

With Valentine's Day fast approaching, I thought I should take a moment to observe one of the most glaring deficiencies of today's pop music: the dearth of sultry saxophone solos. Nothing sets the scene for romance like a smooth, seductive sax solo. Not to mention the fact that "sax" is one vowel away from "sex" (as are "six," "sox," and "sux"--but that's beside the point). So why is the sax solo conspicuously absent from pop tunes these days? To craft an unsubstantiated yet highly convincing answer to that question, we must first re-visit the sax solo renaissance that was mid-1980s pop music. A glance at Billboard's Top 100 of 1984 reveals a goldmine of sax virtuosity: Sade's "Smooth Operator," Wham's "Careless Whisper," Lionel Richie's "Hello," Billy Ocean's "Caribbean Queen"....But in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the sax solo entered its baroque phase. In other words, it got out of control and started to piss people off. Michael Bolton and Kenny G. are the standout figures in this controversial period and their overindulgence is largely responsible for the sax solo's virtual extinction from pop music today. But it's been a while, and time heals all wounds, and...well...all I'm saying is to give sax a second chance. Because when it's right, it's ohhh sooo right. You know what I'm talking about. If you don't, slide on Tina Turner's "Private Dancer" this Valentine's season and engage in a night of casual sax--no strings attached.