"You Can't Put Your Arms Around a Memory" | |
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Single by Johnny Thunders | |
from the album So Alone | |
B-side | "Hurtin'" |
Released | September 22, 1978 |
Recorded | 1978 |
Studio | Basing Street, London |
Genre | Punk rock [1] |
Length | 3:48 |
Label | Real Records ARE3 |
Songwriter(s) | Johnny Thunders |
"You Can't Put Your Arms Around a Memory" is a song released in 1978 by Johnny Thunders, appearing on his debut solo album So Alone and as a single taken from the album. Both the song and album include the guitar work of Peter Perrett of the Only Ones. The title was taken from a line in the "Better Living Through TV" episode of the sitcom The Honeymooners . [2] It is considered by many to be his signature song.
The ballad has been interpreted to be about Thunders' heroin addiction, or about his romance with Sable Starr. However, according to Nina Antonia's biography Johnny Thunders...In Cold Blood , the song was written years before he was a member of the New York Dolls and before he ever tried heroin. [2]
Michael Ruffino, the show's music director, said that the last email Bourdain sent him was about a song. It was the 1978 track 'You Can't Put Your Arms Around a Memory,' by the late punk singer Johnny Thunders. CNN had finally secured the rights to the song, and Bourdain wanted it for the LES episode. He asked Ruffino to record a version. [...] Ruffino didn't record the song until after Bourdain's death. When Ruffino finished, he said, 'I just felt like it needed something in there.' At the last minute, Bourdain's daughter, Ariane, recorded backing vocals into her iPhone and sent them to Ruffino. 'She was a trooper,' he said. The song plays over the episode's closing montage. And then the screen cuts to black.