Black Balloons

On November 9, 2014, in Music, by mugen

Was surfing through my buddy Spip’s blog (post new stuff, Spip!) and saw the song “Black Balloon” by The Kills. Never heard it before, but it made me wonder how many songs with that title exist.

My favorite song of that title is by MONSTER MAGNET:

Arguably the most famous “Black Balloon” is by Goo Goo Dolls:

Spip’s link was to this song by The Kills:

The oldest song with this title I could find is John Renbourn’s 11:34 song from his 1979 album of the same title, a really beautiful guitar track, haunting especially when the flute or whistle comes in at 2:20ish, starts to get a little wilder with an electric guitar around 4:20 or so, and loses me by the end:

Finally, there’s a segment of the soundtrack to a 2008 Australian film The Black Balloon titled “The Black Balloon Theme” by composer Michael Yezerski.

Black Balloon is also the name of a video production outfit that makes music videos for hard rock bands. Check out their demo reel:

BONUS:
This cat’s voice is pretty fantastic. And I want to know what tuning he’s using on that guitar — open tuned to a power chord?