Tuesday Tune Two-Fer: Every Stroke a Bucketful

One of the things that surprised me the most about The Wicker Man was that it seemed to be almost a musical. There were entire scenes devoted to a song, often pivotal to revealing something about the island or its plot. My favorite is “Willow’s Song,” which the lovely young innkeeper’s daughter sings to herself to help fall asleep and for no other reason. I love it for many reasons, including how her movements emphasize the pounding of the drum beat. But mostly for the lyrics, which have the quality of the best folk songs — so abstract or metaphorical that it would take a historian to explain how they were unspeakably provocative for the time — until the last couplet, which could hardly be any more direct.1 (I usually try to keep a strict rule that the two-fer should never become a three-some, but I really like a cover of “Willow’s Song” titled “How Do” by Sneaker Pimps. It’s pretty faithful, but fills out the arrangement with the late 90s stuff you’d expect from the Sneaker Pimps,…