Category: childhood

Saturday’s Theme Music

I haven’t read about many streakers recently. I am surprised.

As lockdowns and business shutdowns are argued and protested, I’d think that stripping off your clothes and running outside would be a natural mechanism to make your voice heard. Nothing makes people hear you more than running around with all your bits flapping. Makes more sense than shouting in police officers’ faces, or threatening others with guns.

Maybe I’m just too early on the curve, and the streaking is about to commence. Perhaps my idea will inspire someone to do it. Yeah, don’t look at me to be the spark plug. I’m a hairy fellow. Last time that I went streaking, people thought a mini Bigfoot was running around. Ended up with that nickname for years. Strangers would see me and shout, “Hey, Bigfoot, how’s it going?” Mom and my sisters started calling me that, too. I thought that showed poor taste on their part.

In honor of the idea, the song, “The Streak” by Ray Stevens (1974) is today’s theme music. Ray had the idea for the song but didn’t execute it until streakers were suddenly everywhere in the news. It’s a story-telling song that utilizes puns and double meanings to express what was going on from a reporter interviewing a witness. The witness is married to Ethel, and he’s always warning her, “Don’t look, Ethel,” and it’s always too late. The song culminates with the witness shouting, “Is that you, Ethel? You get your clothes on.”

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Friday’s Theme Music

“Well you don’t know what uh we can find
Why don’t you come with me little girl?
On a magic carpet ride
You don’t know what we can see
Why don’t you tell your dreams to me?
Fantasy will set you free
Close your eyes girl
Look inside girl

h/t to Metrolyrics.com

Yeah, it’s Steppenwolf with “Magic Carpet Ride” (1968). I was a big Steppenwolf fan in those days; “Born to be Wild”, “The Pusher”, “Sookie, Sookie”, and today’s theme music were heard at least once a day in the summer of my twelfth year. Mom was aware enough of them that when an article about the group and John Kay’s escape from the Soviet side of Germany was in the Pittsburgh Press, she brought it to my attention.

It’s come up today because, hey, locked into the house, a magic carpet ride would be mighty fine to do a flyover. Even more, fantasy will set you free. Fiction writing is the fantasy that sets me free. Although my quasi-official writing time is about three hours a day, fiction writers (including me) will tell you that the story and its twists and characters invade every mental recess, influencing (and influenced by) every interaction and activity. It’s an interesting trip.

Enjoy the music. Happy Friday, and happy May 1st. Another month in the books. Persevere and overcome the current adversity, endure, and then prosper.

That is all.

 

 

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Monday’s Theme Music

Thinking about a big coming out party, someday, after the crises is resolved. (A.C.: After COVID-19. We’ll start a new reference system – “In 2 AC, the first normal baseball game was played.”) Maybe the theme should be dancing in the streets.

The song, “Dancing in the Street”, and its many versions jumped into the stream. I do enjoy the Mick and David version. But I don’t want to show favoritism, so here’s a few offerings. Looking at them, I’m surprised that it has sprung up as a new cover by some one, like, I don’t know, Kelly Clarkson.

David Bowie and Mick Jagger, 1985. Boy, the disco era is really displayed in their clothing style. Fitting for responding to a global problem, as this collaboration was done to raise money and awareness for “Live Aid” famine relief.

Martha and the Vandelllas, 1964 – the original, to me.

Van Halen, 1982 – oh, yeah, lots of synthesizer.

Mama and the Papas, 1966 – a very mellow version.

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Friday’s Theme Music

Today’s music was released in 1966. I was ten years old. Neighborhood kids had this song (and about ten zillion others) on a forty-five. We gathered in their basement in Wilkinsburg, PA, and had dance parties, with the records being played on a little portable record-player.

“Kicks” by Paul Revere and the Raiders, was about drug use, getting sucked into that world, and how it can happen without warning. That’s true about so many things; changes occur under our noses. Our bodies shift. Bad habits led to poor under-lying conditions but we’re oblivious to them until a medical emergency erupts. Same thing can happen to romantic and sexual relationships, friendships, finances, houses, and cars. Those little, sneaking changes are noticed but not noted until they combine into one big fucking change that explodes in your face.

Anyway, “Kicks” came into my musical stream this morning as I was reflecting on last night dreams. There’s one line in the song that says, “You’ll never run away from you, and if you keep on running, you’ll have to pay the price.”

Yeah, you can’t run away from you. It’s a distance too far.

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Thursday’s Theme Music

Lock downs, quarantine, self-distancing, isolation, and every other way you can think of saying “We’re staying inside” is still in effect in many places. Restlessness is grabbing people. They’re suffering urges to hit the road, get their nails done, go bowling, or just stroll the streets and have a drink with friends. Some of them are thinking of escape.

Which brought to mind, “Gimme Three Steps” by Lynyrd Skynyrd from 1973. Bet that’s more than a few out there, thinking, gimme three steps, and I’ll be out the door ‘fore you know it.

Here’s some music for your thoughts.

 

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

Just a simple song from my youth, sparked by random thoughts, “Gee, a road trip would be nice today. Maybe head to the coast, smell the air, listen and watch the waves, experience life as it was, when that was all taken for granted.”

Like a proper theme song, Led Zeppelin’s “Ramble On” (1969) began.

For now I smell the rain, and with it pain, and it’s headed my way
Ah, sometimes I grow so tired
But I know I’ve got one thing I got to do

Ramble on, and now’s the time, the time is now
To sing my song, I’m going ’round the world, I gotta find my girl
On my way, I’ve been this way ten years to the day
Ramble on, gotta find the queen of all my dreams

h/t to Genius.com

Think I’ll ramble on into the kitchen for a cuppa coffee.

 

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Special Edition Theme Song

Had a doughnut, thought about having another. The little devil on my shoulder started singing, “Go ahead and do it, do it, do it till you’re satisfied.” Now the 1974 B.T. Express song, “Do It ‘Til You’re Satisfied”, is stuck in my mental stream, distracting me from my writing and pushing me toward eating a second doughnut.

The doughnut does complement the coffee, though…

 

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Wednesday Theme Music

I’ve done this song before, but it just fits so well to these times, when people are social-distancing and can’t go anywhere.

‘Cause I’m stuck in the middle with you
And I’m wondering what it is I should do.
It’s so hard to keep this smile from my face.
Losing control and running all over the place.

Clowns to the left of me!
Jokers to the right!
Here I am stuck in the middle with you.

h/t to Metrolyrics.com

It can apply to being at home with your, ahem, loved ones (or their reaction to you), or the cat’s reaction to your continual presence. Or there you are in a store, trying to maintain safe distance while you re-supply, all masked, while an idiot behind you ignores it all.

It can even be political, if you think that these are special times which require special leadership, that sadly, you perceive we might be lacking…

Here’s Stealer Wheels with “Stuck in the Middle with You”, from 1973.

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Saturday’s Theme Music

Reading the news today, Sonny and Cher’s big 1967 hit, “The Beat Goes On”, sprang into the mental music stream. I’m sure we all know why that song deserves to be today’s theme music.

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

A friend related her tale of venturing out to a store. Her recounting triggered jungle songs. So here we are – “Welcome to the Jungle” (GNR, 1987), “Jungle Boogie” (Kool and the Gang, 1973, here on “Soul Train”), and “Run Through the Jungle” (CCR, 1970). I think each song speaks for its niche with its musical style, but each convey the jungle with slight variations. Behind them all, though, is the sense that the civilized human scene is a jungle of wild menace. Kind of like that out there, although I haven’t heard stories of violence. I guess it’s not as much of a jungle as it was on, say, black Friday.

Here they are, in chronological order.

Any jungle songs on your mind?

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