This one comes via another blog’s memory prompt. Jill Dennison posted “Photographs and Memories” the other day. It brought back a sharp memory of hearing that song. I was driving in my forest green 1965 Mercury Comet sedan. I’d graduated earlier that year, 1974, enlisted in the U.S. Air Force, and was waiting to leave for basic training. But that day, I was driving my girl friend home on a sunny fall day. Two years later, when I was stationed at Wright-Patterson AFB, I married her. We remained married forty-three years later.
Black Friday began a few weeks ago. I received word on a Tuesday when a mailer arrived announcing that every Friday was Black Friday was Black Friday. Others didn’t start Black Friday until Wednesday or Thursday, but many vowed to continue it until January 1, with one chain declaring that every day is Black Friday.
For some reason, all this Black Friday chatter delivered Steely Dan performing “Black Friday” (1975) to my theme song stream. Steely Dan’s version of the day is much different than the buying extravaganza of this year. Steely Dan’s song relates more to the Black Fridays of financial and social collapse.
Henchfloof(floofinition) – a trusted housepet; a member of a gang of housepets.
In use: “Snuffy the cat didn’t trust any dogs except his beloved friend, Max. Max, a big fluffy-white Samoyed-Spitz mix, was Snuffy’s henchfloof, protecting the feline against anyone entering their yard.”
As I was dressing today, I decided to wear brown shoes.
Like many people — not — my shoes choice drives my attire. As my grandmother used to say, “Start at the feet, and dress up.” (She didn’t.)
Season, weather, and plans drive my shoe choice. I’ve found that I’m uncomfortable in sandals in the fall and winter, usually because the day starts out nippy and doesn’t get warm. I’m not much of a sandal person anyway.
Which takes me to the brown shoes.
Once I decided to wear brown shoes, the pants and shirt were easy, since it was cool, forty degrees, sunny, with sixty-two degrees anticipated as the high. Since I was wearing brown shoes, I needed a brown belt, right?
Time out. Wait. Hang on.
Why did I need a brown belt?
Because that’s how I’ve been socialized, normalized, and conditioned. Brown shoes, brown belt. I heard it from Mom, wife, girlfriends, and others. It’s like, why? WTF difference does it make?
So guess what this rebel did?
If you guessed that I put on black shoes and a black belt, you’re wrong. I’m wearing a black belt with brown shoes.
This is an old and familiar song. It just joined my stream today, coming from many things and nothing, as often happens with the breccia that I call my thinking.
I first heard this song, “River Deep, Mountain High” by Ike & Tina Turner, when I was young. I don’t recall the circumstances, but wikipedia tells me it was released in 1966, so it’s reasonable to think I heard it on AM radio while driving about with Mom in her car. Later covers were more commercially successful.
Ike and Tina broke up. There’s a big story behind those four words. Ike has passed away. Tina lives on.
Sly and the Family Stone gave us a lot of awesome music when I was young. Today’s theme song, “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin) is a favorite. This song’s deliberate mondegreen in its title delighted me. I always knew it as just “Thank You.” When I bought the greatest hits album (actually, on an eight-track tape that the machine ate within a year, but not before torturing the sound into a strange warbling), the full title baffled me. I’d always heard the lyrics correctly, not something that always happened with songs, but did happen at the time. That’s when I was first introduced to mondegreens.
That greatest hits album deserved that title, and that’s why it was worn out. That was common for that time, to wear music out because of its medium, whether it was tape or vinyl. Digital has made a huge difference.
I started this morning by streaming some old ELP, “Welcome back my friends, to the show that never ends, we’re so glad you could attend, come inside, come inside.” Any ELP fan recognizes that opening from one of the Brain Salad Surgery “Karn Evil 9 Impressions” (1973).
But the stream drifted, bringing in “Still…You Turn Me On” from the album. I also enjoy thinking about the song’s enigmatic lyrics. It’s like they’re singing about trying to understand someone, and failing while guessing at who they are, and despite that, being attracted to them.
Many of us find ourselves in like situations in life, trying to understand others, and sometimes loving or hating them for reasons that we can’t explain.
Well, duh? How different was the music from the forties to the fifties to the sixties to the seventies until now? We went from gospel, the blues, rockabilly, and rock and roll to bubblegum, soul, R&B, folk and folk-rock, the British invasion, hard rock, psychedelic rock, acid rock, heavy metal, synth rock, techno-pop, country and western, young country, alternative country, classic country, hip-hop, rap, adult contemporary, soft rock, and every manner of hybrid of these styles.
Those are just a few that streamed through my coffee-less brain (just having the first sip…now…ah.) Today, music seems to be more about sounds, focusing on vocals, with catchy rhymes and repetition, while telling a story For example, my song today is “Jackie Chan” (2018) by Tiësto and Dzeko. Preme and Post Malone provide the vocals.
What intrigues me about it are lyrics such as these:
She said she too young, don’t want no man
So she gon’ call her friends, now that’s a plan
I just ordered sushi from Japan
Know your bitch wanna kick it, Jackie Chan
Not knowing what’s being sung, I sang alternative lyrics.
She said she too young, don’t want no man
So she gon’ call her friends, now that’s a plan
I got to go and use the can
I stand up to take a pee like Jackie Chan
Sometimes, encouraged by the delivery, I just go stream-of-thought freestyle on the whole thing, rhyming on man/plan/can/sand/band/land/hand, etc.
Yes, it’s different, catchy, interesting, intriguing. That’s what’s not new about popular music, and how pop-music in all its forms finds and keeps audiences. A hook is found, and a form is born.
“Back in the U.S.S.R” by the Beatles (1968) is today’s theme music. I thought it was appropriate to give a nod to a nation that no longer exists, one who built walls to keep their nation safe while building up a huge military and cutting their social safety nets and education, a nation whose primary concern became driven by the ruling party, who did everything they could to remain in power, control and intimidate their citizens.
Michael Seidel, writer 