Today’s song is by a Canadian group, “The Guess Who”.
“Hang On to Your Life” was released in 1971. It came to me today out of one of the lines, natch; it’s a common occurrence when I’m walking around town, speaking to the cats, or visiting with my dreams. This one came out in conjunction with mutterings about writing (wrutterings, I suppose), and the quest for a better novel. I figured, “Maybe I can sell my soul.”
Burton Cummings answered in “Hang On to Your Life”, “but don’t you sell it too cheap.” Then I just meandered down some memory lanes about age, life, and choices. Yes, all while sober and not smoking anything. Listening to it, it seems like a perfect 1970 radio rock song, featuring raging lyrics in a taut voice backed by electric guitars and heavy drumming.
You’d think that today’s song, with a cat in the title, was inspired by an interaction with a cat. Nope; didn’t happen that way.
“Honky Cat” by Elton John (1972) came to me because of the line, “Change is gonna do me good.” I was asked to help another. Helping them would force a change to my comfortable, protected routines. But I wanted to help, hence, I told myself, “Change is gonna do me good.”
Turned out, my help wasn’t needed, etc. By then, though, “Honky Cat” was roaring in the stream. Not that I mind that. Its jaunty sound fit my mood.
Now I’m gonna go look for gold in a silver mine, then drink a little whiskey from a bottle of wine. Always enjoyed those lines.
Six thirty in the AM. Post winter solstice and not too cloudy so there’s a little daylight, but still, overhead lights are required for this important task, feeding the cat.
I used to regularly be up at this hour, often at work by now. Since retiring from the USAF and leaving IBM, I’ve chosen not to be up at this hour. I’d rather be sleeping.
But the cat – Pepper, the neighbor’s old cat – has come in through the pet door and is begging for a meal, so I get up to indulge her. Won’t be but a minute. Another cat, Boo, comes in asking for some food as well, so I set him up.
Boo alternatively stares at me and the bowl of food like, “What’s this? What’s going on?”
“It’s your food, Boo. You were just asking for it.”
“Food? Food? What is food?”
I don’t know what game he’s playing and I want to return to bed. Maybe he’s thinking, “This isn’t what I ordered.” Don’t know. So I tell him, “If you want it, here it is, come and get it.” But I know Pepper. She’s gobbling her food down and will head to this bowl afterward. She’s already giving it a side glance as she’s eating. “You better hurry cause it may not last.”
Which was all that my brain required to introduce the 1969 Badfinger song “Come and Get It” from my childhood memories to my conscious stream.
Lyrics:
If you want it, here it is come and get it
Mmmm, make your mind up fast If you want it, anytime I can give it
But you better hurry cause it may not last
It’s weird to think of this as a Badfinger song. I think of them as rock poppers. Yeah, I know its history about Paul McCartney, The Magic Christian, etc. And that’s it, I guess, it has the Beatles sound (or the McCartney sound), but not the Badfinger sound.
The food was eaten when I got up an hour later, and also regurgitated on the foyer rug, highlighted in its own little patch of sunshine.
I watched Once Upon A Time in Hollywood. Tarentino always makes it interesting and watching it for memories of that era was a delight for us Boomers.
Circling around an actor and his stunt double and friend (Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt) and Charlie Manson’s family, the movie offered some fond side trips down pop culture lane. Our American television diet was prominent, because this film’s story was about TV and movie stars.
But pop music was in there, too. And in the background of one scene was an old Vanilla Fudge favorite from 1967, “You Keep Me Hangin’ On”. Loved the song by the Supremes, but the VF’s more psychedelic version spoke to this eleven-year-old lad. My older sister had an older guy interested in her. To win her over, he tried winning me over by loaning me his Vanilla Fudge album, so I played it enough that the notes and I were familiars.
The movie entertained me with its what-if premise. I always enjoy what-if, but the attention to details really impressed. Even period piece can openers were used.
Yeah, big mistake. Reminder: never look in the mirror before medicating with coffee, Michael.
My father’s image started replacing my image about ten years ago; now his father is replacing his image in my mirror. After reflecting on that (hah! get it? yeah, I thought you did), I drifted toward the day’s beginning where the cats awaited the feeding rituals. Thinking about what needed to be done today and tomorrow, I drifted toward a spot of sunshine peeking over mountain, and through the trees and window. With that, a 1979 Kinks song flushed into the stream.
Woke up this morning, started to sneeze
I had a cigarette and a cup of tea
I looked in the mirror what did I see
A nine stone weakling with knobbly knees
I did my knees bend press ups touch my toes
I had another sneeze and I blew my nose
I looked in the mirror at my pigeon chest
I had to put on my clothes because it made me depressed
Surely there must be a way
For me to change the shape I’m in
Dissatisfied is what I am
I want to be a better man
Superman, Superman, wish I could fly like Superman
h/t to Genius.com cuz’ cut and paste is easier than typing.
Here’s the song, “(Wish I Could Fly Like) Superman”. Dig that bass line.
Just out of speaking with friends, reading the news, remembering the past, and pondering the future…
Into the stream came a song from The Falcon and the Snowman based on the book with the same title, with more words in it. A friend received it in a slush pile, read it through the evening one Friday, looked up the author and discovered they were in the same area code. The book excited him. A phone call was made against all standard protocols. Arrangements were made to connect the following Monday to talk about going forward.
Alas, by then, the author had contacted an agent, and everything changed. The book went to another publishing house, to my buddy’s dismay.
Meanwhile, the song — also with the same name — by Pat Metheny with David Bowie on vocas, reflects the disbelief and denial that I feel while reading the news. It isn’t particular to this era. I always think we should learn and move forward, but my idea of moving forward doesn’t align with what others think and want. To me, it’s like they’re moving backward and repeating history as they insist that we’re going forward.
Anyone, this 1985 ditty expresses my point of view. Cheers
I was supposed to have departed the fix about fifteen minutes before, so I was now behind my schedule. Couldn’t help it. Couldn’t stop writing. Coffee was gone, butt was uncomfortable, and my sciatic nerve was causing pain issue from being perched on the coffee shop’s new hard chairs. All the signs were aligned, time to go, mo-fo.
But —
Yes. Closing up with a stern order, go now, I packed it all up, strapped on the backpack, and headed into the sunshine. It was doing little good against the wintry air, but it was in the low 40s, a better place to be than, say, single digits that some in Alaska are enduring, and it’s better than Australia’s fires and blazing heat. So, couldn’t complain.
Walking up the hill, the distinctive piano playing of the Moody Blues cover of “Go Now” (1964) arrived in my stream. It’s a wondrous juxtaposition when the thing you’ve been doing, memories of places and events, and what you’re now doing come together in a perfectly mellow mood. I usually need a beer, a glass of wine, cup of coffee, or the toke of a joint to arrive in such a state.
But here I was, just me and the small town, with myself and music in my head, cold in the air, and sunshine on the other side of the valley.
It seems like my mind is determined to turn back time in my dreams. It’s also making all these song connections. (Like, boom, Cher has begun singing, “If I could turn back time.”)
The dreams were crazy chaos, leaving images like flashes of sunlight off of windshields. The dreams’ theme was ‘anything goes’. That theme conjured up the show tune from the musical with the same name, “Anything Goes”, which, let’s see…came out twenty-two years before my birth, but the movie did come out the year I was born.
Out of this throwback, go-go sense came the song that’s haunting the morning’s stream (now I have this image of a musical urine stream…oh, boy. (“I heard the news today, oh boy.” Yeah, the Beatles.) It’s from a 1964 movie, so I was eight.
The song is “The Monkey’s Uncle”. Although the Beach Boys perform it with Annette Funicello singing it, it’s written by the Sherman Brothers. Yeah, I looked it up. I knew the first two pieces but not the third. The Sherman Brothers were prolific songwriters. You should check out their list. I can tell you that one of their other songs, “It’s A Small World”, has entered my stream.
Meanwhile, the monkey’s uncle idiom amuses me. In one of those flashes in the dream, someone else says it in what feels like a sitcom moment. I’m looking at the guy when he does. Canned laughter kicks in, and then the song begins.
I don’t hear people say, “I’ll be a monkey’s uncle,” that often any longer. I think it was dying out as a popular saying even when I was young, sputtering along in movies and television where caricatures of old folks say it.
That frenetic dream activity left me felt energized, like it was a storm blowing out my mind’s systems. Anyway, the long and short of it (had to throw that in, it was in dream), is “The Monkey’s Uncle” is today’s theme music.
Feel free to sing along, or if you’re like me, laugh along, with the video.
Once again, my chosen theme music arrives via a dream, but is selected because it stays stuck in my mental stream. That forces me to sing it aloud and share it with others to remove it from my traps.
The dream was about neighbors, friends, and food. It was quite chaotic. At the end, almost like the music to the final scene, “With A Little Help From My Friends” plays. It’s the original 1967 Beatles version, sung by Ringo, a song version that’s both morose and jaunty in my ears. Not my favorite version (yes, that would be Joe Cocker) but it’s the one that was in my dream, so here we go.
As an aside, driven by my reflections on the dream and the song, the song came out when I was eleven, making the song fifty-two years old. Where does the time go?
After reading the news updates yesterday, I mourned the patterns, the things we keep doing and won’t change. Haven’t we seen this show before? Assassinating leaders and promoting greater violence while claiming to be de-escalating. We’ve changed centuries; shouldn’t we change our tactics and strategy. No; they continue to fight the last war and run the last political campaign. Of course, there are some that lap it up and beg for more.
The timing was impeccable for this murder. Australia burning, glaciers melting, people fleeing wars and droughts as other nations turn refugees away, but hey, let’s de-escalate by killing others.
Out of that, I started singing Steve Winwood’s “Freedom Overspill” (1986).
Keep on talking all you want
Well you don’t waste a minute of time
Who cares, who knows what’s true
Coffee and tears the whole night through
Burning up on midnight oil
And it’s come right back on you
Freedom Overspill
Freedom Overspill
Force of habit, you could say
The way they talk you’re talking away
Who cares, who knows what’s true
Your wounded pride is burning you up
Burning up on midnight oil
And it’s come right back on you
h/t to Metrolyrics.com cuz’ cutting and pasting song lyrics is easier.
That ‘Force of habit’ line is what hooked me. Nations, like people, fall into habits, especially as leadership and thinking diminishes. Like marketing, they think, well, this worked before. Press drumbeats follow soon. We’ve seen it happen so many times already in this young century.
It takes strength and awareness to change. Does anyone out there have it?
Michael Seidel, writer 