I will admit, I know little about this song. I think it came out around 1985 or 1986. I’m not sure. I could look it up, I suppose, but I prefer letting it float in the sea of memories of the period. I was doing a lot of travel for America at that time. I’d come back to the states, stay a few weeks, hear some new music, and leave again.
Yet, the song, ‘Word Up!’, was very popular and catchy. I knew about half of the words, I suppose. Word up was an expression that seemed to be used like, “That’s true,” “I agree,” or, “You bet.” The expression further evolved into just, “Word.” Yet, back then, and even now, I can’t reconcile the song’s use of the word with those expressions. To me, this song seems to be asking, “What’s going on?” Still, easy to sing to, and a cool techno beat. Well, we thought it cool, back when we were young.
Here is Cameo with ‘Word Up!’, from sometime in the last quarter of the twentieth century.
I thought I’d honor my starry dream in song. I selected one my recent favorites, ‘Counting Stars’, by One Republic, 2013. I like its juxtaposition with a religious meeting going on, with its revivalist overtones.
Thinking of a new year and all your plans, one cannot help but remember the past. That’s what’s today’s song is about. And it has a good beat, easy to dance to and sing as you surf the wave of the day.
Well, hello. Here we are. At the end, the beginning, a break, a start, a finale.
This is New Year’s Eve day. Tonight we’ll count down to a new year.
I mean, most of the western world will count down. Others use different calendars and count down at another time of the year. And we’re only counting down to the end of the Julian calendar year, and not, say, the fiscal year, although some use the calendar year and the fiscal year as the same year. It’s not likely to be your natal year, though. So you won’t be celebrating that new year, nor a wedding anniversary, which is another new beginning that’s often celebrated.
But here we are, celebrating this day that doesn’t quite align with the seasons,businesses, or our lives, but here we are, the masters of our domain.
For this day, I selected a soft, questioning song. ‘The Freshman’ by the Verve Pipe from 1996. It encapsulates a lot of thinking about human nature IMO. Perhaps I’m generalizing by my circle of relationships but this is what I’ll testify that I saw. We began by thinking we knew so much. Then later, we question, what did we really know?
How did we miss the signs?
How could we end up so wrong?
We end up marveling about how we came to be the relationship that we are or were, conducting forensics on our behavior and running audit trails on what was said and who said it. We look for clarity in the murk about what was meant by tone and meaning in the context of gestures that happened before and after.
Some are content to never question. “It is what it is,” they answer with tautological finality. “Ours is not to question why; ours is but to do and die.”
“That’s just the way it goes.”
Perhaps they question but never admit that they question, or limit the circle of who knows about their questioning. Some consider that questioning is a sign of weakness.
They don’t want to be seen as weak.
I’ve always been the questioning sort. I guess that makes me weak. I’m envious of those who find a trajectory of ignorance and remain true to its path, never veering or questioning but riding that comet with the certainty that they have the golden truth, convinced that nothing else other than what they believe can be true or correct.
Older material is housed in my mental jukebox his week. A little more Etta James was played yesterday, followed by Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix. But today’s theme song outlasted them all.
I haven’t heard the song, ’96 Tears’ or the group, ? and the Myserians, in decades that I remember. Then, again, as I write, I realize that it’s connected with the same era as my cousin, who appeared in my dream. Some subconscious excavation and exploration is underway.
Here it is. It’s easy to sing along in your head. I hope you enjoy it.
No particular reason for this song today. It’s a classic R&B tune, flows through the head like an unraveling thread, easy words to remember and sing, with an appropriate key and subject matter. It helps you have a legendary singer and group performing it.
Here is ‘Shop Around’ by Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, 1960.
I’m feline the mood: nap, nibble, nap, repeat. Guess it’s the Christmas hangover, the letdown after the holiday, with catalysts provided by the nippy air and frozen landscape.
So here we go, from 1981, ‘Stray Cat Strut’, by who else? The Stray Cats.
First, the disclaimers, the buts, ands, and the so, and the lists of ‘I know’.
I know it’s a holiday, and actually the day of one of the jewels of the holiday crown.
I know many hold this holiday sacred.
But I like this song.
And it’s been stuck in my head since I heard it on the radio yesterday.
I like this group a lot; their albums were part of my teen-age year go-to rotation. I may have posted this song before. I don’t know; I don’t track what I’ve listed. And theme music can be repeated.
And I like the blues. So, really, I’m just spreading some joy.
So — here it is, the Allman Brothers with ‘One Way Out’. For all we know, the man down there could be Santa Claus.
I’m thinking about the blues today. One, I like the blues. Two, lotta people suffer the blues during the holidays.
I’m a mixed media presentation on the holidays and the blues. Adulthood and cynicism squeezed the holiday cheer right out of me despite some terrific childhood memories. I know many suffer depression or the blues during the holidays. I can’t speak directly to Kwanzaa, Solstice or Hanukkah. Nobody I know openly celebrates Kwanzaa. My Jewish friends celebrate Hanukkah without any expression of the blues. I celebrate Solstice, and it’s too joyful to feel blue.
But around Christmas Eve, the blues creep into my thoughts because I can’t go back to more wonderful times, to that time when I was an innocent and celebrated Christmas without addressing larger world issues. Memories of that time feed impressions that this era seems like a faux celebration. Along the way, I’ve learned, the blues never hibernate, and they sure as hell never die. All you can do is cope.
Here’s Otis Spann with ‘The Blues Never Die’, to remind us of that. Happy friggin’ holidays.
