Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
Ever experience something unexpected that turns out to help you? Sometimes it’s a friend, an encounter with a stranger, or a pet, but you end up telling them, “You’re just what I needed.”
Yes, had that last night with my beer buddies. My time with them was just what I needed, prompting today’s theme song by the Cars, “Just What I Needed” (1978).
Cheers
Once again, I found myself humming along and singing along to a song that I’d started streaming, a song that just sort of blending into the general streams flooding my thinking.
This is a Phillip Phillips song, “Home” (2012). Here the lyrics that hooked me this morning:
Settle down, it’ll all be clear
Don’t pay no mind to the demons
They fill you with fear
The trouble—it might drag you down
If you get lost, you can always be found
I’d be reflecting on the big lie, fleshing more of its manifestations. The big lie is that we’re all the same as humans. Need to lose weight? Diet and exercise. Want to get ahead? Well, the answer to that one includes some references to God, love, and Jesus, as well as get an education or work hard, and you’ll be rewarded.
Sometimes, it happens, and sometimes it doesn’t. The big lie is that it will. And the big lie keeps us trying, because sometimes the big lie works, and that aspect keeps us hoping and striving.
I’m getting off track. Thinking about others, not myself, I was reflecting upon life’s complexities and how people can get lost, indeed, how easy it is to become lost, through bad fortune, misinformation, trusting the wrong others, or tricks of your body or mind. Many people are sick or ill, but won’t let it show until it’s forced into the light. Others will play up every sickness or slight to get attention and help, but end up taking advantage of the situation. Yet, sometimes, that’s a sickness in itself.
We create ruts and chase habits that form addictions, blinding ourselves, or permitting ourselves to lie and mislead ourselves, sometimes more than we mislead others. And others see it but don’t know what to say or do.
What a world, what a world. It’s all too deep, and yet that depth invites greater exploration — is that another addiction?
Give me another cuppa coffee. Oh, wait —
When I think of “Jungle Love”, I usually think of Steve Miller first. His song came out in 1977.
But today, I’m mentally streaming a song that came out over six years later. Performed and released by the Time, “Jungle Love” is a funk-pop rock tune with a terrific chorus and Prince playing several of the musical instruments. The song’s beat always gets me moving, which was useful for today. Two cups of coffee wasn’t enough to get me dressed and out of the house. “Jungle Love” pushed me further.
Hope you enjoy it (enjoy it), (oh we oh we oh).
I was thinking about the our entanglements through love and sex, blood and money, politics and hopes, and all the other ways we become entangled. Crazy dreams played a part, as did my writing process as I work on April Showers 1921, coupling and uncoupling plot twists and character arcs.
And lo, a song did rise in my stream, a song from 1975, when I was but nineteen and serving in the military in the Philippines.
A true legend and Nobel Prize winner (the accepting of which became another facet in the complex musician’s life), here’s Bob Dylan with “Tangled Up in Blue”.
Listening to it always makes me nostalgic for what I thought was going to be.
I don’t know what dislodged in my stream last night that led this song to stream in as I sipped my coffee this morning.
“Guitar Man” was by Jerry Reed (1967). In this version, he’s playing with Glen Campbell. Both of these players have passed away, but a large sense of Jerry Reed’s personality shines through in this song. We’d call him a good ol’ boy.
I remember watching this. I would have been ’bout eleven. Guess I was an impressionable kid.
Today’s theme music is a surprising turn for me. I blame my dreams.
I had a cluster of dreams last night that shared the theme of saving. I saved some people and animals in a few dreams, but I was also saved, most memorably once by a Jack Russell terrior. The dog led me out of what appeared to be a benign situation. After I thanked him, he left.
Keeping with the weirdness of all that, I awoke thinking, “And it said so in my dreams.” I immediately knew that line from “Candida”, a hit song by Tony Orlando and Dawn back in July 1970. I never had one of their albums, but they were immensely popular in the early seventies. That popularity translated to a lot of AM and FM radio play and appearances on television shows — or did the radio play and appearances on television shows lead to immense popularity? Either way, I heard them often. Pop culture tends to be like that.
Today, thinking, through it all, I’ll rise and fall, (and laughing at myself with a small head shake as I did), I thought that those words sounded familiar. My mind stumbled around for a while, tripping over other songs, almost tripping over cats, sipping coffee (and almost spilling coffee) until, wait, wait for it, wait for it…
A face appeared. A guitar riff followed. A voice popped into the stream.
Ah, yes. Having clues, I dashed to the Internet! A little later, the answer was mine: My Chemical Romance, “Welcome to the Black Parade” (2006).
Well, after that time dredging the stream for what it was, I had to feature it. Besides, the video is interesting, don’t you think? The whole thing is a little pop, a little rock, a little punk, a little drama, and a little surreal, don’t you think?
I’ve always had a place in my heart for the Clash, and I like the hard-edge they bring to today’s theme music. “I Fought the Law” by the Bobby Fuller Four was a hit when I was ten. Featuring clear and easy lyrics and a fast beat, I heard it on AM radio and picked it up and liked singing it. It was a decent song.
Over twenty years later (1979), with the Clash’s almost smug, sneering, raw cover, I felt it was more correct. Then, on reflection, I recognized, no, this is more about our cultural shift regarding music, and the evolution of taste. My mother disagreed. She liked Fuller’s smoother version.
I also thought it was humorous and odd after “White Riot” that the Clash recorded “I Fought the Law”. While the subject matter, an unlawful resistance theme, was similar, the songs’ structure were different. I decided the Clash were being ironic with their cover of “I Fought the Law”.
The trigger for releasing the song into my stream last night and today was a conversation with my spouse. I said, “I’m going to the ATM for some cash. Need any?” As I went, I thought, “I needed money ’cause I had none.” Naturally, the chorus followed. Fortunately, my ATM card worked, my account had cash, the law wasn’t involved, and the only fighting was within myself about how much cash to take out.
Here’s both versions. Hope you enjoy one of them. Cheers
Oh, those dreams. After those, I was hunting for an energy jolt. After reading some Dave Grohl comments about Billie Eilish, and thought, yes, she will work.
I like her work because it’s a change, although, honestly, “Ocean Eyes” (2015) was weirdly Enya-esque, prompting thoughts about cycles.
“you should see me in a crown” (2018) doesn’t remind me of Enya. It reminds me of exploration and alienation while sourly mocking invitations, judgments, and expectations.
Count my cards watch them fall
Blood on a marble wall
I like the way they all
Scream
Tell me which one is worse
Living or dying first
Sleeping inside a hearse
I don’t dream
It’s musical art, an expression about a generational segment, in my bones. Don’t mind the spiders. She doesn’t.
After another night of multiple, interesting dreams (some involving playing games), I was mocking myself this morning. “These dreams go on when I close my eyes,” I said to the cats, who were not looking at me nor listening to me (because, the cats were all thinking — I could see it in the spread of their whiskers, the glints in their eyes, and the tilt of their ears — “The others are here, and who knows when one of those other cats will lose it and attack me, so I must stay vigilant!”), “but it feels like I’m thinking about them every second that I’m awake.” Of course, I was close to the song lyrics from “These Dreams”, a 1986 Heart hit.
“These Dreams” sounded different from Heart’s earlier music, IMO, but I liked the song. (Confession: I like songs ’bout dreams. It might be because I dream often, and seem to remember them.) Of course, the band’s line-up had changed, too, another reason for the different sound. Not long after buying Heart’s album, I discovered that Martin Page and Bernie Taupin wrote the song. Ah, hah.
The other aspect of this song, heavily noted during the song’s time on the pop chart, was that Nancy Wilson sang lead vocals instead of Ann, even though Nancy had a cold.
Ah, trivia.
Michael Seidel, writer 