Tag: pop

Sunday’s Theme Music

With all this Apollo 11 hoopla going on, naturally I thought of moon songs, and ended up streaming The Police and “Walking on the Moon” (1979).

I’ve read many account of Americans who decline to categorically embrace that humans walked on the Moon, despite NASA’s evidence. Ryan Newman, a NASCAR driver, isn’t ready to embrace it; he’s only seen photographs. Photographs, videos, rocks, etc., can all be faked.

I know how he feels. I’ve never met him. I’ve only seen photographs and videos of Ryan Newman. He might not exist outside of CGI. For all I know, he may not have said the words attributed to him. So really, if a fake person who only exists on photographs, videos, magazines, and newspapers claims that another event is faked, does the first cancel the second?

It’ll take some giant steps. If humans ever get to Mars, I wonder how many of them will believe it?

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Saturday’s Theme Music

Summertime. Good book, good Gershwin song, interesting cover by Sublime, “Doin’ Time”, a most excellent song to stream while walking around, enjoying summertime.

Know some places are having some summertime heat struggles. Hope y’all survive to have a better day.

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Thursday’s Theme Music

Surprising to find that today is Thursday in this part of existence. I strongly recall Monday and Wednesday, but I think Tuesday took a header.

Prepared myself for writing this morning via a pep talk and then a walk. As I finished the latter, I told myself that I’m good, I’m cool, and then some neurons fired and I added, I’m easy.

Perhaps that was my sub’s plan to relax and fortify me. Next, the subconsciousness began playing “Easy” by the Commodores (1977) in my stream. Music always affects me, soothing, calming, exciting, sometimes even forcing me to cry. But this was a perfect, mellow counterpoint to the focus and intensity building. I need both of those, but they need to be tempered just enough to take the edge off.

“Easy” did it.

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

“Stay with Me” by the Faces (1971) popped into this morning’s stream. This type of bluesy rock, with so many musical elements heard complementing one another, remains my favorite style. Ronnie Woods plays a wicked guitar. Love that opening. It’s good air-guitar stuff. Ian McLagen is awesome on the piano, and then that singer, with the gravelly voice, what’s-his-name? Yeah, Rod Stewart, did a damn fine job with the vocals.

Good walking song. Don’t trust me on there. Get out there and walk and do your Rod Stewart imitation. You know you got one.

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Tuesday’s Theme Music

I love the beach, and I miss the beach, so I’m trying to make plans to go to the beach. Challenge number one is timing; number two is finding trustworthies to feed the cats.

Hunting for beachy accommodations on the net, I began streaming a popular beach song. I like “Rockaway Beach” by the Ramones (1977) for its raucous fast pace and lyrics. I especially enjoy those opening lines, which are later repeated:

Chewin’ at a rhythm on my bubble gum
The sun is out, I want some
It’s not hard, not far to reach
We can hitch a ride to Rockaway Beach

h/t to azlyrics.com

I laugh at the first because I used to chew rhythms on my gum, which infuriated Mom, my sisters, and later, my wife. They all consider it noisy. Mom also thought I was like a cow chewing my cud.

I tried chewing my gum to “Rockaway Beach” — you have to, right? — and failed. Guess I need to keep working on it.

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Monday’s Theme Music

I know multiple versions of today’s song, but a little background to coming to it.

I dreamed of ear wax and getting rid of this morning. That apparently opened a direct channel to the mid-sixties in my head (that’s the 1960s, boys and girls, in case, you know, you were wondering…) because I was channeling sixties music this morning. Some early Beatles, Beach Boys, Lovin’ Spoonful, Richie Valens, Little Rascals, Monkees, Paul Revere and the Raiders, the Supremes, Dave Clark 5, Stevie Wonder… Whole songs didn’t playing. A snippet would begin, I’d identify it, and the stream moved onto another song.  You can see from the list that it was mostly American pop, with a little Motown thrown in.

After a bit of this, “(I’m Not Your) Stepping Stone” settled into the stream. Although I enjoy the Sex Pistols’ version, in keeping with the stream, I chose the Monkee’s 1966 version. You should watch the video just for a taste of 1960s TV pop America.

The song’s sentiment, though, resonates, which is probably why the stream settled on it: “You’re tryin’ to make your mark in society, you’re using all the tricks that you used on me.” I like that declaration: I know what you did, and we’re done.

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

Hump day. It’s become embedded in me.

I don’t work nine to five. I write seven on seven, breaking for some sickness, some holidays. Mostly I write, following the words the muses strew along the paths, trying to connect the story that I glimpse.

Though I don’t work Monday through Friday, the weekend remains the week’s end, and Wednesday remains the middle, the hump that I gotta get over. All psycho, innit? Yeah, a marriage of mental, physical, and emotional energy that started when we were in school in the U.S., and then carried on through employment.

I’m going to get through it with a little Dire Straits, cause I’m doing the “Walk of Life” (1985). It’s a good walking song to stream. “Here comes Johnny singing oldies, goldies, bebob a lula, baby, what I say?”

The video is a fun look back at sports and hairstyles…

 

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Tuesday’s Theme Music

Today’s music is owed to a cat. I opened a new can, put it in his bowl, and set it down in front of it. He took a step toward it, bent his head, sniffed it, looked up at me, and meowed.

“Looks fine to me,” I said. “Whatcha see is whatcha get.”

That naturally triggered the 1971 Dramatics’ song, “Whatchat See Is Whatcha Get”.

I gave another cat the rejected food. The other cat wolfed it down and then washed itself. The first cat, Boo, found kibble in the always there kibble bow.

Thinking about the song, I thought that it’s not only effective for telling the cat this is his breakfast choice this morning, but can hold to our politics with Trump. What you see, an ignorant, self-absorbed person and known cheat with a first-graders’ maturity level, and nursery-school knowledge of history and the U.S. Constitution, is what you get. That seems fine with the Trumpettes, but the rest of us are not pleased.

The song’s first words:

Some people are made of plastic
And you know some people are made of wood
Some people have hearts of stone
Some people are up to no good

h/t to Genius.com

Yes, I think that’s apropos for Trump and the Trumpettes.

 

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Monday’s Theme Music

In our world’s tiny niche, this was a significant hit when I was a teenager around 1973.

Jim Croce had been around for a few years and had several hits, like “Operator”, “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown”, and “Time In A Bottle”. Then a black crash killed him, devastating us, his fans, although it was probably harder for his family and friends. It seemed like even as they were still talking about it on the news, he had a new song rising on the charts, “I Got A Name”.

I awoke this morning still streaming several songs heard in my dreams. Among those were “Sisters” from the movie White Christmas, and James Blunt with “Make Me Better”. But “I Got A Name” was sharper and stronger. It’s silly and sentimental, but here it sits as my theme music this morning.

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Saturday’s Theme Music

Chicago was a friend’s favorite group when I was a teenager. Sometimes when we hung around at his place, he’d put on one of their tapes. He bought all of their early albums, so I became familiar with their songs. One such song, “Saturday In the Park” came to mind today.

  1. It’s Saturday.
  2. I was in the park, Lithia Park, in fact.
  3. People were talking and smiling, and a man played guitar, singing for us all.

You can see how it all came together, right?

Saturday in the park
I think it was the Fourth of July
Saturday in the park
I think it was the Fourth of July
People dancing, people laughing
A man selling ice cream
Singing Italian songs

[Chorus]
Eh Cumpari, ci vo sunari
Can you dig it (yes, I can)
And I’ve been waiting such a long time
For Saturday

[Verse 2]
Another day in the park
I think it was the Fourth of July
Another day in the park
I think it was the Fourth of July
People talking, really smiling
A man playing guitar
Singing for us all

h/t to Genius.com

If you’re looking for me, I’ll be in the park.

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