Suzanne Calling

Chef likes to play Little Big Planet 2. When he plays against other players in the Playstation Network, there are a lot of things that people can embed into games, as well as use their headsets. This is because players can build levels into the game. This means that for a while, my son was Rickrolling people, because he may be one of the rare people on the planet who actually likes the song "Never Gonna Give You Up". I don't know where he gets it, maybe it's a gene mutation? However, thanks to that game, I think we'll call the summer of '12 "Banana Song Summer", because of this: You're welcome. And if you need to get rid of it, may I suggest Unhear It? http://unhearit.com/

A friend pointed me towards the Bill Shatner rendition of "Bohemian Rhapsody," which I could only tolerate for just over a minute before waving the white flag of surrender. Inspiration struck when I looked at the suggested videos to the side. How about some hideously bad music? For instance, like Telly Savalas: Or Phyllis Diller: even Leonard Nimoy got into the recording studio: and the one that, back in 1996, made me happy for employees who could dig up anything on the Internet before DogPile or Google. (IIRC, this nugget of joy came up on Alta Vista and we were giggling at work for WEEKS on the audio alone) I don't know, should I start digging through the depths of YouTube for more abominations of music?

At 11:11pm on 11/11/11, Chef concluded his premiere viewing of "This is Spıṅal Tap", and as we'd hoped, he found the movie very funny. However, one of the funniest scenes, the infamous 'but these go to eleven' that inspired naming today as Nigel Tufnel day produced something else: my list of eleven songs that I like to play at eleven. *Disclaimer-I could probably use about 50 songs, so take this list as eleven for this moment in time.* Baba O'Riley, The Who Red Barchetta, Rush (though to be honest, Camera Eye is the one that gets played at 11 most often) All Star, Smashmouth Rock Lobster, B52's Bohemian Rhapsody, Queen What I Like About You, The Romantics It's the End of the World As We Know It (and I Feel Fine), R.E.M. Don't Fear the Reaper, Blue Oyster Cult Dream Weaver, Gary Wright Saturday in the Park, Chicago Life's Been Good, Joe Walsh How about you? Which songs do you thing MUST be played at 11?

I recently won a gift certificate to an excellent Cuban restaurant, and today, I enjoyed a nice lunch with that prize (Chimichurri beef, which is really Argentinian, but the sides were most definitely Cuban). It's nice, I get to speak a little español and listen to latin pop music. Today, though, a melody sounded very familiar, so I listened to the lyrics and realized that I was hearing in Spanish (and translating into English) was a song from an album I played to death in high school. Solo Ti, or Only You, by Yaz. The original: There was an awesome a capella cover about a year later from the Flying Pickets: But today, Enriqué Iglesias had a turn with a favorite, and now I can sing those harmonies en español! I should see if Enriqué covered some other 80's favorites.

I'm in final exam mode, and research proposal mode, so this week's will be short. This old Debbie Gibson song has been running through my head lately. Odds are good that you haven't heard it, because it wasn't released as a single, but I like it.

One of my classes this summer has focused on the four main theories of education: Scholar Academic, Social Efficiency, Learner Centered and Social Reconstructionist. Each has qualities that are good, but my opinion is that none of these is idea without incorporating elements of at least one other curriculum. This week's homework involved reading about a comprehensive study of five northern New Jersey schools around the time that I started middle school. The teaching materials used in two of the schools were the same ones I used in my elementary classroom. It was cool to see that, and frustrating to see that students from working class communities in the same school district, with the same budgetary dollars, weren't given the same quality education. This song went through my head, because one of the comments made in the study by an educator was "The parents don't care, anyway, so why should we bother?" Last week's assignments focused on Social Reconstructio...

It's summer, so time for some favorite summer songs: Enjoy!

Time Marches On I'm starting this off with a confession that I'm pretty sure I've shared before: I can't stand Bruce Springsteen. His voice and horrible lyrics just turn me off. It is better to listen to Bruce's songs covered by other artists, mainly because I cannot stand his voice. (To my New Jersey friends: I know it's a law that you all like 'The Boss,' but I've never resided in the Garden State and am therefore exempt from the legal ruling) However, from the first Bruce song I ever remember hearing (Tenth Avenue Freeze Out), the thing that always stood out was that saxophone. As I didn't like The Boss, I never made an effort to find out who was blowing that sax so fine. It was that instrument that made all of Bruce's songs great. Can you honestly imagine 'Born to Run' or 'Rosalita' without it? In the mid-80's, a song came out and got heavy rotation on MTV, in the days when they actually played music videos. ...

Bonus Tracks Do you remember back before our cars had CD players, we had iPods and adapters to use them in multiple locations, how we used to tape our favorite music onto cassettes to listen to on the daily commute? I had dozens of them. Even my dad got a few (Basia and Grayson Hugh on one, until he confessed that he fast forwarded it to hear Basia, so I made a new one with the same album on both sides.) Anyway, I made a tape with the two October Project CDs that got played over and over, to the point that both boys can sing along with them. The limitations of a 45 minute cassette required me to shave a song off each album to fit the format. So, now when I hear those two songs, as I haven't heard them nearly as much as the rest of the album, I think "Hey, an October Project bonus track!" The two tunes that are my 'bonus tracks' Be My Hero from October Project One Dream from Falling Farther In How about you? Do you have tracks that got shaved from the cassette ...

Songs of My Youth I loved this song when it came out, and enjoyed hearing it played often on WABC that year. When I started working at the college radio station, when I got the "Good Gold" show, which was a past top 40 format, I think I played this one as often as I could get away with before Jim Green would hassle me about Good Gold didn't mean I only played Andrew Gold. My trusty Joel Whitburn Top 40 Hits (not the one pictured, but similar), informed me that his mom was Marni Nixon, a woman I knew to be the singing voice for Natalie Wood in 'West Side Story' and Deborah Kerr in "The King and I" What I didn't know until yesterday is that he was born in 1951 and his sister, two years later-just like in the song. Top 40 hits book Andrew died yesterday at 59 years old. Besides this hit, he had a busy career backing up some of the biggest names in music on their biggest hits, including playing all the instruments on Art Garfunkel's "I Only ...

With GameTeen's prom last night, I thought about how fast time flies. One day, you're bringing home a tiny infant and the next thing you know, they're in high school and going to proms. No, I'm not here thinking "My Baaahhhhbeeeeeeee", but realizing that as I get older, the time just flies by so fast. So, of course, I thought of a few songs from my youth that touch on the subject of time. The first, probably one of the first Steely Dan songs I can recall hearing (Do It Again was released first, but it didn't make as much of an impact.) At the time it came out, it was in heavy rotation and the words didn't mean much. Now I appreciate the sarcasm. A guy whose voice has always caught my attention is Al Stewart. In 1978, this one was all over the airwaves and for some reason, it seemed to be played every afternoon in the half hour drive between my junior high school and my bus stop, not that was a bad thing. Anything to cut down on Don Imus running ...

Considering that it's past 6pm in Australia, Japan and New Zealand, I'd say the doomsday people are wrong. Just in case, I made a really good dinner of stuffed clams tonight. (I wonder if the people who haven't paid for the auctions they won earlier today are hedging their bets before paying tomorrow-after 6pm)

In theatre, the term 'Triple Threat' refers to an actor who can also sing and dance. It goes back to the very early days of Broadway, when budgets allowed for a corps de dance, singers who just sang and actors who just acted. I think if you look at any Buzby Berkeley musical, you can see how the casts could number over a hundred, sometimes two! So, to have an actor who did all three, and well, was a hot commodity. Nowadays, to succeed on the boards of Broadway, and get roles in the musicals, you need to be able to do all three very well. There are plenty of people after those limited jobs, and if you can't do it all, there's someone right behind you that can. Meanwhile, if you're a big name actor with major marquee value, this can be forgiven. So, when this actor was announced as taking the lead in a revival in a Broadway musical, I figured he'd either dance or sing well. Dancing can be taught to the point that someone can pass muster for eight performance...

This semester's big project is a powerpoint about several episodes of the PBS series "Spain...on the Road Again." The series features food, culture and history while four erstwhile travelers consume lots of wine during their sojourn. What could be bad about a series with Mario Batali, Gwyneth Paltrow, Mark Bittman (of the NY Times) and Claudia Bassols? Not much, in my opinion Well, there was this bed music they used throughout the series that was evocative of Carlos Santana. Some digging netted this musician from Miami and that song: The artist's name is Monterosa and the song is 'Me Lo Robo' Then I went to his website and listened to samples of the rest of the tracks on the featured album. Me gusta!

So I'm sharing it with you, since I am finishing up a term paper. Enjoy!

The generational divide reared its ugly head the other day. We were studying for that test in spanish, and the question came up "which ones are the adjectives?" It made me feel bad for the younger generation, because they weren't raised on these: I even started singing parts of it for mis compadres to explain. It made me wish that these songs were en espanol to help with language absorption. In playing it to find for this blog post, Ed commented that his favorite Blossom Dearie song is the lovely minor key composition "Figure 8". Those of you who enjoyed these back in the day, which one was your favorite?

Over the almost five years of writing the blog, I've mentioned my love of the nightly fireworks show at Epcot, IllumiNations, Reflections of Earth. Of all the pictures I have of WDW vacations, I easily have more of this one show than anything else in the Disney parks or resorts. I know the soundtrack intimately, thanks to a coworker handing me a tape of it not long after I started working at the stores. She told me that it was her treadmill tape of her absolute favorite thing at Disney. It was easy to see why, the music effectively inspired mood. In April, 2001, we made our first trip to WDW since Ed and I were married and saw the show for ourselves and discovered what Tina had already known-this was the BEST way to spend an evening at Walt Disney World. Over time, we found our favorite place around the World Showcase Lagoon to view the fireworks (near Germany, with a nice glass of German white wine)) and we probably enjoyed the music more than the fireworks. As a result of ...

A friend mentioned on FB yesterday how this time of year made her pull out the Jesus Christ Superstar Sundtrack and listen to it over and over. Another friend added that for her, the show of choice is Godspell. This sent me off on the search of YouTube for one particular song. In college, attending all ten nights of the theatre department's production of Jesus Christ Superstar actually was the catalyst for my return to theatre as a course of study. I'd been a communications major at that point. I have the soundtrack and know it intimately, some of the songs are so tied to the actors in that production. For instance, it'd be hard to beat Josh Mostel's " King Herod's Song ", but the actor who did it in that production was phenomenal. Another musical of religious theme from that era has music that always caught my attention, but until last year, I didn't own it, the movie was purchased at rock bottom price during Circuit City's demise. As a huge ...

I hope you're wearing your green! No corned beef and cabbage meal here, due to class tonight. Perhaps I should go pick up a four pack of Guinness for afterwards?

This is too cool not to share. Besides, you don't want to hear me whine, anyway. Trust me.