This week’s music thread is about your personal theme songs, songs that speak to you or for you when you’re happy, furious, romantic, determined, chillin’ or remind you of a special time or event in your life.
A newer addition to my driving, chores and groovin’ songs:
Running Man’s Bible – Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
This song, though not a somber song, reminds me of a somber time:
What I Do – Donald Fagen
Two Who songs come to mind when I think of rebellious theme songs, Behind Blue Eyes and this one:
Who Are You – The Who
Many songs to choose from for good times, I’ve posted my usual suspects in previous posts so here’s a couple I haven’t posted much if at all before:
Touch of Gray – The Grateful Dead
If You Want to Sing Out, Sing Out – Cat Stevens
Your turn!
Frank Zappa–I Am The Slime;
Fly me to the Moon
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6qLNnxGDaA
Pick Yourself Up, Brush YOurself Off
And one more Tish “Closer Still”. The singing – which is incredible – starts at about 14 seconds in….
Good night you wonderful people;
Night KT. Nice sharing some good tunes.
My pleasure KQ.
KT – night. I’m fading fast, too as I am NOT forever young (at least in body). Goodnight, dear friend.
Your spirit is “forever young.” Thank you for your kind words.
Oh, AB. What a voice. Just listening washes away the fatigue and achiness of the evening’s work. Thanks for introducing me to this marvelous talent.
AB, I’m saving her till everyone’s gone. She sounds special.
Santana–Europa (Earth’s cry Heaven sigh)
Good night, KT, ole buddy of mine.
Sleep a joyful sleep Sally! And wake up to new dawn.
Bito & Kalima: This one is for you; Bito, because I know you will love it and Kalima, because of all that you have had to endure since the earth refused to stand still. Tish Hinojosa, a friend of mine, singing “There’s Something in the Rain” (HINT: It’s about spraying fields of immigrants with pesticides, something I often witnessed first hand in South Texas)
Just beautiful. (and humbling)
Thanks, KT. I heard her at a folk festival in Texas in the late 1970s as a back up singer. They let her sing a solo, she sang “Clouds” and my heart stood still.
Forward about 10 years later. I was at a cowboy poetry gathering in Elko, NV and brushing my teeth to go have some big fun. TV on, and this voice came out – this video was airing on MTV – and I remembered hearing that voice. I never knew her name, but learned it that day. About six months later, (I’m living in Seattle) and I pick up a Spanish language newspaper and see that she is playing in Sunnyside WA for a benefit for the migrants schoolchildren. Grabbed the Blov and a friend, drove 3 hours over mountains to get there. My friend – who did not speak a word of Spanish – gave hundreds to the cause, and my husband fell irretrievably in love. (Male groupie) Years later, I became true friends with Tish. All this music stuff made me go look her up. She now lives in Germany (another Kalima coinkydink) and I’ll see her on December 15th in deep south Texas, Inshallah.
Oh – and her new CD is called “Our Little PLANET”. Coincidence? I think not…
Life doesn’t get much better than that AB. You are a fortunate one and as far as I can see, it is much deserved! Bless you! 😉
My Granddad was a farmer and he died at 68 from leukemia that was contracted from pesticides they were using then. My sister received a letter from Robert Redford when she wrote him about our Granddad. Redford was campaigning for it to be discontinued. I always think of him when I hear this. Thank you for posting it.
Sally – I am so sorry to hear about your grandfather. I remember traveling in the back of our 52 Ford and watching the crop dusters fly criss-cross over the fields, dumping pesticides while the Mexican farmworkers labored over the cotton.
I thank Tish for this song, and all her others. She has an absolutely haunting voice.
Thank you AB but it was a long time ago. Back when they mixed it themselves and got their hands in it. He was a great guy. I have some wonderful stories about him. Loved to say: “What the Sam Hell you up to now!” I was probably out playing with the new piglets or something. And, he said Hell not Hill.
Sally – I had an uncle who raised pigs, and I adopted one little black and white runt. I named him Michael, and slept with him every night the summer I was 9, on a cot in the kitchen. Ah, memories!
But I do eat bacon, and I do love a good set of ribs. Call me an infidel.
AB, I also had a runt pig and would lay out in the grass with him. I eat everything, too. But, that reminded me of a story. Hope you don’t mind me sharing it. It was before I was born. When my sister was little she got a baby duck for Easter one year and she raised it until it got big. Called him Donald naturally. Well, my Grandmother fixed it for a big family dinner one day. Everyone knew where the duck came from. My sister was eating away and said, “This sure is good chicken, Grandmother. Sure glad it isn’t duck and Donald.” Of course no one else could finish their dinner.
Oh Lordy. When I lived in FL. I went to a party and asked what was on the menu and it was your standard BBQ fair but the hostess said “the pig is a pet”. Well just coming from NJ about a year earlier I about laughed my arse off.
Oh dear AB, beautiful and a flood of memories. I became as close to angered violence as I ever was when I saw someone spraying highly toxic chemicals without warning on “my girls.” I knocked him off his tractor and was just about ready to thrash him and throw him in a chemical infused “settling pond.” Something stopped me, Beautiful song about a real inhumanity to humanity because their skin color was brown and they “talked funny.” Thank you, AB!
AB, just home from work and it’s almost 2 a.m. here. What a song! What a voice. You and Tish must be a tremendous gift to each other. May your friendship go on forever!
Thanks for this middle of the night melody.
Something just occurred to me. There are 5 words that may say it all.
“Won’t you help to see…”–Bob Marely
Dylan–The Man In Me;
This was one of my favorite songs for several years of my starting out on my own life
Zenith, not a bad one to start out with, at all.! Nonconformance is the heart of true rock and roll. And the key to a genuine existence.
AdLib, this is a better sound and performance, and a great video. The Dead was a tremendous band, and truly one of a kind. But sometimes their performances were pretty inconsistent. And to me, that is what made them great. They were real, in your face and NOT subdued by studio tricks and record company bullshit.
I had the pleasure of seeing them do this for the first time, live! A night I will never forget!
I saw the Dead 15 times and like you said, sometimes it was the best music ever made, other times, it was “What was that all about?”. I can’t recall the song but I remember one of their jams just falling apart once. My most “magical” musical moment was actually during a long jam by Burning Spear(by far, best reggae band I have ever seen) at Bumbershoot. I was sort of dancing with my eyes closed on a nice sunny day, and just ended up in a very different place. Suddenly the song ended, the crowd started cheering, I opened my eyes, looked around at my friends and saw I wasn’t the only one. I liked the reaction of the 15 year old neighborhood kid I took along, he had his hands clasped over his mouth and uttered, “Oh my God” a few times.
Very cool. Sometimes the vehicle isn’t as important as the ride. The trick is arriving at a destination.
I went to a Dead show at the Laguna Wild Animal park, and it was at night. The two drummers went into a long drum, “solo” and I swear it took me right out of the present into a primal age of man. Almost like the apes who surrounded the Monolith in the film 2001. I was really in a different time and place. And I wasn’t on acid or any other hallucinogen. It was just those drums that took me away!
Not a vid, but a good site for music lovers http://www.archive.org/browse.php?collection=etree&field=%2Fmetadata%2Fcreator
Youtube is hard to beat. Whatever I look for, there it is, no matter how old or obscure.
Pink Floyd–Wish You Were Here;
Excellent choice.
You just can’t go wrong with the Floyd!
The Stones–Dead Flowers;
Dave Mason–Shouldn’t Have Took More Than You Gave;
The Who–Behind Blue Eyes;
I have posted this more than once before, but it’s only because it’s so beautiful. Cassandra Wilson–Redemption Song;