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A DELAYED DOSE OF JACK UP MUSIC FOR YOU ALL

Check it out…I wanted to get this posted yesterday, and have something else completely cool for you all today, but the events of the past three days have kind of kicked my ass. More on that in a bit, because I REALLY need to vent. So, if you’re not interested in some severe ranting on my part over my job, I would read this paragraph and skip to the tunes. Like I said, I originally had this lined up for yesterday, but music never dies, and it never gets old, so one day won’t really matter, I don’t think. I have some more tunes based on the Jack FM format…I am seriously loving the freshness of it. At least for now, it’s keeping me sane for 20 minutes in the morning, and 20 at night.

Now on to my rant. Work of getting kind of completely out of hand, and today I’m pretty much going to put a stop to that today. It’s become apparent that the project managers in my company are content to allow me to take over the effective management of all areas of their projects, including resource management, ordering, priority setting, etc. I am an architect. My role is to provide a sound technical solution, and a map for them to integrate complex applications across the board. Instead, I have been doing so much project manager crap that I’m behind. Way behind. And I just had a come to Jesus meeting where I laid it all out, and told my lead PM that either he gets a team here tomorrow, or I go home.

So, hold on…I have to be in Boulder for yet a third week in a row, and the second weekend. No, my wife is not happy, and no, I am seriously not happy.

IT CAME FROM THE 90′S, UPDATE EDITION!

Today’s list is my update of one of my favorite blog series called “It Came From The Nineties” over at Can You See The Sunset On The South Side. The author of this blog, which, by the way, if one of my favorite reads, has a pretty good eye for talent, and usually posts outstanding stuff. A month ago, I did a 3 day series on what I thought was the best of…if you get a chance, I still recommend going over and visiting his blog.

Of today’s list, maybe the song that means the most to me is The Nixons’ Sister. It was a moderate hit in 1995, but the words really hit me pretty hard. In 1995, the relationship I was in had fallen apart, due to the distance between us…I was in Chicago, and she was in California. We were both going through pretty nasty divorces, and though we loved each other pretty dearly, the stress just tore us apart, and we went months without speaking to each other. I heard this song, and the words just kind of shot through me, and I realized that I was making a mistake I would never recover from by letter her go. I mailed her a copy of the song, and fortunately, she felt the same way. A few months later, with both our divorces complete, she moved to Chicago. A year later, we were married, and this December, it will be 12 great years. Never has a song made such a difference in my life.

I DON’T KNOW JACK ABOUT MUSIC…OR DO I?

One of the nice things about traveling for business is that I sometimes find some great music stations on the radio. It’s rare, but when I find one, I get pretty jazzed. Well, my friends (as John McCain is so fond of saying), this week, I have found one, though it has a little twist, as you’ll see. First of all there is a Denver Station that calls itself Jack FM, and I gotta admit, they play one hell of a variety of songs. Not every song is great, or even a song I like. But unlike most stations, I can listen to 3 or 4 songs I really enjoy for everyone I don’t. Normal stations are lucky to have the reverse ratio.

Now for the controversy. I guess that Jack FM is a new type of format, or so says Wikipedia (who we all know is NEVER wrong!). The playlist creation is centralized, and market research driven. Their catalog of songs are, I guess, twice as large as other stations, and they are no where near as specific to one genre of music. Honestly, I find none of those things disturbing, and in fact, it’s a nice change. The stations (and there are several across the US, Canada, and now even in the UK), have no local programming. No DJ. No local voice to add that local touch. I guess that upsets people. To be honest, though, there are very few DJ’s I honestly care to listen to. The last one passed away a few years back (I hope your jamming your ass off up there, John Peel!). It’s all about the music…the other stuff is just fluff.

That brings me to today’s list. All the songs on the list are from a 2 hour period. Of course, I choose the ones I liked the most, and left off the clunkers like Neil Diamond and Kool and the Gang (apologies to those that like those two artists…I have nothing again em. Hell, I even dig the hell out of Neil once in a while.). But the stuff listed here is pretty typical of the range of styles, both in genre and in decades, that they play around the clock. Like I said, it works for me, and makes that drive to and from work a little more bearable. Enjoy!

MUSIC FROM THOSE CHEESY 80′S MOVIES

There’s nothing I like better than all those old cheesy movies from the 80’s. I’m pretty sure you know, and have seen, all of them, just like me. Pretty In Pink, 16 Candles, Fast Times, Valley Girl, Breakfast Club, St. Elmo’s Fire, etc. etc. The list is endless. No, I’m not ashamed to say I went to see them…I mean, mostly, because my girlfriend/wife at the time wanted to see them…yeah, that’s gotta be it! Anyway, no matter how bad those movies were, you could always count on one thing, a great soundtrack. And by great, I mean, they invented, and perfected the modern movie soundtrack. Since the 80’s (with some exception of some of the Cameron Crowe movies in the 90’s), movie sound tracks have tried to be that cool, with very few successes. It was just the greatest 10 year span ever to be in my late teens / early 20’s. I love watching those movies now because it really does remind me that at one time, I could flit about the halls at high school, being an outsider, scorning the “in” crowd, and generally not giving a shit about anything. Maybe the reason I still listen to the music I do is because for 4 minutes at a time, I can still be like that.

The real reason I used to watch those movies, to be honest, is that, among my other crushes in the 80’s, Molly Ringwold just rocked my world. I thought she played some of the coolest characters back then, and it’s a shame her career died when she pissed of John Hughes. I don’t know where she is now, or what she’s doing, but for me, she’s just one of the coolest chicks from one of greatest times of my life. Here’s to you, Molly! Enjoy!

MO’ MONEY, MO’ MONEY, MO

I watching Wall Street gradually melt into a big pile of goo the other day, wondering how much of my 401K actually exists anymore, which led me to wonder what it will be like to still be working at the age of 80. Hey, how bad an it be? Except for the fact I’ll need to take more naps, and change my adult diaper during breaks, it might be so bad. But watching all that chaos unfold just kind of reminded me of one thing…In Living Color! I’m pretty sure most people know it as the shows that launched the Wyans and that other douche, Jim Carey. And it launched the phrase “Mo’ Money, Mo’ Money, Mo’ Money!”

I thought it might be a hoot to come up with a list of songs with Money in the title, as a tribute to the innate greed of the average Wall Street CEO. I hope you enjoy the music…it’s about all I can afford to give out anymore!

A DAY OF PEEL SESSIONS

First, for everyone who commented about Mr. Sicks, a huge thanks. It really did make my wife feel a lot better reading them all, and for that, I thank you all from the bottom of my heart. There are a lot of really great people in the world, and I’m lucky enough to have quite a few of them reading this blog.

Someone left a comment the other day about this blog having the influence of the great John Peel running through it. I take that as a high compliment, indeed. John Peel had the finest taste in music, and sadly, most people over here have no clue who he was, or what his influence on modern music is. Never let it be said that I am guilty of either of those. I’ve done numerous posts featuring the Peel sessions, but it’s been awhile, so I thought I would gather up some great tunes from Peel sessions, and pass them on to you all.

The thing I love best about the Peel session is that the songs all have a rough edge to it, yet not as rough as a live recording. I’m not a fan of live recordings…usually, I just don’t find the music as good. But the Peel session gives some of that live quality, while still keeping a bit of the studio polish. It’s just good stuff. Enjoy!

A MUSICAL TRIBUTE TO MR. SOCKS

I mentioned a few days ago that a stray cat had come to live on our back deck. We informally named him Mr. Socks. That him there in the picture. The rains of the past few days, along with the coming of fall, and eventually winter, spurred us on to take him to the vet this morning, to get him checked up, immunized and try to get him ready for winter.

My wife took him into the vets office this morning. An hour later, I got a call from her, and on the other end, I heard only sobbing. The vet had done a feline HIV test on the little guy, and the test came back positive. Further more, the vet said he was already pretty sick, and could not survive a winter. Unfortunately, it was time to make a very rough decision. Mr. Socks has been living on the back deck for two months now, and we honestly have grown extremly fond of the little guy. But this morning, we made the decision to put him at rest. It was hard, and it sucks, and it’s left a little bit of a hole in our home, but we just could not stand to watch the poor guy suffer, and gradually pass away. So it’s with more than a little sadness that today, we said goodbye to our little friend, Mr. Socks.

SONGS ABOUT CARS FOR A THOUSAND, PLEASE…

You can tell I’m going a little stir crazy. After three days of non-stop rain, this is the best title I can come up with. For some reason, I was sitting here playing some xBox, watching football, and generally trying to not be bored out of my skull, when somehow, the thought came into my head to try to come up with 10 songs that mention cars in their title. You know what? It wasn’t even close to being as hard as I thought it would be! Plus, I think I actually put a great list together to boot!

There’s something for everyone here…some old stuff from the 70’s (Adam and the Ants), to newer stuff (Arcade Fire), and everything in between. There goodies from the 80 and 90’s. If you can’t find a song you like in this list…then you must not like songs about cars. What the hell ever that means! Like I said, it’s been raining here for 3 straight days, and will be for another 3 it looks like.

Enjoy the car tunes!

HAVE A GREAT DAVID BOWIE DAY!

First, anyone that has family or friends in the Houston/Galveston Texas areas, I hope you all have been able to get a hold of them and everyone is safe. After having lived through numerous tropical storms and hurricanes when I lived in Florida, I can tell you first hand they are big, bad and can be extremly destructive. I have a feeling that there is going be a lot of clean up after Ike…let’s hope that the government continues to handle this stuff better than New Orleans.

Here, it’s a rainy, mellow Saturday. Somewhere along the line, we adapted a little outdoor cat. He’s very tame and socialized, so I thing it’s a cat that was just left behind when someone moved. How someone could do that is beyond me, but there he is. He’s been living on out back deck for about a month now. So last night, I build him a nice little house to live in, including a shingled roof with some old roofing shingles I had sitting around. I used scrape wood from other projects, so it really cost me zero dollars to build, and the little guy now has a warm, dry place to live.

Anyway, while I was building it, I listened to David Bowies “Singles” album from about 8 years ago. If you want a really good collection of his greatest stuff, it’s a very nice primer. The problem with that is that Bowie is one of those album oriented artists, and to truly appreciate his greatest singles, you really need to listen to the entire albums. Since I can’t do that, at least enjoy some of my favorites of his. Enjoy!

A NICE LITTLE ALTERNATIVE SUNDAY

I’m enjoying a nice little weekend after having a couple pretty stressful weeks. I smacked the hell out of some more golf balls at the driving range (very useful for burning off stress!), watched my Buckeyes barely beat Ohio University (WHY do they insist on scaring the crap out of me all the time!?!), took a nice little nap, hit some of those plastic practice balls around the yard. And that’s just Saturday. I’m hoping I can go indulge myself of my new habit again today, and play 9 or 18.

The music list today was inspired by the Batman Returns movie from like 10 years ago. I was listening to the radio and heard Kiss From A Rose. It struck me because I remember when the movie came out, Q101 was at the parking lot in Schaumburg, IL, right down the street from where I worked. If you came down there and answered a question, you could pull out an envelope that had a prize in it. I won a CD single of Kiss From A Rose (I still have it somewhere around here). The guy behind me? Yeah, well, he won front row tickets to a U2 concert. Such is life. Enjoy!

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