My New Bestie is an Amazing Lip Sync-er

I often times wish that celebrities were my besties but not in a "I want to be famous" way, more in a "they look like so much fun to hang out with" way.

Rachel McAdams, Rachel Bilson (hmm... both Rachels, interesting), Zoe Deschanel are a few that have found a spot on my Besties Wish List. Recently Jimmy Fallon has headed the list. And through my BF, James (my nickname for him), I have a new friend to add to the list: Emma Stone. 

Recently on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, Emma's lip sync battle was coined it, EPIC. I do believe this to be true.

Come over to Expat Village and check out MY BESTIE, EMMA on Jimmy Fallon

Photo Credit:
Heart (edited by DTWB) - epSos.de

My Total Truths #7 - Words are Powerful (And the Jukebox Plays...) #TunesdayTuesdayHop

Each one of us has inside of us our own truth. My Total Truths is a series based on MY truths; a list of things that I know to be true. What are your total truths?

# 7 - Words are Powerful

Words matter. The writer in me knows this as an essential truth. They don't always have to be neat or pretty or elegantly spoken; they can be simple and rough around the edges but no matter what words you choose to say they are always heard. So think about the ones you choose to be spoken. I don't understand people who toss words out of their mouth like spitballs in a middle school classroom, without thought or much attention but then grow upset when they are called out on those words. When you say something, when you use words you offend, encourage, affirm, accept, neglect, negate, humiliate, liberate, comfort and reassure, compliment, challenge, or enrage. Be ready to accept whatever words you speak. They are powerful. They can evoke revolution and throw over governments. They have won over hearts and flattened souls.

Writers know this... musicians know this too. (Well, some.) Lyrics are words made more powerful to a rhythm. Although, Dave Matthews makes it insanely hard to choose just one song with lyrics that move me, my first choice would undoubtedly be from his Before These Crowded Streets album, a song called Don't Drink the Water.

The song with its already powerful musical arrangement could seem a bit dark if you don't know what DMB is singing about but the lyrics force down your throat an overlooked truth, one our country rarely talks about; that the development of our country was made at the expense of its native inhabitants. It poetically sings about a dark time in our nation's history when colonization caused near extinction of the Native American population. But the reason it is so powerful is its point of view:

"Interestingly, the song is written from the perpective of a typical white man, who comes to a new land where he hopes his dreams can come true, only to find that there are people living there already that 'don't fit into his idea of paradise, so he asks them to leave.'"

The opening words sound playful like an adult playing a silly child's game. It's eerie, really, the way he talks to "them" making it known what will happen like a parent giving commands. "So you will lay your arms down. Yes, I will call this home." But perhaps what I find to be the most powerful line(s) are when he asks:

What's this you say?
You feel the right to remain
Then stay.... and I will bury you.

Powerful words that show no compromise. Words that show no room for disagreement. Words that tell a story, that send a shiver down my spine every time I hear them.

This song is one of the most genius-ly written musical creations ever written. I say that with honest words, words I would defend to anyone. DMB finds away to make his commands sound like requests to his new neighbors. He makes the commands of the "typical white man" so sound and reasonable while still attacking with words.

Words that are powerful. Words that make you listen.

It is longer than typical songs but totally worth every minute! You might never hear music in the same way.

Come out come out

No use in hiding

Come now come now

Can you not see?

There's no place here

What were you expecting

Not room for both

Just room for me

So you will lay your arms down

Yes I will call this home

Away away

You have been banished

Your land is gone

And given me

And here I will spread my wings

Yes I will call this home

What's this you say

You feel a right to remain

Then stay and I will bury you

What's that you say

Your father's spirit still lives in this place

I will silence you

Here's the hitch

Your horse is leaving

Don't miss your boat

It's leaving now

And as you go I will spread my wings

Yes I will call this home

I have no time to justify to you

Fool you're blind, move aside for me

All I can say to you my new neighbor

Is you must move on or I will bury you

Now as I rest my feet by this fire

Those hands once warmed here

I have retired them

I can breathe my own air

I can sleep more soundly

Upon these poor souls

I'll build heaven and call it home

'Cause you're all dead now

I live with my justice

I live with my greedy need

I live with no mercy

I live with my frenzied feeding

I live with my hatred

I live with my jealousy

I live with the notion

That I don't need anyone but me

Don't drink the water

There's blood in the water

Can't stick around for this week's party??

Next week's theme will be...

What song makes you sing out loud in public?

**Don't forget to link up your post below & visit some participants to see what they're jamming out to!**

Mission: 

Tunesday Tuesday was created to bring people together through music while discovering some new jams for your playlists. Every Tuesday the linkup is LIVE here at DTWB and at The Patchwork Paisley, MrsTeeLoveLifeLaughter and Structure in an Unstructured Life 

Host Follow Links:



          Meg                                                                     Jen                                                    Beth                         Tiffany

Grab our Tunesday Tuesday Retro Button below! #TunesdayTuesdayHop

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Don't Drink the Water Quote cited from Dontburnthepig.org

An InLinkz Link-up

And the Jukebox Plays: Tunesday Tuesdays - Using the "Bop" to Help Katrina Victims

Mission: 

Tunesday Tuesday was created to bring people together through music. Every Tuesday the link up is live here at DTWB and at The Patchwork Paisley, MrsTeeLoveLifeLaughter-

AND  Beth from Structure in an Unstructured Life!

Host Follow Links:





       Meg                               Jen                              Beth                       Tiffany

Can't stick around for this week's party??

Next week's theme will be...






And Now...

There are songs that you love to hate. For me that song is Celebration by Kool & the Gang. Cna't tell you what it is about that song that makes me want to drill my eardrums out so that I never have to listen to that song again, but if you ever wanted to torture me - think Clockwork Orange torture - all you'd have to do  is play that song over and over and over again. I'd tell you anything you wanted to know.

But this week we are asked to name a song we hate to love. That song that you know you should hate because it is that bad but you can't help but find it a little catchy. My choice seems so obvious that I wouldn't be surprised if we all chose it.

It's this:

But here's a quick story I love about just how catchy and hated this song is for people:

In 2005 after Hurricane Katrina swept through parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama like a giant wielding a broom devastating New Orleans beyond rational belief, schools across America began raising money to donate to the victims.

One school in Pennsylvania came up with a tune-tastic way to make money... fast.

As I heard the DJ tell the story on a New York radio station, this school decided that they would play MMMBop, brother band Hanson's hit in 1996 on the loudspeaker of the school. Every day. At the beginning of each day. And before classes. And throughout lunch. And in between classes during every passing. The idea was to annoy the students so much that they would pay to stop the music - to "Stop the Bop" as they called it.

Genius. If each student donated $5 to "Stop the Bop," the school would raise $3000.

So to this I say:

Hanson,
Thank you for creating a song so catchy and so annoying that a school could raise funds on the principal of ending your play time.

As for me, I gotta say, I'm not sure how much I would have wanted to "Stop the Bop."

**Don't forget to link up your post below & visit some participants to see what they're jamming out to!**

And grab our NEW Tunesday Tuesday Retro Button below!

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An InLinkz Link-up

Under Pressure and in the Danger Zone

Mission: 

We created Tunesday Tuesday to bring people together through music. Every Tuesday the link up is live here at DTWB and at The Patchwork Paisley, MrsTeeLoveLifeLaughter-

AND  

welcoming our new permanent co-host, Beth from Structure in an Unstructured Life!

Host Follow Links:





       Meg                               Jen                              Beth                       Tiffany

Can't stick around for this week's party??

Next week's theme will be...

Random Five-O

Put your iPod on shuffle. 

What are the first 5 songs that play?




And Now...

This Week's 

You can't seriously be asking me to pick my favorite 80's song? 

Why not ask me who my favorite parent is or which kid I like better? 

Better yet, why not ask me which finger I like best and then to chop off the rest?

You might think this would be easy for an 80's fanatic such as I but oh sweet child of mine, it's like being in the land of confusion.

This year my husband threw me a SURPRISE 80's Birthday Party. It was so much fun that my group of friends still talks about it. It was so much fun that I kinda wish I could walk around life in an 80's musical. I was born in the 80's. Correction: I was born to the 80's. It owns me. 

So to repeat, how could I possibly choose my favorite 80's song? Like a record, baby, right round round round I go, asking myself the same question, this eternal flame of a question, the kind that flickers in your mind slowly but steadily all day. For a week now, from 9 to 5 I've asked myself what song would be able to encapsulate all that the 80's means to me. And time after time I come up with nothing. No solid answer. When I think of one, another one pops into my mind like a Warhol begging to be remembered, shouting, "Don't you forget about me!"

I thought about asking around for help. So I asked the boys of summer, rad guys I met a few summers back through a friend of a friend. My friend, Jessie who knew this girl, they were her friends. But they weren't at all helpful, bunch of burnout karma chameleons those guys. I asked my other friend who just smiled at me like she had some secret she wouldn't share and I said, "Come on, Eileen. Help me out!" But she just turned and walked away. Next I called Jenny, she was a maneater but she was the expert on all things 80's. I dialed her number. 867-5309. No answer. Damn it! DAMN IT! I left her a message, said, "Call Me!" I could have called Jack but crazy Diane never liked me, some bizarre love triangle thing so I called Billie Jean but she was busy having baby daddy issues. Just then my cell phone rang. I hoped it was Jenny returning my call but my cell screen said 

CALLING...

GLORIA

Ugh. I can't talk to this chick right now. She drives me crazy!

I started to feel lost, like someone who had one really drunk night in Bangkok, someone who has searched the world high and low, head to toe and still hasn't found what she was looking for. I searched in Africa, Down Under, this small isla bonita off the coast of Kokomo I sometimes visit. Nothing. Will I find the answer to my question anywhere? It is somewhere out there?

I was so tired of thinking about this unanswerable question that I needed a vacation, an escape and a piña colada. But the piña colada wasn't enough so I poured myself a glass of red, red wine. But even that wasn't enough so I took some bad medicine. What? Don't judge! It's my prerogative how I handle my problems. You ain't my papa. If you don't like it you could look away or stray cat strut your ass right on outta here, papa. Don't preach to me.

I'm sorry. I said that in the heat of the moment. I didn't mean it. I just feel like I'm wearing a raspberry beret driving a little red corvette down the highway to the danger zone on a manic monday and I just need to relax like Frankie said. "Stand back," he said, "STAND BACK," and just let the answer come to you but at this point, I'm just holding out for a hero because I don't think I will be able to write about anything even close to 80's song related.

This theme has me under pressure like a gambling addict in Atlantic City who owes money. Because let's be honest, does one favorite 80's song encompass the absurdity, the glitz, the putting on the ritz, the abracadabra magic of the 80's? Of course not! Like purple rain, a favorite 80's song is impossible to find. It's St. Elmo's Fire... something that doesn't exist.

I lay down and stare at the ceiling. Just then it starts to rain and my brain can't fight this feeling anymore. It wants to shut down and take a sledgehammer to these rapid thoughts. I allow myself to drift to sleep like 99 luftballoons floating to the sky without writing about my favorite 80's song. It's ok. I'll try again tomorrow.

Tonight, I'm just gonna blame it on the rain. 

**Don't forget to link up your post below & visit some participants to see what they're jamming out to!**

And grab our NEW Tunesday Tuesday Retro Button below!

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And the Jukebox Plays: Tunesday Tuesday - Say What?!

Week 12: This is the Memory

Can't stick around for this week's party??

Next week's theme will be...

 Favorite 80's Jam

(This will be impossible)  

And now...

Image courtesy of Meg at The Patchwork Paisley, designer extraordinaire!

When I started And the Jukebox Plays it was because music is a part of my existence like breathing. Then And the Jukebox Plays turned into Tunesday Tuesday, a link up I'm grateful Meg from The Patchwork Paisley asked me to start up with her because it reminds me weekly why I love music so much. 

It reminds me of my father and my earliest childhood memories. It takes me back to days past and conjures up smells, feelings, and emotions in a way that nothing else I can think of does. It brings me to moments I want to remember and moments I don't. Most moments in my life could be summed up by a song... couldn't yours? And because music is a reminder, choosing ONE song that reminds me of ONE person has infinite possibilities on all kinds of scales.

Here's a trick that I've learned in the last 12 weeks of blogging about music... the first song that comes to mind is usually the one you go with. I've tried a few times to think of a different song, telling myself, no, convincing myself that there has to be a better song choice but like swimming against a current, I always find myself being brought back. It's better not to fight it.

This week is an example of that. With all of the music I have stirring around in my head and all of the people in my life that have undoubtedly been connected to a song, I find myself coming back to this one: "Steel Bullets." Never heard of it? That's because it's actually called "Steel Bars" by Michael Bolton - 90's sensation - but my sister used to swear it was called "Steel Bullets." She probably still does. 


We were on our yearly family drive to Miami and like usual we were playing games to pass by the endless hours of the loooooong haul to the bottom of the East Coast. It was Name that Tune hour. I remember the song was a few years old already when we heard it in the car and although sometimes we had to wait a few bars for a song to play before quickly spitting out the answer like sour grapes, we didn't have to wait for this one. 

We both shrieked at the same time:

     Me: Steel Bars!

     Her: Steel Bullets! I said it first.

     Me: What?! 

     Her: I was first.

     Me: No! What did you call it?

     Her: Steel Bullets

Silence. Howling laughter. 
This is the memory: My howling laughter gave way to her howling laughter. The laugh betrayed her, it gave away that she knew she was wrong but it wasn't in my sister's makeup to give up that easily. Years before when we heard Paul Young's "Every Time You Go Away" she swore to me that he finished the line with "you take a piece of meat with you." Really, meat? Not "you take a piece of ME with you?" 

She was hopeless.

(Here's the short clip of the Paul Young song for your listening pleasure)

     Me: The song isn't called "Steel Bullets."

     Her: What is it called then?

     Me: Steel "BARS"

     Her: That's ridiculous.

     Me: Right. That's ridiculous. 

And then to try and prove me wrong she waited for the chorus and inserted the words "steel bullets" into the place of the actual title thinking if she sang it well enough I would concede. I tried to explain to her that even if it did kiiiinda sound like "steel bullets" that it didn't make any sense. Why would "steel bullets" be wrapped around him and make him a prisoner? My father - the musical authority in our car and tiebreaker extraordinaire was brought into the conversation.

     Me: Dad she's telling me this song is called "Steel Bullets."
     Dad: "Steel Bullets?"
     Her: Yeah, listen. (She waited for the chorus again which I happily sat by waiting for as well) "My love for you has got me locked up inside me... Steel Bul-lets wrapped around me, I've been your prisoner since the day you found me..."

Silence. Dad howls in laughter. My sister and I howl in laughter. 

Let's just call that one a tie, ok? 

(If you don't listen to this for ANY OTHER reason - you have to listen to it just to see how my sister fits the words Steel Bullets into the chorus)

 

join us next week...

Every Monday night at 9pm the link up will go live at The Patchwork Paisley, Drinking the Whole Bottle, and MrsTeeLoveLifeLaughter. 

Tunesday Tuesday: And the Jukebox Plays: Booty isn't just a Pirate Word

Week 11: Booty Booty Booty

Can't stick around for this week's party??

Next week's theme will be...

 A song that reminds you of someone

And now...

Photo credit: Megan Hawthorne of The Patchwork Paisley. Isn't she amazing???

What is a booty shaking song? 

I ask Google: 

The first two results I see are:

KC and the Sunshine Band - Shake Your Booty

AND 

Twerking - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hmmmm... These are pretty different results.

This time I just search for booty shake definition. Maybe the definition could give me some insight into where the booty shake originated. 

This is what I get:

I could see this isn't going to get me far because there doesn't seem to be one set judgement, one hammered down set of rules that could define what a "booty shaking song" is. I think Maybe there is no one set definition of a booty shaking song because everyone's booty, like fingerprints or taste buds, are different. Perhaps my booty is moved by music that makes your booty sit still (pun intended). Could it be possible that a booty shaking song cannot be shackled by the tyranny of a definition? Maybe a booty shaking song cannot be held down and confined or generalized or limited to one type of booty. Is it possible that you just know your booty song when you hear it? Like soulmates?

I have an epiphany. 

We are a world of booties that are inspired to shake by the beat of our own drummer. 

Doubtlessly you hear the words "Booty Shaking Song" and you, like Husband, have probably been singing "Rump Shaker" in your subconscious. I would vote this the "Go To" booty shaking song by a slim margin since Baby Got Back is an obvious "Go To" as well. 

But if by my epiphany definition a booty song is anything that makes MY booty move than these are not my booty shaking songs, no matter how much other booty they make move. 

There's just something so gooooooooood about your booty shaking song that you will not cannot hold your booty back. To try and do so would be an injustice. So to not injustify my booty I'm gonna give you my award winning booty shaking song(s) and then dance my ass off!

This year (or last year) Macklemore & Ryan came out with a song called "Can't Hold Us." It is physically impossible for me to hear this song and not lose my ever loving mind. I don't bounce or jam to this tune; I fucking straight up jump when I hear it. It makes me move so much that sometimes dancing isn't enough and I just have to jog in place in order to move my whole body enough. In the car it makes me want to dance so hard I am close to driving off a cliff when I hear it, or at the least, crashing into oncoming traffic. Simply put: it's dangerous when I hear this song. I fear a heart attack. "Like a great white shark on Shark Week, what?!" 

BUT what's a booty shaking song prompt without Miss Bootylicious herself. The original just Beyonce song that always makes me want to shake and get crazy:

What defines your Booty Shaking Song?

 

join us next week...

Every Monday night at 9pm the link up will go live at The Patchwork Paisley, Drinking the Whole Bottle, and MrsTeeLoveLifeLaughter. 

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