Suddenly, I can’t get Cyndi Lauper’s “Money Changes Everything” out of my head:
I love the original version, which is the one stuck in my head, but I also thought I would look around and see what other versions there are. I found this one from Lauper’s 2005 acoustic album, which rerecords some of her biggest hits in acoustic duets with other artists:
I’ve since downloaded this album, and I really like it. Lauper has a bit of raspiness to her voice in this version of “Money Changes Everything” that really appeals to me. This version feels like the point of view of a more mature woman rather than the carefree younger woman of the original version.
Today I drove up to Akron (3 hours) for a meeting and then drove back. It was a very successful meeting, so I’m glad I went. A couple of days ago I started listening to my iPod with the intent of listening to all 1300+ songs that I have on it. Six hours in the car seems barely to have made a dent!
While I was driving back home, Jill Scott’s “I Am” came on and I am now officially obsessed with it. It’s typical of Scott’s love songs: sexy, soulful, and genuine. I also love that it’s a song for adults. Here’s a YouTube video of the track from her 2007 album The Real Thing: Words and Sounds Vol. 3:
Here’s a video of her singing it live:
I love that she weaves lyrics from her other songs into this live version. Someday I HAVE to see her in concert — she’s such an amazing live performer (I love her live album!).
When it came out in early February, I immediately downloaded Sade’s new album, Soldier of Love from iTunes. Lover’s Rock from 2000 is a great album that I still listen to from time to time, so I eagerly looked forward to this new one.
I’ve found the album a little difficult to get into, mostly because I just haven’t had time to really sit with it and just listen. The past two months have been incredibly busy — every time I think my “new” job couldn’t get busier, I’m proven wrong!
While I was working on my laptop recently, however, I had iTunes on shuffle and a track from the album came on, “The Safest Place”:
I really love this beautiful love song. It’s so typical of Sade’s love songs, slow, quiet, and not really very sweet. Instead, she sees love from the perspective of someone who’s seen it all and lived through heartache. Her take on love is always much more interesting than most pop music. This track has made me want to find some time to listen to the whole album and get acquainted with it.
While I was in Europe earlier this month, I had limited access to English-language television. The one channel that I consistently had was BBC, so one evening I watched Your Country Needs You, a show hosted by Graham Norton in which 6 acts competed to represent the U.K. in this year’s Eurovision Song Contest.
The Eurovision Song Contest is totally fantastic. It’s a cheese fest like no other. Acts from each European country compete by performing an original song (not necessarily written by the act). Each country then votes on the winner. (The voting is slightly more complicated than that; here’s an explanation.)
Near the end of the show, while people in England were voting for the winner, Alexander Rybak, who won the Eurovision competition last year, performed his winning song, “Fairytale.” He’s totally adorable, and I loved the cheesy deliciousness of the song, so I’m making it my song of the week:
The 24-year-old Rybak completed for Norway, where he now lives, but he was born in Belarus. He wrote “Fairytale,” which won the highest number of votes ever recorded in the competition. After winning the competition he released an album featuring the single of “Fairytale.”
I spent the first week of my trip to Germany and the Netherlands without PJ, who met me in Amsterdam last Saturday morning. I had checked into our hotel on Friday evening. When he got on the train from the airport to Amsterdam’s central train station, he called me and then I met him at the station.
While walking to the station, which was only about three blocks from our hotel, I couldn’t get Cascada’s “Everytime We Touch” out of my head. So, I’ve decided to make it my song of the week:
While I enjoyed all of my trip, I have to say that the best part was meeting PJ at the station and spending a weekend together in Amsterdam. I missed him terribly while we were apart. I managed to work myself up to a major case of nerves before I left for the trip — I supposed because it was the first time I had traveled abroad on my own in 10 years and because I was meeting with lots of people, etc. — which ultimately affected me physically during the week I was away without him. Not surprisingly, all of that went away (almost) as soon as I was with him again.
Cascada is actually the name of a group rather than the lead singer’s name, which is Natalie Horler. The group originated in Germany, and when they started getting international attention Horler became synonymous with Cascada. I guess it’s not the first time that the lead singer of a group has taken over its identity!
Since I was just in Germany, it seems particularly appropriate to choose a song from a German group for my song of the week. While I was there, I also reconnected to my love for Euro-trash pop music, which I’ll blog about later. Until then, I’ll just keep singing, “Everytime we touch ….”
My song of the week this week is Lady Gaga’s “Telephone.” Like so many of her songs, this one is infectious. I realized recently that I hadn’t downloaded it onto my iPod. When I did, I couldn’t stop listening to it, and now whenever I’m not thinking about anything else I find the chorus playing over and over again in my head!
This is third or fourth Gaga song that I’ve selected as a song of the week. She’s clearly my favorite artist right now. I’m not sure that nearly 40-year-old gay men are her target audience, but that’s how it goes — artists can’t predict or control who loves their work.
I love the way the song begins relatively quietly and then builds to its dancing climax. She’s a great performance artist and musician, a rare combination, I think. I’m especially reminded how much I lover her music and performance art as I watch the new (and so far dreadful) season of American Idol get underway. Where’s the new Adam Lambert when you need him (or her)?! Say what you will about Lady Gaga, her drive and ambition are relentless. Fortunately, she’s also extremely talented.
Over the weekend, our electricity was knocked out by the snow storm. The first night our power was out it was actually kind of fun. After going out to dinner and seeing a movie, Young Victoria, we lit some candles, cuddled up in blankets, and listened to “Mountain Stage” on the radio. My feeling Saturday night was that spending a night without electricity and listening to the radio by candlelight with PJ was a perfectly delightful way to spend the evening.
When we turned on “Mountain Stage” we couldn’t quite place the voice of the woman who was singing. She sounded a but like a mix between Lucinda Williams and Kasey Chambers. At the end of her set, we learned that it was Jessica Lea Mayfield. Listening to her music with PJ by candlelight felt kind of perfect, so I decided to make her song “Kiss Me Again” my song of the week. Here’s a clip of her singing it live:
Once our power came back on, I looked her up on the internet and downloaded her CD, With Blasphemy So Heartfelt, from iTunes. I really like her music and hope she puts out a new album soon! She’s from Kent, Ohio, who started out singing with her family in a bluegrass group. Now she’s out on her own (her brother’s in her band), and she released her album in 2008.
Last Tuesday I ordered my copy of Patty Griffin’s new CD (and for once I actually bought the CD rather than downloading the album from iTunes) Downtown Church, which NPR describes as “the equivalent of a slow walk into a field of wildflowers — a journey in which you look up at a bluebird sky and take a deep breath with your eyes closed.” I really like much of Griffin’s other music, and PJ and I had seen her in concert here in Athens with Emmylou Harris, Shawn Colvin, and Buddy Miller not too long ago (and, PJ reminds me, we also saw her as the opening act for Lucinda Williams back in the 1990s when we lived in Knoxville).
Even though I generally like her music, I’ve never bought it before. Usually PJ buys it and I just listen to it. But I started listening to it on NPR and thought it was worth getting. Besides, if I didn’t like it I could always give it to him.
It turns out that I love this album. It’s already in contention for my favorite album of the year. It’s definitely a breathe of fresh air. I also agree with NPR that she’s produced “an album that’s so mesmerizing, it’s difficult to believe Griffin isn’t a card-carrying member of The Downtown Presbyterian Church in Nashville.” (Griffin recorded the album there about a year ago.)
Only two of the songs on the album are original; the others are all gospel classics or traditional tunes in the public domain. Not surprisingly, it’s the two original songs that I love most, “Little Fire” and “Coming Home to Me.” After much internal debate, I’ve selected the latter as my song of the week:
I love that, while this song is written from a God-like perspective, it can easily be transferred to other situations as well. For example, when I listen to this song, what I hear is a song from one lover to another, a reminder that whatever is happening in his life he’s always coming home to me, to my arms, to my love. And vice versa. In that way, it’s an incredibly moving and beautiful song.
This week’s song of the week is Madonna’s “Nothing Really Matters” from her 1998 album, Ray of Light. Here’s a clip of her singing it at the 1999 Grammy’s:
I’ve been looking for more than a song of the week since the beginning of the new year; I’ve also been looking for a theme for the year. Last year, my theme was “Here, Now, and Me,” which became a kind of mantra that helped me keep focused on what seemed most important: living in the now (rather than the past or future) and focusing on what it was I want out of life.
Since the new year is a time for resolutions and new commitments, I started looking for a theme that encapsulates what I’m thinking now. At first, I couldn’t find anything that felt right, but then I remembered Madonna’s song, which I’ve always liked. In fact, it’s one of my favorite songs from Ray of Light. I even bought the single when it came out.
So, I broke out the single and started listening to it in my car as I drove back and forth to work. The more I listened to it, the more it seemed to fit my mood and thoughts at this moment in several ways.
It’s going to take a little explaining before I get to the point of this post, my song of the week, which is “How Naked Are We Going to Get?” by The Blow.
The other day I was watching episode 6 of Jeffery and Cole Casserole, which I missed when it was on T.V. I love their show (and their YouTube videos). While watching the episode, I started to wonder about one of the other actors in the show. His name turns out to be Max Steele, and, since he’s cute, I started surfing the web to see what I could find out about him: he’s a 24-year-old actor/musician/writer/go-go dancer/performance artist who lives in New York City.
My great envy in life is that I’m not a twenty-something gay performance artist type guy living in NYC. I’m sure part of it is the hipsterness of such a fantasized life. And part of it is the feeling that I wasted my early twenties being good in southeast Texas. Whatever its roots, I wish I were a twenty-something gay guy living in NYC surrounded by people making videos and making out with each other while drinking cheap red wine and listening to really cool music. Only slightly lower on my list of fantasy lives would be to be a mumblecore director, which would still involve living in NYC, making out with cute guys, and drinking cheap wine while listening to cool music! I’m starting to think that I need to do more with contemporary young queer culture in my next Lesbian and Gay Lit class–maybe turn it into a queer culture class or something.
![IMG_8341[1]](https://live.staticflickr.com/8644/27753735444_2ca20d29d0_s.jpg "IMG_8341[1]")
This Gaudy Gilded Stage 