Crazy-Pops

I just want to give a special shout-out to Honda for their new ad for the Honda Odyssey mini-van (if you've seen it, you'll know what I mean). Honda, thanks to you and your magical PR firm (or whoever thought of it), The G-Man (my 3 year old) is now walking around my house demanding the funk. In fact, he's gotta have the funk. He wants the funk. He's got to have the funk. He's even demanding that I tear the roof off the sucker.

Thanks, Honda. I always thought I was going to be the one to get The G-Man out of his rock and roll phase and into more esoteric forms of music. Actually, I appreciate the help. While I have explained to him about rock and roll and jazz and even soul music, I have not yet ventured into the funk, because I didn't think he was ready for the funk. But now he demands it. He wants the funk. So we're going to be spinning a steady diet of P-Funk around my house over the holidays so he understands what the funk really is. And he'll know when he has it. SO HE STOPS ASKING FOR IT, HONDA!!!!

Well, the holiday party season is upon us. And, being that I'm married to a Career Woman (she can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and go to Canada to get the kind I like, too!), we go to holiday parties. Actually, we had one at our house a couple of weeks ago, which was surreal. There were 50 people in my house. And, a couple of times through the evening, they were all in the same room. Which was cool. I wish I had taken a picture, because it reminded me of one of those pictures from the 1950s where they'd cram as many college students as they could into a phone booth.

But, like Canadian Bacon, I digress. We've gone to several holiday parties this year, to be honest, because it's important politically to play that game. After all, Mrs. C has to maintain her high level job so that I can sit around the house all day noshing on Canadian Bacon and bon bons. Which don't come from Canada, I don't think. They're probably French. Or something.

But, again, I digress. So we've gone to several parties and, at one of these parties, I mentioned to somebody that I went to college in San Luis Obispo, California, and they started talking about wines, because that's an up and coming wine area and they are a big wine fan. Now, understand, I don't know dick about wines. Not that wines don't have dicks; they might. I certainly know that flowers do, now (see "Question of the Day" post below). Anyhow, so, where were we? Right. Holiday parties. And nothing like standing around talking about wine all night with a bunch of strangers. Especially when I don't know anything about them. That's where my improv skills come in handy. "Yes, the 1995 Wild Horse Pinot had a hint of the oak barrel in its flavor, while the 1996 Pinot was burdened with flavors of cat piss and donuts. Which, when you're 21 and in college, is a treat for the palate, but as you get older, you come to terms with the fact that donuts are an unsophisticated cuisine. Now where are those canapies?"

…I graduated from college. Saturday, December 13^th, 1986, was the first winter graduation ever held at California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo (Cal Poly, as it’s known – or “Cow Poly” for you humorists). I guess up until then they never had anybody take more than 4 years to finish a degree, but for me and about 1,000 other slow students, a winter graduation was the perfect thing. Because, yes, I took 4 ½ years to finish a 4 year degree. As did 5 of my Architectural Engineering classmates (out of a class of 48).

What does this have to do with music? Well, dear friends, it has a lot to do with music. Let me explain. No, no time, let me sum up. 3 things:

1) I was, in some sense, aware of the big change I was going to go through. I had a job waiting for me in Los Angeles at a large architectural firm, I was leaving a small town, and more importantly, I was leaving all of my college friends behind and moving to a big city where I knew exactly nobody. So I was feeling slightly reticent to go through it all. And sad about losing what I had. And afraid of starting over. Then, a couple of nights before I graduated, I drove out to Los Osos (a smaller town right on the coast) to my favorite place at the time – a little coastal inlet surrounded by trees that nobody really knew about – and I sat and I pondered. And a song came into head. An incessant song that wouldn’t go away as I sat there, looking out over the water, pondering what was coming up. A song that somehow made it all okay. That song? “Solsbury Hill” by Peter Gabriel. More specifically, the part with the lyrics “grab your things they’ve come to take you home.” When that song wouldn’t get out of my head, I somehow knew I was going to be okay. And that I needed to go to Los Angeles.

2) As a defense mechanism against the deep emotional aspect of it all, my classmates and I employed humor to help us all enjoy the actual graduation day. And, being that it was 1986, and we all had a very bright future, we all wore shades to the ceremony. Yep, “The Future’s So Bright I Gotta Wear Shades” by Timbuk 3 was one of the hits of the day. It’s funny to look back and see that they were a one hit wonder, and that we used their one hit at our college graduation.

3) The Architectural Engineering Department had some sort of senior “party” that year, where we all got together somewhere to eat and drink and celebrate our impending Overworked and Underpaid status (little did we know!), and they asked me to provide the music for said party. Somehow I had a reputation for listening to lots and lots of music – probably brought about by the fact that I always had my Walkman on at our engineering lab, where we spent most of our waking hours, and by the fact that I was always listening to something quite loudly. Anyway, I made two 90 minute tapes for this party, and, sadly, the second one has gone missing. But the first one still exists, and yesterday I tortured Emily (my 27 year old assistant) with it by playing it. First I had to go find a tape player…what an archaic piece of machinery! Anyway, as a gift to you, dear reader, here is the song list from Mix Tape 1 prepared (from records!) in 1986 for a bunch of engineering students. Enjoy:

Side 1:

1) Old Mother Reagan – Violent Femmes (it was 1986!)

2) Let’s Go Crazy (12” remix) – Prince

3) Are You Leading Me On – General Public

4) She’s a Doll – Jesse Johnson’s Revue (he’s a former member of The Time)

5) I’m Down – Adrian Belew (the Beatles song)

6) Never Say Never – Romeo Void (“I might like you better if we slept together…”)

7) Bachelor Party – Oingo Boingo (the theme song from the movie)

8) La Bamba - Richie Valens

9) I Wished I Looked A Little Better – Sparks

10) Shining Star (live) – Earth Wind and Fire

11) Hungry Wolf – X

12) I Saw Her Standing There – Beatles

Side 2:

1) Can’t Get There From Here – REM

2) Close to Me (extended) – The Cure

3) Kiss Off – Violent Femmes

4) 867-5309 – Tommy Tutone

5) White Lines – Grandmaster Flash

6) Tell Me – Bangles

7) Shout – Otis Day and the Knights (From the “Animal House” soundtrack)

8) Modern Love – David Bowie

9) Jeanette – English Beat

10) The Bird – The Time

11) I Do – J. Geils Band

Crossposted from Waking Up With Morning Song

This morning I was trimming hair. From my ears.

Yeah.

Could be worse, I suppose. One of my neighbors doesn't trim any of his hair and he's got it coming out of every orifice and he's got a huge unibrow. Which, honestly, inspires me to attempt to keep myself trimmed. But still: from my ears? Dammit.

From The Mixmaster:

"Do flowers have penises?"

And, yes, I SO wanted to answer, "No, but trees do. That's where the wood is." But I didn't. I shouldn't confuse the boy.