Father Christmas

Occupy Xmas! First holiday song that's been in my head this season that I haven't actually heard in the Ethers yet.

Artist: The Kinks
Year: 1977
Rating: Luke Hot

Black Water

Been remiss at updating lately. Life is just too dense with the obligatory right now, including my ever-elusive battle to get to work on time every day. The other thing is that most of the songs I've been waking up with lately have been strictly due to recent exposure (hearing it on a playlist or at the grocery store, etc.) and I've, by and large, refrained from blogging about those particular songs, because, while recent exposure is clearly my number one source for earworms, that phenomenon is just less interesting to me than when a song seems spontaneously to generate from some unconscious depth or memory trigger or other more poetic means. Anyhow, the Doobs entered the neural paths a couple days ago, and I have a moment to share 'em now. These guys just hold so much nostalgic warmth for me. I love 'em. And they happen to be from my home town.

And I ain't got no worries
'Cause I ain't in no hurry at all

I'll throw a question out to you, the reader: where do your earworms come from?

Artist: The Doobie Brothers
Year: 1974
Rating: Hot!

Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo

When one writes a blog such as this, one wonders when a song such as this will pop up. In this case, I'm flouting my usual rule of no blogging a song if it's in my head due to recent exposure; I heard a snippet of it last week at my pub trivia night, in the music round. (I nailed it.) But the song begs to be mentioned as one of those insane earworms we all carry around with us.

Lordy mama, light my fuse!

Artist: Rick Derringer
Year: 1970/73
Rating: Lukewarm

Note: Yes, there is a comma in the title of this song.

Fly By Night

My ship isn't coming, and I just can't pretend.

Unlike my last entry about a Rush song, this one has emerged spontaneously from my unconscious. ("Limelight" back in 2010 was a carbon copy mental image generated from listening to classic rock radio.) So, there Rush is, a bona fide presence in my neural pathways, one might say "crackling with life" in the "invisible airways" of my brain. Ahh, sweet prog geekery.

Artist: Rush
Year: 1975
Rating: Warm

Wonderful Tonight/Stuck On You Mash Up

This morning, I woke up with a perfectly blended mash-up of Eric Clapton's "Wonderful Tonight" and Lionel Richie's "Stuck On You." It was prompted by last night's re-watching of the Friends episode where Monica and Chandler get engaged; they dance to the Clapton song over the end credits. These songs have always been glued to each other in my head. Maybe it's the relatively similar tempo, key, and song structure, but whenever one of them enters my consciousness, the other one seamlessly follows.



In fact, I often play, in my mind's music studio, the intro guitar riff to "Wonderful Tonight," then go right into the first verse of "Stuck On You," then back into Clapton's riff unconsciously before my brain recognizes that I'm melding the two songs. You know, now that I'm listening close, the guitar riffs actually sound almost identical.

There's a further twist in this mental mash-up of mine: at certain points when these songs have appeared in my head historically, I have also searched my '70s/'80s mental catalogue of radio hits, always with the nagging sensation that there was a third song stuck to "Stuck On You" and "Wonderful Tonight." I'm realizing now, though, as I play these songs side by side, that this "third" song is probably just a mental creation, my brain explaining the cognitive mystery of why these songs also sound like some unidentifiable country tune that I want to attribute to someone like B.J. Thomas or Gordon Lightfoot. As Lionel Richie's image knowingly tips his ten gallon hat to us from the cover photo of his 1984 single, I'm guessing that my brain was just trying to explain why I'm hearing what is essentially a country-pop song written by an R&B legend. Kind of awesome how the brain compensates and creates "realities" that don't exist.

Artist (Stuck On You): Lionel Richie
Year: 1984
Rating: Warm

Artist (Wonderful Tonight): Eric Clapton
Year: 1977
Rating: Cold

(Just Like) Starting Over

I did hear this song on the radio the other day, upon the occasion of John Lennon's would-be 70th birthday. It feels relevant to my emotional space these days, so filled as it is with dramatic endings and nascent beginnings. Artist: John Lennon Year: 1980 Rating: Luke Hot Note: Some of the old Jewish youth group crew might remember that I used this song for my intro-aisle walk when I delivered the State of the Region address in 1990. It's special to me.

And We Danced

I've tried to avoid blogging about the songs that have made it to my head just because I've heard them on the radio recently, but I figured this one deserved attention. It's one of those '80s standard rock tunes that got lots of airplay back then but hasn't received lasting attention. I heard it on KFOG's 10@10 several days ago and can't get it out of my head. It's such a facile pop song, but so pleasing to my ears. Yes, The Hooters is an awful name for a band, but I like to think of it in the "hootenanny" sense as opposed to the "boobs" sense. I think that's what was intended, after all.

Artist: The Hooters
Year: 1985
Rating: Luke Hot

No You Girls

A testament to catchy, this song's in my head already, even though I only heard it for the first time a few weeks ago on the radio, and then once more on a friend's mp3 mix (the mind reels at the change in technology; where here I thought I'd gotten used to "CD mixes," we're now onto the next new thing). It's a cute but pernicious song reinscribing the gender norms that girls can't know how boys feel, and boys couldn't care less how girls feel. I like FF, but I'm giving this one a "meh" rating. Artist: Franz Ferdinand Year: 2009 Rating: Lukewarm Note: I think this is the "newest" song to appear in my head thus far.

No Sugar Tonight/New Mother Nature

Another song in my head just 'cause I heard it on the radio. I've considered stopping listening to the radio in the car just because I think it's tainting the "purity" of songs emerging from my brain.

Artist: The Guess Who
Year: 1970 (still sounds like the '60s though, don't it?)
Rating: Warm

Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses

Shockingly, this is the first U2 song to enter my brain since starting this project. And it's mainly here because I heard it on the radio the other day. But the opening lines do resonate with me emotionally this week, as does the final sentiment in the song, so I'm guessing I woke with it for a reason.

You're dangerous 'cause you're honest/You're dangerous, you don't know what you want (and) Don't turn around, don't turn around again/Don't turn around, and don't look back.

Artist: U2
Year: 1991
Rating: Luke Hot

Notes:
I did invoke U2 in this entry previously.
Also, I've been driving more than I used to, since I now have a car. Commercial radio is seeping in big time. I can't reiterate enough that the Eagles are played too frequently on classic rock stations.

Repeat Loops

Three recent head-songs are replaying this morning. Woke up with the Entertainment Tonight theme again; then a repetitive medley of Zeppelin's Immigrant Song leading into Closer by Nine Inch Nails.

As I progress with this project, I'm finding that the songs manifesting in my head are certainly influenced by blogging about them. A song that would perhaps have been long gone into the unconscious reaches might resurface again and again just from writing about it or re-reading one of my entries. I'm also noticing that I have a slightly anxious anticipation upon waking, in an active wondering of what song might surface. This has possibly "pushed" songs to consciousness that otherwise wouldn't have arrived; some of them due to having blogged about them already, some due to recent exposure from actually hearing the song played. I'm attempting to dismiss songs that feel "forced" upon waking, and opting to blog about the songs that seem to float in more organically if possible.

Also, only two more days to vote for your favorite Geo-Band! Do it now! And if anyone out there has an idea about what the next poll should be, please leave a comment!