I am doing the IPod Shuffle

As usual I have like five posts started that I either can’t seem to finish or I think are pretty weak (like that has ever stopped me before.) Sometimes just writing helps me unblock my blockage. (Does that make sense?) I do get something out of writing here. I use this blog here to get things off my chest, tell old war stories or create geeky lists.

So without further adieu I thought I would fall back to the old IPod trick where I hit shuffle and see what the next 25 songs that come up are. This usually gets my creative juices flowing again.

1. Cowboy Song, Thin Lizzy – Thin Lizzy will always remind of Bob Walker, a friend from my Peace Frog Days. He would always spew how great they were and really all I ever knew of the band was the Boys are Back in Town Again. One day, I’m not sure why I started listening more to them and he was right, they rocked.

2. Hells Bells, AC/DC – What is not to like? This is an opening track that reels you into to what is in my opinion AC/DC’s best record. Brian Johnson announces his presence upon the first bar he screams out. Sure, I am a Bon Scott guy but, man did they find the perfect replacement.

3. Try a Little Tenderness, Otis Redding – There have been numerous versions of this song out there. It was also lip synched perfectly by Duckie in Pretty in Pink. (Again, yes there is a 15 year old girl residing in me somewhere.) I have to say Redding’s version is probably the best out there. I also think the Commitments did a really good job covering it as well.

4. Fall Out, The Police – This was the first single ever released by probably my favorite band, The Police. It is also the only recording to feature their original guitarist Henry Padovani . It is the band in its infancy. The song is like two minutes long back when they were still trying to be punk.

5. Cheap Sunglasses, ZZ Top – This song will always remind of the Grove. The Grove like every other bar in the southwest suburbs of Chicago had the best of ZZ Top in its jukebox. After our softball games a lot of dollar bills would be entered into the box and inevitably this song would come on at some point during the evening.

6. Who Was in My Room, The Butthole Surfers – I am not nearly the Surfers fan that my brother is. At some point in the early 90’s by osmosis I became a fan of the album Impendent Worm Saloon that my bro cranked out often. Eighteen years later this song still is catchy as all hell and rocks.

7. Police and Thieves, The Clash – The Clash covered this reggae song back on their first record. I think I first discovered it from the movie The Royal Tenenbaums, back when I was still a novice with the band. Wes Anderson has always been very good at using music in his films.

8. Someday We’ll Go All the Way, Eddie Vedder – Yes, I am a Cubs fan. This tune is pretty hard to defend but, I have to admit I get a tad verklempt when I hear this one. Can you imagine how much I will wail when the Cubs actually do go all the way?

9. Hook, Blues Traveler – Liking an album has never gotten me so much shit as me digging this record. I know all the negatives so, please spare me. For what they do, Blues Traveler does it well. I am a harmonica fan and no one is going to tell me John Popper can’t play a mean harp. So, yes I will defend it but I get the negative reactions.

10. Dearest, Buddy Holly – I don’t know how you could dislike Buddy Holly and call yourself a fan of rock and roll. The story has been told of how he died tragically and way too young. This love song touches all the right cords and is in a word, pretty.

11. Dead Flowers, The Rolling Stones – I guess anyone in our posse will always associate this song with our friend Wally and the Christmas Parties. It was a highlight every year and one of these days we have to talk him into getting up on stage once again and belting it out.

12. Candy, Cameo – I am a product of bad 80’s music. I would drive to school in the mornings in Chris Dusza’s Bitchin’ Camaro with the radio tuned into B96 and this song was a hit at the time. That lead singers voice was in a word unique. Strawberry! Raspberry! All those good flavors.

13. Rainy Day Woman, Waylon Jennings – Much to my wife’s chagrin I have a soft spot in my heart for old school country. While I hate the new school Toby Keith and Keith Urban’s of the world there is something about a good Willie Nelson or Waylon Jennings song that gets the Urban Cowboy in me moving. I found this song in the underrated movie, Extract.

14. While My Guitar Gently Weeps, The Beatles – I have more Beatle songs on my IPod than any other band, which is kind of the way it should be. Here George recruited his friend Eric Clapton to play lead guitar. I have to assume this was before Clapton stole his wife from him.

15. Beginnings, Chicago – I am a sucker for a good horn section. Chicago has a killer one. It also helps that Terry Kath was on guitar. I have long stated my feelings on just how underrated I think Kath is. Playing in a band like Chicago he kind of gets lost in the discussion of great ax men. But trust me he was a true talent who also died way too young and tragically.

16. 99 Luftballons, Nena – This is one of my personal guilty pleasures. It is in my top five one hit wonders from the 80’s. Mind you, it has to be the version in German. There is something about Nena cranking this out in her native tongue with those synthesized keyboards behind her that just works for me. Also, if you say you don’t like this song you are lying.

17. Frankenstein, The Edgar Winter Group – First off a great instrumental. My favorite use of this song was a Simpsons episode from back in the day. Homer was trying to hang out with some dudes in the 70’s that had a van that was lovingly titled “The second base mobile” I believe. All the while this song is blaring out of the speakers of said van. You had to see it and if you did you laughed.

18. Wildfire, Michael Murphy – I swear this came up on the shuffle. I know very few people quite understand my love of this song. It is cheesy 70’s puss rock at its finest. But, for some reason this song connects with me. I get nuked for it, but I don’t care. I dig it and will own to it.

19. Bulls on Parade, Rage Against the Machine – What more needs to be said about one of the top five bands to come out of the 90’s? If upon hearing it if your first urge isn’t to dive head first into a mosh pit then you need to check your pulse because you might be dead.

20. Pump it Up, Elvis Costello – I can’t hate MTV. For no other reason than it introduced me to acts I never would have gotten into living in the burbs. I was never a huge Costello fan when he was in his prime, but I didn’t turn the channel when his videos came on. Then when I got to a certain age I really started listening to Elvis and really started digging his work.

21. I Believe in Love, Paula Cole – Hmm, what can I do or say to defend myself on this one. I am not a huge Paula Cole guy (not sure anyone is anymore) but I have to admit I dig her voice. I liked, Where have all the Cowboys Gone and I also dig this song. There are worse musical crimes.

22. Englishman in New York, Sting – I have stated my love for The Police. With that said I am often disappointed in Sting’s solo work. However, I do like his first two records. Nothing Like the Sun was his last record where he hadn’t completely jumped the shark. This song is one of my favorite if not my favorite solo song of his.

23. Cars, Gary Numan – Look I have a lot of questionable 80’s material on my IPod. I know this. However, when I hear songs like Cars with its electric infectious hooks it takes me back to my youth and reminds me of simpler times. There is nothing wrong with that.

24. Bohemian Rhapsody, Queen – I am a fan of Freddie Mercury and Queen. This is not my favorite Queen tune and I think the whole Wayne’s World thing has kind of weakened this one in my world. With that said, judged on its own merit despite it being severely overplayed it still rocks.

25. Bad Influence, Robert Cray – To me this is Cray’s best album. I actually saw him live once as he opened for Clapton and Stevie Ray Vaughn. But thanks to some iced tea mixed with Everclear that I was ingesting on the way to Alpine Valley I passed out for his whole set. Not one of my finer moments.

If I had a Time Machine

To quote the living legend Cher: “If I could turn back time.”

I would have followed up on a stolen kiss with a friend back in my college days.

Speaking of college, I would have not picked DePaul as my school of choice. Didn’t hate it there, but should have gone away to school. You only get one chance at that.

I would have listened to the wife and bought something in the city instead of the burbs. Been stuck waiting out the housing market. Plan was to live in the house 5 years and it has now been 7.

On October 14^th 2003, I would have bought a ticket for seat 113, row 8, section 4. And I would have let Alou catch that ball and saved poor Steve Bartman years of unnecessary scorn.

I would have been a better boyfriend. I tell Joyce if she had met me in my teens or early 20’s she would have hated me. I was a total self absorbed ass and I treated a couple of girls like complete shit and they really didn’t deserve that.

I would have started running in my 20’s instead of my late 30’s. Man it was so much tougher starting out at an older age.

I would have let a soft fly ball drop in a meaningless softball game instead of going all out for it and blowing out my right knee. It hasn’t been the same since.

I would completely re-live the year 1997. Man, what was I thinking?

I would not have been so quick to dismiss the Grateful Dead. In retrospect what I disliked where the “trust fund hippies” to steal a line from Patton Oswalt, that pretended to be Dead Heads to look cool. The band itself made some really good music but, I was too angry at the posers to notice.

I would have learned to swim and overcome my fears. Everybody has one irrational fear and mine is of water. I don’t know where it comes from and I know it is not too late. But to this day, my biggest fear and maybe my only phobia is that of water.