Beatles Album of the Week

I'm going to switch it up a little this week with the release of LOVE, the soundtrack to the Cirque Du Soleil show of the same name. It is a brilliant mash up of sorts, as George Martin, the Beatles producer, went back to the original master tapes and recreated every song from the ground up. Take the drum intro from this song, the vocal harmony from that song, add a hint of a guitar riff from another song and you have a whole new feel to these long beloved songs.

The majic of this album is that an experiment like this could have gone horribly wrong. Taking music that is so familiar and loved by so many people and tweaking it in this way could have been reduced to nothing more than a cheesy gimmick, but the album just sounds so fresh and alive. If you haven't seen the show you there is no substitution for hearing this music through the amazing custom built theater and sound system at the Mirage but if you can't make it too Vegas, this album is the next best thing.

Look what a mess we've made of love

The Bachelor is an awful awful show. It pains me to admit this but I actually spent a good amount of time watching this run of the Bachelor (I have not spent more than 2 minutes watching the show before this season). Who thought this show was a good idea? It is brutal. What good comes out of taking a sinlge guy and 25 single girls and then making a game show out of the whole thing in which the winner gets a shot at marrying the guy. Explain to me how this turns out good for anyone!

The girls who don't win: they leave being rejected and felling like they wasted their time, especially the very last one, who spends her last few days on the gameshow wondering if she will be engaged to this guy only to find out she was just like the previous 23 losers, only she got her hopes up more than they did. She probably is the biggest loser of them all.

The bachelor: he meets a woman who will potentially be his wife on a game show and during the process opens himself up to falling in love with multiple girls. He goes an a multitude of potentially romantic dates, kissing every girl he can get his hands and then he is required to send the girls off one by one until he finds the one he wants to be with and in the process he is conditioned to not get too attached to any one girl because you only have so many roses. Sounds like a guy any girl would be lucky to have.

The girl who wins: Lucky her right? I mean what little girl doesn't grow up dreaming of being proposed to in this way, after her future husband arrives at her as his choice by a process of elimination, and then being proposed to on national TV. Then the best part is after all of this happens they get to watch the whole thing together as the show airs. Someone tell me why we don't have a live feed from the lucky couples bedroom as they watch the show as it airs. Just imagine him trying to explain every romantic encounter with the other girls who didn't win to the winning girl. "Hey at least you won, right?"

tomkat makes me sick to my stomach

Just a short post so I can be on record with my prediction. I think that Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes will be divorced by April 2008.

Beatles Song of the Week 8.0, 9.0 and 10.0

I'm not sure how far I am behind in this category and I am too lazy to go through and figure it out but I think I am at least two weeks behind and probably three so here you go.

For this week I pick Run For Your Life. This is a song of pure jealousy and rage because a guy suspects his "girl" of cheating on him and of course in early Beatles fashion it is singable and poppy which kind of masks the jealousy.

The chorus goes like this...

You better run for your life if you can, little girl
Hide your head in the sand little girl
Catch you with another man
That's the end little girl

and then one of the verses says...

Let this be a sermon
I mean everything I've said
Baby, I'm determined
And I'd rather see you dead

Don't try to read into this selection at all. I am not jealous of anything or anyone, I just think the song is good.

For last week I will select She's a Woman.

I am selecting this to offset any chance that you think I selected the previous song because the bride is giving boys the eye.

She don't give the boys the eye,
She hates to see me cry,
She is happy just to hear me say
That I will never leave her.
She don't give the boys the eye,
She will never make me jealous,
Gives me all her time as well as lovin',
Don't ask me why.

She's a woman who understands.
She's a woman who loves her man.
That one is more autobiographical for me than Run For Your Life.

And finally I will select Till There Was You, a cover of the song from The Music Man. The Beatles actually played this when they performed for the Queen and a recording of that performance can be heard on The Beatles Anthology 1 disc 2. Good song from a good play.

One Bank

Where do I even start? I mean this is just absolutely...(searching for the right word)... awkward?! hideous?! painful?! awkpaineous?! There it is! This video is awkpaineous!

3 questions come to mind.

#1 How long do you think they practiced this before their performance? My guess is there was at least 4 to 5 power lunches spent writing lyrics and maybe another 2 or 3 late night office jam sessions where they loosened the ties, rolled up the sleeves and let the good times roll.

#2 Why is no one in the audience laughing? How long can you hold it in? I mean that "What's in your wallet? It's not Capital One." line alone was enough to make me pee my pants. This song is the definition of unintentional comedy, and if the audience can't appreciate that when it's happening then it's their loss. Most likely they were all sitting there in complete shock and horror, hoping that this wouldn't find it's way onto youtube so they could avoid questions and comments from friends and family like, "Hey weren't you away at that Bank of America and MBNA merger celebration last weekend? Don't lie! I know you were because you asked me to feed your cats. One Bank man. One Bank." and "Those guys were good! It will only be a matter of time before they are playing at The Department of the Treasury!"

#3 How does a song like One get picked to represent the merger of two banks who are, by the rendition's own admition, in it for the profits. Maybe it's just me but I would have gone with a cover of Chain Hang Low by Jibbs.

You're so vain, you probably think this blog is about you

You know that Carly Simon song You're so vain?

You're so vain
You probably think this song is about you
You're so vain
You probably think this song is about you
Don't you? Don't You? Don't You?


If the song isn't about him who is it about? If you are singing a song about a person's vanity, it is about them. Jokes on you Carly Simon, he wins in the end because the song is about him.

Until We Feed The Starving Blood Is On All Of Our Hands

I was listening to this Joseph Arthur song today in the car and it reminded me so much of the message of the Hebrew Prophets, especially the first part of the song. However I do think he is missing one of the important ingredients that the prophets had...hope. Joseph Arthur is not Jewish or Christian (as far as I know) but I do think that the children of God would do well to pay attention to and reflect on this message.

Anyway here are the lyrics to All Of Our Hands for you to read and ponder.

All Of Our Hands

Until we feed the starving, blood is on all of our hands
Babylon is burning and there is no promised land
Until we clothe the naked all of us are damned
Dreams are just for savages calling themselves men

And in time fire will rain down
On our head
The sky will open up
And life will be bled

We are all the same spirit, we are all the same love
And still somehow we've chosen to slaughter the white dove
There is only one energy just different sets of clothes
For human beings to dress up and protect what no one knows

So in time fire will rain down
On our head
The sky will open up
And life will be bled

All of us will fall into the same hole
And all will reunite into the same soul
The death that we allow is the death that is our own
The murders we commit are committed in our home

So in time fire will rain down On our head
The sky will open up
And life will be bled

Murdered by indifference, murdered by our greed
Murdered by our riches taken from the ones in need
Murdered in our churches and murdered by belief
We who just do nothing shall be murdered in our sleep

In time fire will rain down
On our heads
The sky will open up
And life will be bled

Truth is just a word said to the ones who plead
What will we get back when we plant a poison seed?
Consumed by our consumption that can never be enough
The hungry are attacking, they are swallowing our blood

And in time fire will rain down
On our head
The sky will open up
And life wil be bled

The victims are now victimized and the world is inside out
Everyone is terrified the faithful are in doubt
Religion is a gimmick we want back the god they stole
But everyone is fighting to go deeper in the hole
Some believe salvation comes when the world is gone
But we have been forsaken, there is nowhere we belong

So in time fire will rain down
On our head
The sky will open up
And life will be bled

90 in November

Are any other CA residents bothered by the fact that Thanksgiving is a few weeks away and it feels like we are living on the surface of the sun? As a lifelong resident of southern california, I don't like the rain, but to be honest I wouldn't mind some right about now. This is just ridiculous.

Beatles Song of The Week 7.0

I let the bride pick this week's selection and she chose Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band as the song of the week. This is the first song on the album by the same name, which by the way, was the album for me that started my Beatles love affair. I still remember in high school hanging out at my friend Mike's house playing basketball in his driveway listening to music. It sounds funny, but during those times at Mike's, my relationship with music went from casual interest to intense fan. For whatever reason, Nirvana, the Grateful Dead and of course The Beatles stand out as three bands I can remember listening to in Mike's garage in between games, and specifically I remember that fateful day when our mutual friend Dylan brought over an album called Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. I was immediately struck by the album's cover and then while listening, the diversity of musical genres that existed on the same record was something I had never encountered before. It is brilliant, and to this day it is a record that all other pop/rock records aspire to.

Good choice Bride.