I love me some Cee Lo Green

Cee Lo Green's brand of R&B is different than everything else I've been hearing on the radio, and he does fun videos, as well. Plus, it IS nice of him to give Jaleel White some work :-).

Epic Rap Battle!

M told me today that she thinks Rhett and Link are one of the greatest things to come out of NC, right up there with Michael Jordan and First Flight :-). The funny thing is that I didn't recognize them when she showed me a few of their videos and I asked her how she had found out about the duo. Apparently, I had showed her one of their videos a while back called T-Shirt War. If I had any doubt that my memory is slipping, this is proof. Anyway, this video I've embedded in this post is just the beginning. Rhett and Link have a lot of funny stuff on YouTube, so go check them out.

"Sneakernight" by Vanessa Hudgens

This video is a couple years' old, but I just discovered it recently. Besides my weakness for Disney pop tarts who try to prove that they are serious musicians, I think "Sneakernight" is a great summer song. It's clean without being cheesy, and it is just as catchy as that "Tik Tok" song by Ke$ha that I will NOT let my kids listen to. The video evokes that feeling of how I wanted Saturday nights to be when I was in high school: full of friends, hanging out and partying without the underage drinking and what-not.

What's all this fuss about the Granny DJ?

Several news outlets have done a story about Ruth Flowers, the 69-year-old woman who works as club DJ. In the segments, much ado has been made about someone her age being behind the decks. I, too, was taken aback by the stooped shoulders and the white hair in a club setting. However, if you do the math, it doesn't seem so strange. If she is 69 now that means she was in her 30s when disco was hot. The presenter in the video quipped that she should be more comfortable dancing ballroom, but she was in diapers when big band was popular. She is more likely to want to listen to KC and the Sunshine Band than Glenn Miller.

I think that sometimes our stereotypes of people and situations get stuck in a certain era that doesn't jibe with their age. For instance, I had a coworker who told me the story of how she and her husband met and how she had been a cheerleader and they lived in married student housing for his last years of college. I had this picture of her in my head wearing a 1950s cheerleader uniform and having his fraternity pin on her sweater, which was ridiculous because she was the same age as I was! I also get surprised when my kids tell me that their teachers have iPhones and play XBox. Once I stop to think, it makes sense because their teachers are younger than I am, so if I play video games than they probably do, too. In my mind, however, "teacher" doesn't go in the same sentence with "XBox" or "World of Warcraft". If other people make the same misjudgments that I do, then white-haired grannies will be stuck with big band music for at least another 20 years.

Rat Pack at Kiel Opera House,"Birth of the Blues"

I know I usually post music videos on Mondays and this one focuses more on the performance, but I hope you will indulge me. Frank Sinatra was on my mind because M and I were rifling through 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die this weekend and one of his albums was at the top of the list. Unfortunately, I couldn't find a Frank Sinatra solo video that I was happy with on YouTube, but I like the Rat Pack stuff best, anyway. Also, I figured it couldn't hurt to post a video with Sammy Davis, Jr as a nod to Black History Month :-).

Joss Stone and James Brown "Man's World"

I can't believe that I haven't posted a Joss Stone video on this blog prior to today. I lurved her first two CDs, The Soul Sessions and Mind, Body & Soul. Her live performances are fun, as this duet with the late James Brown shows. Whether she is singing a cover or one of her originals, Joss Stone puts me in a 70s mood.

Sade, "Soldier of Love"

I've lost the use of my heart
But I'm still alive . . .

That first line slays me every time. The militaristic sound of the song paired with a video that looks like it should be in the opening credits of a James Bond movie have brought Sade to the forefront of my musical attention once again. On top of that, she barely looks like she has aged since her mid-80s heyday.

Mika, "Big Girl (You Are Beautiful)"

I don't know why I like this song. The lyrics are repetitive and the tune is pretty close to being cheesy disco, yet it makes me happy when I play it first thing on a Monday morning.

Mahalia Jackson "Precious Lord, Take My Hand"

I read this morning that this was the song Mahalia Jackson sang at Martin Luther King Jr's funeral, so I thought it would be appropriate for this Music Monday.

Manhattan Transfer "Boy from New York City"

There are some songs and artists that I have loved all my life and carry with me, but there are others that transport me back to my youth. Manhattan Transfer and "Boy from New York City" fall into that category. I saw a segment profiling the group on CBS Sunday Morning and realized that it had been years since I'd heard this song. I was absolutely crazy about this song back in the early 1980s when I was going through my 1950s-early 1960s stage. Sadly, I don't think this is a group that my kids will add to their playlist.

Brian Stokes Mitchell, "Impossible Dream"

Back in the early 80s when teenage girls were watching Trapper John, MD and drooling over Gregory Harrison, I was crushing on his co-star Brian Stokes Mitchell. There weren't that many swoon-worthy black guys on TV then so he stood out. The eyes and the curly hair -- dreamy! Because of him I stayed faithful to the show for almost the entire run.

Years later I'm a wife and mom of four kids, and I had pretty much forgotten my teenage crush. Then I started listening to streaming radio at work and heard a version of "Impossible Dream" that brought me to tears. It was the cheesy Gomer Pyle rendition that everyone associates with that song. This version made me feel like I could go out and do something worthwhile, no matter how crazy others thought it was. I clicked over to the music player and saw that the singer was Brian Stokes Mitchell. Seriously? Could it really be the same guy I had a crush on when I was 12? Yes, it was. I didn't even know he could sing.

Anyone who knows me knows that I get a thrill out of strange little coincidences, and this was one of those. Who knew that my girlhood crush would resurface so many years later for an entirely different reason?

Music Monday: "Main Offender" by The Hives

If you said "The Hives", I would know that they were a band, but that's it. I had never heard any of their music until this past weekend when I was playing Rock Band with the kids. We got it for Christmas and I was doing most of the singing because many of the songs are older and I know them better than my kids. Well, I didn't know this one. It is called "Main Offender" and I liked it right away. I had forgotten how much I like straightforward rock-and-roll. I'll have to check out the rest of The Hives' discography.

Beelzebubs' Cover of "Right Round" on The Sing-Off

The finale of "The Sing-Off" is tonight. NBC showed a perfect sense of timing in scheduling this talent competition. Fox's dramedy musical "Glee" is riding high on good buzz right now, so slipping this show in while people are still jonesing for show choir goodness was a smart move. You can go to Hulu if you are interested in catching up on the competition thus far. There have only been three episodes so it won't take you long.

I am rooting for the Beelzebubs from Tufts University to win. I've been a fan of college a cappella for several years and I am glad to see a college group in the finals. I picked this performance to post because I find the incongruity of preppy white boys doing hip-hop to be entertaining. The expression on the lead singer's face kills me! Go Bubs!

Music Monday: National Anthem by the cast of Glee

I am a fan of the show Glee so my opinion is admittedly biased. However, I think that the cast's rendition of "The Star-Spangled Banner" at the World Series was one of the purest ones I've heard. In past years, many artists have tried to prove their vocal chops by singing the song with all kinds of vocal acrobatics. This clean and simple version performance made me think about the meaning of the words and what Francis Scott Key must have felt that inspired him to write the poem that became our national anthem.

Music Monday: A Kung-Fu Clogging Extravaganza

I can't give a reason for sharing this video, other than I find it amusing.

Music Monday: Crayola Doesn't Make a Color for Your Eyes

This is the video that led me to the kung-fu clogging video. The singer, Kristin Andreassen, is also in the band Uncle Earl. I found the Crayola video in my Google Reader when one of my acquaintances shared it. The song is a few years old, but Andreassen just got around to making the video for it (there is a story about the making of the video here). It has a quirky, sweet quality that was popular with female singer-songwriters like Lisa Loeb in the 1990s but isn't heard much on the radio today. Strangely, it brings tears to my eyes despite its perkiness. Go figure.

Music Monday: Hurry Home

This video is a perfect example of why I'm usually playing CMT in the background around the house. I don't know if it is a sign of age or what, but I appreciate story songs more and more these days. I would find these lyrics corny if they were set to any other genre of music, but when they are set to country music I buy into them. The way they dropped the music out at the 3:12 mark is designed to tug at the heartstrings, but I don't care that I'm being manipulated. I just roll with it :-).

"One" Mary J. Blige featuring U2

This song reminds me of the first time that I heard Mary J. Blige. It was her cover of the Rose Royce song "I'm Going Down" in 1995, and I haven't liked a Mary J. Blige song since then. Most of her songs are too repetitive; she gets two good lines and repeats them for three minutes. This video is a reminder of what she can do when she is given a real song to sing.

Music Monday: BandSlam

I can't wait until this movie hits DVD. Yes, I know that this is a teen movie, but I can't help myself. I like movies with music in them and the fact that the actors are actual musicians makes it even better.

Music Monday: Skid Row

I watched Little Shop of Horrors with M this past weekend, and it reignited my love of the soundtrack. For years, "Skid Row" was the song that I played on those mornings when I wasn't in the mood for work. It may sound strange, but "life sucks" songs usually cheer me up.