Music

Summer Song Suggestions

Summer Song SuggestionsI’m looking for some suggestions from folks.  If you were to go to an outdoor concert on a perfect summer afternoon, say just before nightfall.  What songs make you feel patriotic and give you the feeling of summer? Songs that you’d love to “Rock Out” or dance too? The idea is to have a roughly 90 minute long show towards the end of a cookout/get together.

So picture a warm summer day.   It’s sunny, roughly 75 to 80 degrees.  The smell of food on the grill.  A large gathering of family and friends.  Kids playing of all ages.  After the food is eaten, and the sun is just about ready to set, a group of talented folks take to the stage.  What music would make you feel, Summer, Patriotism, Love and Happiness?  Songs to dance too.  Songs to rock too.

Here is the current playlist.  What would you suggest?  What songs should come off the list.  I’ve linked the music videos to them in case you’ve never heard the song or just want to listen to it :)

(Currently in no particular order. Order suggestions are welcome.):

  1. California Girls – David Lee Roth
  2. Animal – Def Leppard
  3. ** Sausalito Summernight – Diesel
  4. All Summer Long – Kid Rock
  5. That Thing You Do! – The Wonders
  6. ** There’s Only One Way to Rock! – Sammy Hagar (Clean Version)
  7. These are the Days – 10,000 Maniacs
  8. Army – Ben Folds Five – 90′s (Clean Version)
  9. ** Don’t Tread on Me – Damn Yankees
  10. This Time of Year – Better than Ezra
  11. Counting Blue Cars – Dishwalla
  12. ** Ride the Wind – Poison

If this song was included in your choices, which version would you prefer?

  1. Kiss Me – Sixpence None the Richer or… New Found Glory Version?
  1. Pinch Me – Bare Naked Ladies
  2. Whole Lotta You – A Rocket to the Moon
  3. Rhythm of Love – Plain White T’s
  4. Summertime – The Sundays

I need suggestions. Whether to remove songs, or add different ones. Please nothing heavily adult, hateful, or too hardcore.  Also not looking for anything by Warrant, Rush or Nickelback!! (Think patriotic, upbeat and summertime family friendly.)

You can leave your thoughts in the comments below, on the facebook post this linked from or by emailing me by clicking here.

Lyrics & Music

Lyrics & MusicI posted this last Friday on Facebook.  I am terribly sad that not one of the people who would know about this particular night even caught on….

“As I was on my way home that night, a song started playing. It made me smile and I become all nostalgic (as I so frequently do, as I miss the “good old days”).  It reminded me of a specific evening after school on main street in the backroom of a small business.  I believe it was 1985, even though the song was released in 1983.  Wish I could remember the exact date, but I can’t.

My smile got even bigger as I realized that as of just a few days ago, all the people who were there that evening are now on my Facebook friends list.

I was curious to know if any of them remember the words, “Earth below us drifting, falling. Floating weightless. Calling, calling home…”, and why they make me smile so.”…..

As luck would have it, no one apparently remembered or they didn’t even read the post over the weekend.  It makes me sad.  However to my faithful few readers, here’s who was there that night.

The song lyrics (if you don’t know) is from Peter Schilling and the song was Major Tom (Coming Home).

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We also practiced Smoke on the Water that night by Deep Purple.

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Skip the first 1m 18seconds (dumb link ignoring rules…..)

 

Level 90 Elite Tauren Chieftain – Power of the Horde [HD]

I’ve played World of Warcraft for over 3 years now.  I started on the UK Servers and then moved to the US servers.  I’ve met hundreds of people in that time.  Sadly, not one of them told me about the Level 90 Elite Tauren Chieftain that play at 8pm server time every day.  The play an actual song called “Power of the Horde”.

It wasn’t until I started looking for pictures of drum kits to use on my blog that I stumbled upon this not so hidden but awesome tidbit in Warcarft.  As I remember seeing a drum kit for WoW while doing one of the many runs through Blackrock Depths.  It was in The Grim Guzzler bar.  Upon further reading I found this little piece of info:

Anyone who has Direbrew’s Remote from the Brewfest event can trigger a performance here at any time by talking to the roadie in charge, Ognip Blastbolt.

Source: WoWWiki

My Warlock Kyllia just happens to have one of those remotes.  So I took a trip on down to watch the show.

Contrary to belief of people I know, I’m not that big into WoW as they may think.  Turns out this is a real life band comprised of Blizzard Employees that play at all the Blizzcons and have a number of other Warcraft songs they play.  :P

When I went to add this post, all there are on YouTube are old versions of this video in crappy size.  So after 3 days of fighting with a way to convert Fraps (and clip together as it made 3 segments), I uploaded it today to YouTube in HD format :)

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The Remainder of My Life

I’ve had some time now to really think about things.  Now that the initial flames from my nearly fatal incident.  That and everything else that was flooding my mind.  All in all, it’s nearly over.  Time for me to begin fresh one last time.  I realize that I really only have a few years left in this world, and while I mean to squeeze out every last minute by losing weight, eating better, continue walking and being more active.  Time to make new friends and re-embrace the family that loves me regardless of my recent situations.  Everyone involved knows exactly what I mean by that.  Those who don’t, simply need to ask me or watch and learn :)

For many years I’ve chased the dream of a wife and kids.  Three failed marriages and many bad decisions later, I realize that perhaps I was just not cut out for it.  Short of death, communications have been lacking.  I love my kids regardless of what they may think of me.  I love the kids that were never mine as if they were.  They are all grown now and on to lives of their own.  I wish them all the luck in the world not to repeat my mistakes.  While to many this isn’t the highest of goals to achieve.  However, the caveats are that, I never wanted to be rich.  I was always happy so long as the bills were paid and I could come home to them every night.  That was good enough for me, but it seems never good enough for the ones I chose as my partners.  They always wanted more.  For better or for worse meant nothing to them.  When the worse came, they up and moved on.  Claiming things like we grew apart.  We didn’t grow apart, they simply wanted more financial stability.  Proving repeatedly that money means more than love.  I’m hurt emotionally, but I’m surviving.  However I am changing my goals.  I’m not changing who I am.  I still welcome someone to love me.  However they must love me as I am.

HD Video CameraI want to finish my movie.  Really it’s just a short film.  Something I wrote the script for in 2007.  I even went as far as finding voice actors on the net to cover the parts of the callers, the narrator and other fill-ins.  The film itself is nearly done short of needing an actor, and two extras.  A place to shoot, some props and an HD video camera with some software.  OK, so it’s only half done.  I stopped when I realized the equipment I bought was defective and couldn’t get the company Samsung to do anything about it.  With lack of further funds to buy a new camera, I stopped the project and all but forgot about it.  It’s time to dust the pages off, buy a new camera, find some college students eager to make YouTube gold.

It’s about a tongue and cheek look at a support tech and his typical day and how customers could make life so much easier by simply following some rules.  The Ten Rules for Calling Tech Support.  Anyone who has seen the script loved it.  I’m sure it won’t win me any awards, it will still be a load of fun for everyone involved as well as those who watch the finished product.  This is my first goal.  Anyone who can contribute in any way are welcome to do so.  Please contact me!

DrumsMy second goal will require me to save up a few bucks first and buy an old used drum kit.  Because I want to join a band.  I don’t want to join a band trying to be famous like I did in years past.  I just want the group of guys who get together on weekends and jam out in a garage or warehouse somewhere.  Perhaps like in high school, perhaps play at private parties or small gatherings if we happen to be any good.  This would be more of a social experience for me than a venture to make money.  Relive the glory days a bit.  I don’t think I’ll ever be as good as my son on the skins, though perhaps someday I can really sit down and show him his old man can and has.  One thing I gave up to be the dad was my drum kit.  So my children really never have seen or heard me play outside of a Drumscape machine at the Busch Gardens arcade.  Rock on!

The Guild: I’m the One That’s Cool

I remember well the days of being picked on by my classmates.  Bullied (back when we weren’t wimpy little sods that cry on the internet about bullies and all that boo-hoo bullshit we’ve got going on now) about being a nerd, and a geek that played Dungeons and Dragons, and we used computers before the internet and before flipping Facebook.  I get a kick how now all those people who ridiculed me and my friends, now need our help on a daily basis.  Because now Geeks are cool :)

I’ve written about this before, and now The Guild has released a new song / music video saying nearly exactly how I feel these days.

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PURCHASE THE MP3 @ AMAZON AND ITUNES
AMAZON MP3: http://amzn.to/GeekCool
ITUNES MP3: http://bit.ly/iTunesGeekCool

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Welcome to My World

My musical tastes are somewhat vast.  Rock, Metal, Jazz and even some Rhythmic Tourette’s Syndrome (commonly known as Rap) along with even harder to believe (for me that is) Country music, as well as some Classical bits are included.  My current favorite band has recently changed.  It used to be the Foo Fighters.  Dave Grohl and company are still quite kick-ass, but their last two albums just didn’t do it for me.

I’m quickly becoming a huge Sick Puppies fan.  And while this song isn’t real recent, it certainly covers how I feel today.

Enjoy :)

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Visit Sick Puppies or Check out More Videos

I Effing Hate Glee

I can’t hold a decent conversation anymore (outside of the workplace that is), without hearing something about this god awful show Glee.  At home it’s talked about Ad nauseam.  While I’m still unhappy listening to local radio stations, I can’t even try to enjoy a song without hearing “Glee made this song famous!”.  Oh and this Bruno Mars… Every time I hear that name, I want to ruin another pair of shoes.

Whatever happened to our family watching things like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Lie to Me, Angel, Merlin or Doctor Who and the like.  (Yes the one episode of Buffy “Once more with feeling” was a cute musical, but they only did it once!!!)  My hatred for this reconstruct of MTV of the past (only you never see any new talent), is only seconded by American Idol; where they exploit the world’s most ignorant people and condemning the human race by listening to the god awful noise that is one step down from listening to cats have sex in the ally.  At least the cats have harmony.  Granted Glee has talent.  However, I’m more prone to be engaged in Time Traveling Doctors and Vampires, rather than a high school glee club actually having that much talent.  I go to these shows, and some kids are talented but we aren’t talking a school for the arts.  (Also see here.)  Then again, I am talking about the same crowd that calls me up daily and can’t answer simple questions like “what is the error message” or “what version of windows do you use” or “what is the name of your email client”.  So why wouldn’t they call butchering every song on the radio good entertainment.

Honestly this does not capture the real high school environment by any means.  Unless you mean to tell me there is a California High School that does this.  John Hughes were are you now!!  (yeah I know he’s dead, but I wish he wasn’t)  Only he knew how to capture the true life of a teenager on the silver screen.  I’m sure he could’ve made some killer TV shows.

Perhaps my wife would be happier with a metro-sexual man or going lesbian.  I certainly can’t be the person to watch or converse with about this television media nonsense.  What we watch on TV certainly has changed.

I was going to use this image for this post, but I then realized the overly sensitive minions of the Glee Brigade would misconstrue this as a threat of murder or intent to harm.  These people cannot take anything without reading too far into it and taking every word out of context.

I Love the 80s!

The 1980′s.  The best years of my life.  I was young, free, skinny, had long hair, I was decent looking; and I had dreams and ambitions.  It was the perfect time of the world for me.

What did I love about it?  Let me break it down by category:

The Music – I was all over the place with the music.  I loved heavy metal, rock, punk, new wave and more.  It just didn’t seem to matter.  I loved it all.  Metallica, Poison, Def Leppard, Missing Persons, Van Halen and on and on and on!  At the time, I was an aspiring drummer.  I was all up in anything with a good beat.  God I wished I had never given up that.

The MoviesJohn Hughes was a genius.  His movies touched everyone I knew.  Including: Sixteen Candles, Weird Science, Pretty in Pink, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Some Kind of Wonderful, National Lampoon’s Vacation Series, She’s Having a Baby and my all time favorite The Breakfast Club.  The movie that set a single song as the Anthem of my age, Don’t You (Forget About Me), performed by the band Simple Minds. Who initially refused to record the song, but then agreed under the encouragement of their label.  There were a load of other good movies too, but his stood out.  St. Elmos Fire {cough cough}

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The Girls – Were hot, sexy, wild, free, open, dangerous.  From the teased hair, to the spandex outfits.  Girls had it going on!  High heels in jeans, skirts, and leg warmers.  Stockings while wearing socks with frilly ankles.

The Colors – Were bright and exciting.

The Guys – We were carefree and crazy as hell.  Parachute pants?  Yeah right; but then it was the cool thing.  Ripped up jeans and wild hair styles.  I even got my ear pierced as reward for avoiding the hazing my freshman year.  Still wear the earring in it from time to time.  Then left was right and right was wrong.  Now… I guess everyone is gay.

MTV – Was on at mine and all my friends houses almost 24/7.  Music videos, captivating and cool.  That was…. Before… Fucking Reality Shows…. Now MTV can suck it.  Back then, it was music videos and weekend marathons of Beavis and Butt-head or The Monkees reruns.

The Attitude – It was about life, freedom, freedom of expression, about having all the fun you can have before you die.  Sexual freedom as well, even though there was the big AIDS issue that was plastered on every TV, Radio and Billboard, we just didn’t care too much about it.  We wanted it and we went for it.

I so wished I never had to let go and grow up.  I’d live that era again and again and again.  Get rid of the internet, cellphones and this social networking bullshit, and give me my 80s back!!

Harvest Barn Church – Love Song

Exciting! Both my sons are in their first Official Music Video!!  I’m so very proud!  You may have seen my videos of Allen during band practice in this post (videos at bottom).  Now you can see Allen on Drums and Adam (far right singer) in a video they have for a contest.

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Vote for this video by clicking HERE!!!  (as of this morning, they are in second place)

Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda, Didn’t

My Dream Drum Kit

My Dream Drum Kit

Once upon a time, I was a musician.  A drummer.  Always wanted to be one.  Despite my parents buying me, not one, not two, but three different guitars.  Not exactly sure what ever led them to believe I wanted a guitar as I would tap and bang on anything I could get my grubby mits on.

Outside of a simple cheesy toy drum set I had gotten for Christmas as a kid many many years ago, that was all I had until I got into 7th grade.  That was when I got detention for something about flushing crackers in a toilet.  Don’t even remember doing it.  But my step dad couldn’t pick me up for another hour after detention, so I managed to sneak into the band room and found the drums and started toying about.  No one even bothered that I wasn’t in band.

After getting into High School, I hung out with others who liked playing music and we started a band called Shady People and we would practice at the music store in town that was upstairs from Der Chocolate Haus.  I was allowed to use the drums they had up there.

A lot of practice later, I managed to coax my mom to come see us play.  She told her friends and one day, a man named Chet pulled up with a drum set in his conversion van.  It wasn’t new, but it was the world to me.  A nice blue metallic finish set of Slingerland drums, in a Jazz setup.  Sure it wasn’t Rock or Metal, but it was mine, and I played and played and annoyed the neighbors something fierce in that tight neighborhood.

Though as many child hood bands go, ours didn’t make it.  We did a mean Peter Schilling’s Major Tom and Deep Purple’s Smoke on the Water and a couple of hand fulls of songs we played at the school and parties we hosted.  That was as close as we got to being famous.  Basically not at all.

I gave up my musician dreams in favor of a family.  So I married my high school sweetheart, had two wonderful little boys.  Played my drums in the garage until one day we needed some money and sold my beloved drum kit.  When the marriage broke down, I tried to make a come back in a band called White Steel.  That lasted a few months but having to borrow equipment and our very talented but retarded lead guitarist (who decided to become a Martial Arts specialist – I mean the dude could play like Eddie Van Halen blind folded)…. We broke up.  We did manage to record messing around in a studio in New York.   I say record, but it was recorded, put on a cassette tape, which ran out of room so it’s cut off.  This was also with 3 drummers.  Our bass player George on the Left Channel.  Me on the Center Channel.  And Denise on the Right Channel.  It’s rough and you can hear mistakes during our solos.  Though Denise wiped the floor with Me and George.

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Sadly, my second wife decided my memories weren’t any good for me and had thrown out many pictures of my life before her including ex-girlfriends, my band and a lot of other pictures basically between my life between the age of 12 through 25.  Needless to say, I have next to no pictures of those years unless my kids were in them.  Thus my drum set pictures are history and even the hand painted logo I did on the bass drum is all but visions in my head.  The audio clip is all that’s left of anything I ever did musically.

Of my two sons.  One is an amazing Basketball Player.  The other…  A drummer :)

He made his old man proud by not only being a drummer but a better drummer than his old man ever was.  Though.  History repeats itself.  He’s now married and works a steady job and his band broke up.  However, I do have video memories of his days of glory.

Chrio Video I
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Chrio Video II
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