Friday Random Ten – The Delicious Meme-alicious Edition

Now featuring FRT, Guilty Pleasures, Music I’m Not-Ironically Into, and Friday Cat Blogging, all in one single post! Warning: this post is very heavy on video, ego-stroking, and bad taste.

Friday Random Ten
Because if it’s Friday somewhere, we might as well.

1) Tanya Stephens – Man Fi Rule
2) Whale – Hobo Humpin Slobo Babe (I should have saved this one for the Guilty Pleasures list. For shame.)
3) Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – The Mercy Seat (Acoustic)
4) The Meteors – Who Do You Love? (See guilty pleasures list, No. 1)
5) The Cramps – Human Fly
6) The Chameleons UK – I’ll Remember
7) Daniel Johnston – Love Not Dead
8) The Howling Hex – Teenage Doors
9) Jens Lekman – Do You Remember the Riots?
10) Chromeo – Way Too Much

I’m just excited I get two days off in a row this week.

Guilty Pleasures: I have a second hard drive dedicated to 100% legitimately downloaded, non-pirated music, which means that approximately 5/6ths of my computer is dedicated to crappy music I found online. I also use this second hard drive to store stupid pictures that I can whip out later on my website, but somehow never manage to remember when they’re most astute. I’ve been sitting on the one to the right for years.

Now thanks to Jill, I can expose you to the crap I hide from others — even though Jill’s list embarrasses me. Ashley Simpson? Eve 6? Damn, girl. Meanwhile Physioprof’s looks like a regular mixed CD at my house.

1) A lot of people poo on a wide spectrum of cover songs because they think any music that is so blatantly referential is shoddy and masturbatory at best. I, on the other hand, like to find a bit of irony and dignity in a well done cover song. I download and keep every unusual cover I’ve ever come across which saddles me with travesties like The Yeti Girls covering ELO (Don’t Bring Me Down) and a bored cabaret version of Blur’s Boys and Girls, and even Tim Curry doing a reggae version of the Beatles’ I Will. This obsession also gives me two cover songs by one band that I will defend to the death if given the opportunity, one the best and one the worst of my entire collecton: the Butthole Surfers singing Summer in the City (the worst; Lovin’ Spoonful cover) and Butthole Surfers’ Hurdy Gurdy Man (the best; Donovan cover):

I will not defend the video.

2) Duran Duran – Rio
Did I mention this is my ringtone?

3) Candyman – Knockin’ Boots
I really loved the whole New Jack Swing thing and, like, everything Teddy Riley ever touched.

This video happens to feature a lot of cheesy dancing, heavy-lidded love-makin’ eyes, and Tone Loc. When I was a teenager I thought this song was tres sexxay. Check out Candyman’s sweet rat tail.

This might indicate that I also have a large collection of H-Town and Silk songs, but I’ll never tell.

4) Sir-Mix-A-Lot – Posse’s on Broadway
This has a lot to do with the fact that I love hip hop but kind of have bad taste in hip hop. The hard truth is that this song sounds really good when you have big subwoofers and don’t know who sings it.

You can throw my N2Deep and Domino love in with this too. BUT I HAVE NO SHAME.

5) Johnny “Gay Pimp” McGovern – Soccer Practice
The song is campy as all hell, but hey, there are pretty boys in the video.

And who can resist a bunch of pretty, gay men doing manly things? Very manly things. On the football green.

Songs I Like Non-Ironically
Ilyka Damen tagged me with this one weeks ago but I was filled with too much fashionable ennui to actually compile a list. The rules are thus: a) list seven songs that are shaping your summer and b) tag seven people to do the same.

I am bad at following rules.

Psalm One – Beat the Drum
Despite my record of liking bad hip hop, I swear I occasionally find and share worthwhile music in the genre. I just discovered this Chicago-based artist a couple of weeks ago and was blown away. Lookit this live performance.

Her highly recommended full-length album, The Death of the Frequent Flyer, is available via the Amazon widget in the right-hand sidebar.

The Besnard Lakes – Disaster
Chef and I went on our customary post-nuptual vacation last fall to a little place in the Caribbean where the electricity was constantly out and we couldn’t keep a land line connected. We spent the rainy autumn afternoons drinking rum and playing cards with the windows open, listening to the rain and this album.

The CD got tucked into a random case and lost in the depths of Chef’s bag, only to be found last week, the first time either of us heard it since the trip. I drove to work this morning listening to this song and wishing that I was drunkenly bobbing around the ocean. Alas, I was most certainly not.

Joy Division – Transmission
You can blame it on the recent movies about Ian Curtis (which are pretty good), but I rediscovered Joy Division awhile back thanks to Ethan’s thing for 80s music, and Chef’s unbridled encouragement. Live on the BBC, fangirl antics ensue.

Baby Dee – Teeth Are The Only Bones That Show
Fantastic song by a really compelling trans songwriter. I wrote about it briefly here, but you can listen to it here.

Baby Dee is fucking fantastic. Just like I want credit for Chef’s favorite joke (a dead baby joke), Chef wants credit for this song. He found this song first, I told the dead baby joke first.

Friday Cat Blogging

Fidel, who is the newest cat and therefore the most photographed cat, practices his Pile O’Kitteh impression. Here he tries to resemble a Hershey’s Kiss.