What MUSIC are you listening to?

Tonight, I will be listening to dance music from 1996-2006.

Dance music, proper, was OK during that time period. Daft Punk ruled the scene. Paul Oakenfeld, Fat Boy Slim, Moby were cutting some great tracks in this era.

Pop music was by and large eminently forgettable. You can find some gems in there though: Crazy In Love by Beyonce, Promiscuous by Nelly Furtado, Can't Get You Outta My Head by Kylie Minogue. Depending on the hop-hop tolerance you might get Missy Elliot's Work It or Lil Kim's The Jump Off, which would be nice.

As ever, a good DJ will put a good show together. A shit DJ will be playing Pussycat Dolls and make you want to die.

jeb wrote:

Tonight, I will be listening to dance music from 1996-2006.

Dance music, proper, was OK during that time period. Daft Punk ruled the scene. Paul Oakenfeld, Fat Boy Slim, Moby were cutting some great tracks in this era.

I would be happy to dance to that music, but the ad for the event showed a picture of Lance Bass in a tux with an unsuspecting girl. The ad copy says, "Dance to the music you forgot you loved: Kelly Clarkson, Outkast, Destiny’s Child, Chumbawamba, Aaliyah, and Blink 182, along with Britney, Nelly, Missy, Justin, Whitney, Kanye, Madonna and more."

I can endure Blink 182 and Madonna, and I like that stupid song by Chumbawumba. I actually have some enthusiasm for a couple of songs by Missy Elliott. Hopefully they play plenty of electronica, too. I talked a friend into going because 80% of the people going per Facebook are women.

(WARNING - potential false nostalgia incoming )

I never really rated Tiger Army until 'Music From Regions Beyond'. To be honest, psychobilly isn't my thing and prior to that I had written them off as a front runner of the 90s psychobilly revival. Anyway, i dug that album, but Nick 13's country solo album blew me away. One of my favorite country albums of the past decade. After really enjoying that one, I went back into the Tiger Army catalog and appreciated the older albums more, though to no surprise it was the more americana/country/pop songs I enjoyed more than the full on pyschobilly or punk tracks.

Well, he (Nick pretty much being Tiger Army) just released the first Tiger Army in about a decade...and it's amazing. Apparently he's drawing a lot on the early 60s with a dash of 70s NYC punk. He's got some opera singer or something doing this western/ethereal thing on several tracks and the effect is hauntingly beautiful. Classic 60s horror.

Here's the lead single to get a sense of that experimental 60s vibe:


For some of that ethereal vibe check out:




Man, I could put up the whole album. Damn, I may even buy a shirt this summer and I haven't bought a band tee in about a decade.

Album of the Year.

Tiger Army got me interested in psychobilly. No speakers at work, so I look forward to these videos when I get home.

jeb wrote:

Tonight, I will be listening to dance music from 1996-2006.

Dance music, proper, was OK during that time period. Daft Punk ruled the scene. Paul Oakenfeld, Fat Boy Slim, Moby were cutting some great tracks in this era.

Pop music was by and large eminently forgettable. You can find some gems in there though: Crazy In Love by Beyonce, Promiscuous by Nelly Furtado, Can't Get You Outta My Head by Kylie Minogue. Depending on the hop-hop tolerance you might get Missy Elliot's Work It or Lil Kim's The Jump Off, which would be nice.

As ever, a good DJ will put a good show together. A shit DJ will be playing Pussycat Dolls and make you want to die.

Got the shit DJ team. I can't verify that they specifically played Pussycat Dolls, but it was a lot of popular crap from that period, like Christina Aguilara, Backstreet Boys, Nelly, etc. Boring beats, bland melodies, and auto-tuned voices. Ellen and I didn't specify when we were meeting up, so I showed up at 9:30, while she and her three female friends showed up at 11:00. We hung out for less than a half hour, and the women were hating the scene because it was an 18+ event, so there were a ton of really young women there, while our group was averaging around 47 in age.

So we left for a notorious gay bar a few blocks away, because they have a good DJ, and because my date wanted a couple of her friends to see the shower show. Turns out that the club has a glass shower set up, and a naked Fabio wannabe was prancing around in their and receiving tips through a strategic slot in the glass. He finished his show with a handstand. I'm trying to get a beer while the girls watch the show, but the bartender is deliberately ignoring me. Ellen swoops in and buys me the beer easily.

The music is good and we're getting into it. Kind of techno and kind of tribal, and definitely danceable. So we're dancing in a circle on the dance floor, with Ellen on my immediate left. This is only the third time we've been out together, but there has been plenty of good signs. We're casually hands-on with each other, and doing some fun banter on anything, everything. Then this big guy approaches on her left. I'm a wiry 6'1", 190#, and give off a cop vibe even though I'm an accountant. This guy looks like a marine with a jarhead haircut, and he is maybe 6'3", 230#. Initial impression is bodybuilder, second take and he looks soft, bulky but no muscle tone.

He talks to Ellen for 10 minutes, and the noise level means they have to be very close to talk, so I come over and throw an arm around her shoulders and ask "Is everything okay?" Ellen laughs and whispers that this guy is only 25. She is 46 but could easily pass for 30, so she's flattered but not interested. I move back to my spot in the circle, and they continue talking. Only now his hands keep casually drifting in and grazing her ass from both sides. After a few minutes, I step over and and grab one of his wrists, pressing hard on a pressure point, and tell him, "Be cool." He pulls back his hands and nervously steps back a couple of small steps. I figure that the message has been sent, and I move back to the circle.

Wrong. This idiot keeps talking to her, and the hands are drifting in again. I walk directly towards him with an intense cop stare, as he steps back again, and I tell him, "Don't be an asshole. We're on a date." Ellen unhelpfully says, "I didn't realize this was a date." She and I have a brief sidebar discussion, where I tell her if she is interested, she can go for it, and I'm out of there. She tells me that she is definitely not interested in a guy who is about the same age as her son. The big goon hasn't left us yet, but he is maintaining a more reasonable distance now. I assume that Ellen is going to wrap up the conversation and we can get back to the fun.

I go back to the circle, and her lesbian friend assures me that Ellen would never be interested in a guy like that. This same lesbian was earlier complimenting me like crazy, telling me that she wasn't hitting on me but considered me the "total package." She compliments me again as I watch Ellen and the goon, and the lesbian even holds my hand. Then Ellen and the big guy walk off together. WTF.

As I stomp towards the exit, the lesbian catches up with me and asks me where I'm going. I tell her the paranoid crap in my head at that moment, and she points out that another girl in our group went with those two. The lesbian says that she thought the girls were headed to the bathroom. Just minutes later, the girls are back, without the goon. They went to the restroom simply to ditch him, and the friend was serving like a point man/scout. Our group headed out a few songs later, and I didn't relax again until we left the club. Ellen and I had a nice talk as I walked her group back to their mini-van. I hate dating.

tl;dr
Remember that scene if Forrest Gump, where the two white guys get in a big fistfight over a white girl at the Black Panther HQ? I almost re-enacted that scene last night, only in a gay bar.

For some reason, I thought you had a younger live-in girlfriend?

Regardless, sorry to hear it was a crappy night. I blame the music.

Yikes, Shell...I was on the edge of my seat reading that, feeling all those intense emotions of jealousy and everything that entails. Brutal situation, glad the guy didn't escalate. He must have been high.

I had a casual relationship end in a evening like that. Got super paranoid so I did a stakeout like a psychopath. Turns out I wasn't paranoid

Thanks for the great story

EDIT :

F%^&in' impossible to embed anything that isn't youtube. Screw it.

Here's a link for some cool yacht rock 1985 remixes of Bieber - Keytar and Sax sexiness :

The Frightnrs have a new album upcoming this Sept. Gonna be great. Lots of fantastic new music this year...but yeah a lot of it aping older sounds.

Who cares!?

In the meantime, here's Sharon.

If you're working at a computer all day today, you could do worse than 'Maniac 1980' by Cluster Buster.

future80s.bandcamp.com/album/maniac-1980

Generic, over reliance on 80s films used as the song titles, but beside that great album!

Is this the greatest music video ever made?

I'm not sure, but those might be the greatest jackets ever made. Ah, memories of Butlins discos...

Mr. White wrote: Is this the greatest music video ever made?

False.

Maybe you're like me and listen to music all day at work.

New for summer '16!

(also on spotify)

Butterflies is the early stand-out track for me.

I've made the mistake of falling for this 20-yr old. Had a "date" last Thursday where we just talked for five straight hours in a pub (it was amazing), and she started texting me that night right after and hasn't let up since. Thing is, I don't think she's really interested. I mean she is and she isn't. And now I'm realizing the the joys that come with someone young who doesn't really know what they want. Anyway, during the evening together, she talked about how we went for a one-hour coffee months ago and just talked the time away like it was nothing, and she revealed that at that moment she had thought about how she wished she knew me when I was young cuz I would have been someone she'd want to date.

Then this song comes on the radio this weekend and I totally love it. Not just for the timing, but it's a really fun song with great lyrics. And is it just me, or did they rip that guitar riff off of Daft Punk?