GENERAL MADINE: "We have stolen a small Imperial shuttle. Disguised as a cargo ship, and using a secret Imperial code, a strike team will land on the moon and reimplement merge tracking from scratch."
The assembly begins to mumble among themselves.
THREEPIO: "Sounds dangerous."
LEIA (to Han): "I wonder who they found to pull that off."
GENERAL MADINE: "General Solo, is your merge team assembled?"
Leia, startled, looks up at Han, surprise changing to admiration.
HAN: "Uh, my team's ready. I don't have a command crew for the shuttle."
Chewbacca raises his hairy paw and volunteers. Han looks up athim.
HAN: "Well, it's gonna be rough, pal. I didn't want to speak for you."
Disclaimer: I'm lame and not posting every day, so this is going to take more than a year. You get what you pay for.
The Lovely Hope Sandoval. I don't think she had much trouble getting dates.
I've never been sure what to call Mazzy Star. Wikipedia lists no fewer than 9 genres for them. My favorite is "shoegaze". Why don't we just call them "good"?
Artist: Mazzy Star Song: Five String Serenade Album: So Tonight That I Might See (1993)
I could have picked almost any song off this album, I love the whole thing and always listen to it in its entirety. I did resist picking the much better known Fade Into You, which is what passes for a hit for this band, but really you can't go wrong with any of it. It's all just so damn trippy, dreamy, peaceful, etc..
Artist: The J. Geils Band Song: Musta Got Lost Album: Blow Your Face Out [Live] (1975)
This song is among my earliest memories of my "own" music, rather than whatever my parents had playing in the house or on the car radio.
The studio version was found on 1974's Nightmares...and Other Tales from the Jungle, but for me this recording, from a November 15, 1975 concert in the old Boston Garden, is the definitive version of this song.
I've been a bit lax with the blog the last few days, so I owe three songs. Fortunately inspiration hit after attending last night's horrific Celtic's game. To say the C's didn't get it done would be an insult to epic underachievers the world over.
After the Green stunk the joint up, I got thinking back to those Boston teams from the 80's who, more often than not, did get it done, or at least gave nothing away easily. This line of thought (logically?) led to thinking about 80's Boston bands who got it done. And any short list of the Hub's best 80's bands would have to include the Cars.
Like many non-hip boys of the era, I both marveled and bemoaned the fact that lead singer Ric Ocasek (35) somehow managed to land supermodel Paulina Porzikova (19) in 1984 and actually marry her in 1989. Marveled, because it gave hope for us all, I mean look at this guy, if he could do it then we all had a chance. Bemoaned because, by the perverse logic of a 16 year old, we felt that, "Hey, here is a supermodel that likes odd looking guys, she's probably the only one on the planet, and this bozo has taken her off the market! It's unfair! He's rich and famous, he could find another one!" It's as if we somehow thought that we were part of Paulina's backup plan if things didn't work out with Ric. And apparently things did work out, since according to Wikipedia they are still married.
Well to get back at "lead singer" Ric, two of the songs I've chosen are actually sung by the band's late bassist Benjamin Orr.
Artist: The Cars Song: Drive Album: Heartbeaty City Album (1984) Performance: Official Video
Artist: The Cars Song: Just What I Needed Album: The Cars (1978) Performance: Live Aid (1985)
Artist: The Cars Song: Since You're Gone Album: Shake It Up (1981) Performance: Appearance on Friday's (1981)
Artist: Jackson Browne Song: The Load Out / Stay Album: Running on Empty (1977) Performance: BBC In Concert, Live At Shepherd's Bush Theatre, London 1978
Simply put, the greatest song(s) ever about performing and being on the road. Disagree? You are of course entitled to your opinion, but this blog is moderated, so good luck sharing it here ;-)
Artist: Cold War Kids Song: Hang Me Up To Dry Album: Robbers & Cowards (2006) Performance: Official Video
Love or hate the video, at least they tried. Kinda like the song.
I need to go back and listen to this album, outside of this song I never really connected with any of it. I might not have given it a fair chance though, as I was listening to Silversun Pickups' Carnavas at the same time, and the latter was handily winning the fight for my attention.
Artist: Feist Song: 1234 Album: The Reminder Performance: Official Video
Yes, it's the Apple iPod Nano song. It's still very good. Fun video too, one that actually adds something to the song and is entertaining in its own right. As someone who thinks fast cuts are a tool of weak directors, I also like that it was done in one take (or appears to be at any rate, it's hard to be sure these days).
I'm a programmer (or software engineer when I'm trying to sound impressive) living in the achingly beautiful Monadnock region of south western New Hampshire.
My job at Collabnet primarily involves working on Apache Subversion in an attempt to create the world’s most fabulous version control tool. In this capacity I’ve learned a few things about C and Python and get to fly out to the foot of the San Bruno mountains once and a while.
GENERAL MADINE: "We have stolen a small Imperial shuttle. Disguised as a cargo ship, and using a secret Imperial code, a strike team will land on the moon and reimplement merge tracking from scratch."
