Friday CJ Random 11

It’s one more random than 10!

I am dedicating this Friday 11 to the person or persons who felt compelled to remind me and everyone else that my story about Mitt Romney promoting dry humping was not real. That sort of thing has happened a few times here, and it makes me very, very proud of my work. On to the list!

1) “Doctor Jimmy,” The Who. Quadrophenia is my favorite Who studio album (with Live at Leeds my overall favorite). It holds up much better than Tommy and rocks as hard as Who’s Next.

2) “Your Picture,” Camera Obscura. I don’t know why, but this song—featuring a beautiful acoustic guitar melody and male vocal—makes me think of the guy singing on the stairs in Animal House, right before John Belushi destroys his guitar. Once you have an association like that, it’s impossible to erase. My apologies to Camera Obscura.

3) “Strange Brew,” Cream. Fossils like me can not only remember a time when MTV played music videos all the time, but had a feature called Closet Classics where they played old classic videos. They used to play the video for this song a lot. I am not sure if it was drugs or an electric shock that caused Eric Clapton’s hair to look like he should be singing in the B-52s. But I do know it takes divine intervention to outdo the fashion disaster that is Ginger Baker’s cape. Clapton is indeed God.

4) “Afterimage,” Rush. Synthesizers, like cheese, should be stamped with an expiration date. I love the band, I like this song, but it’s filled with those 80s synths that sound so out of style: not cheesy enough to be 70s retro, not realistic enough to be 90s samples. My perscription for synth poisoning: Take two Casios and call me in the morning.

5) “Tired of Sex,” Weezer. This is actually a slightly modified cover version of a song I wrote in college, “Tired of No Sex.”

6) “Zombie Eaters,” Faith No More. I saw them play this song at Oakland’s Day on the Green, with Soundgarden, Queensrÿche(!), and Metallica. During the slow opening part of this song, I tried pushing my way up through the masses to get closer to the stage. The crowd got too dense, though, and I encountered the Crowd Tide, where you're so close together that any little movement triggers this huge ripple effect. I was a little claustrophobic. Then the thrashy part kicked in, and the entire crowd broke into a mosh. I saw this one huge guy stumbling around dazed with a big cut on his forehead and blood rushing down his face. Right then, like something out of a Spiderman movie, I imagined this newspaper spinning around with a headline that read, “Dozens Trampled to Death at Day on the Green Concert.” Thankfully, the story wasn't written, but I decided the view looked better from the back. Despite my love for it, I am so not metal.

7) “Watch Out for Me, Ronnie,” Yo La Tengo. From the awesomely-titled I Am Not Afraid of You and I Will Kick Your Ass. There’s no quiet shoegazing here, either, as the song laces up its boots and pulls the leg back from the get go.

8) “Running Train,” Geddy Lee. Have you ever accidentally bought light cheese, thinking it's the real thing and not seeing the "lite" on the packaging? You unwrap it and take a bite, and realize that even though it looks, feels, and smells the same, it’s not the same. That’s what this song is. Not bad, but it lacks extra creamy awesomeness of full-fledged Rush.

9) “Tell Her About It,” Billy Joel. Later rerecorded by Christie Brinkley as “Tell My Lawyers About It.” You can practically smell the schmaltz.

10) “Just What I Needed,” The Cars. Speaking of “she married that?” guys, I don’t think we’ll ever see a greater looks mismatch by two people who seem genuinely in love than the Ric Ocasek/Paulina Porizkova marriage. It’s like Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hit streak. When Paulina appeared on The Colbert Report recently, she looked stunning. My college roommate had the famous swimsuit poster of her, and she looks even better now. Ocasek has also appeared on Colbert, and he looks the ugly stick used to beat Dorian Gray’s portrait. But God bless him for writing this song, which is on my desert island 10.

11) “Everybody’s Happy Nowadays,” The Buzzcocks. This was used in an AARP ad earlier this year. You know that expression, “When X happens, God kills a kitten?” This is one of those Xs. But it could be worse—at least they didn’t use “Orgasm Addict” for an abstinence PSA.

Have a good weekend.