Two Hit Wonders x 2

I was driving home from work today when I heard a song I’ve always liked, but couldn’t have told you the name of it for a million bucks. That’s rare for me, but that’s the case with the Suzanne Vega composition called “Tom’s Diner.” It’s a pretty unique song. Does the hypnotic song intro qualify as “scat”?

I would describe this song as “airy.” The melody is memorable, the lyrics really aren’t to me, but it still works. It’s like an everyday stream of consciousness. I think whoever arranged the instruments on this one deserves some credit, too. Vega is an example of an artist who has had a couple of hits. Interestingly enough, I was never a fan of her hit song “Luka”, which I have always affectionately called “Puke-A.” Do you think Vega wrote the song as a tribute to The Godfather character Luca Brasi? It’s the only other person with that name I can recall.

Although the songs are nothing alike, I would put “20th Century Boy” by T. Rex into the same sort of category as “Tom’s Diner.” Catchy riff, but airy enough that I really have to focus to remember the name of it. T. Rex frontman Marc Bolan wrote this one.

I think I could listen to this one repeatedly, but still not remember many of the lyrics. Maybe someone can write a song about Vega, Luca, Luka, and Bolan. It would be a long the lines of Neil Young’s “…Marlon Brando, Pochahontas, and Me.”

Till next time, keep your Mojo on the Horizon!

31 Flavors…of Vanilla?

2024 is fast approaching and ice cream is on my mind. Sometime in my twenties I started having that whole lactose intolerance issue and I said goodbye to the creamy treat for many years. Now, we have a lot more lactose-free options than we did in the past. However, it can be slightly overwhelming. (More in a moment.)

Given the choice, I usually opt for vanilla over chocolate. I like the creamy taste and always put mine in the microwave for a few seconds to soften it and give it that melty sensation I love. Just in case you’re wondering, the song “Ice Cream Man” made famous by Van Halen was originally written and recorded by a guy named John Brim.

During the past few years, Breyer’s Lactose-Free Vanilla has become my personal favorite; however, you have to be careful in the ice cream aisle and REALLY pay close attention. My pseudo-extensive research has revealed not quite one billion variations on Breyer’s Vanilla. Here are just a few of them:

Breyer’s Extra Creamy Vanilla — Hmmm….sounds like my style, but it has lactose?
Breyer’s Carb Smart Vanilla — Carb reduction is good. Okay, I get it.
Breyer’s Homemade Vanilla — Ummm..does this mean the others are industrial made?
Breyer’s Natural Vanilla – I’m not sure how this different from homemade. Is a churn used in one of these? If so, are we talking billions of individual churns or one the size of Shea Stadium? Maybe there’s a Greek myth about it. Didn’t someone have to churn something into something else for some reason or another?
Breyer’s Non-Dairy Vanilla — Wait a damn minute….what’s the difference between non-dairy and lactose-free? Will eating this put me on a watch list?
Breyer’s French Vanilla – Do I have to wear a beret when I eat it or do they only use French cows? Maybe when French cows are in short supply, they make American cows wear berets.
Breyer’s Gluten Free Vanilla – What’s good for the gluten is good for the gander?

Whew….that’s exhausting. I’m pretty sure I saw “oat milk” mentioned on one of the numerous choices, but I have absolutely no idea what oat milk is. By the way, I checked out the company website. The dude’s name was Breyer, but I don’t see an apostrophe on the box. I hope this doesn’t ruin my B average for punctuation. Also, Baskin Robbins used to be known for 31 flavors, but now they have over one thousand. I wonder why I’d like to drop a few pounds.

Till next time, keep your Mojo on the Horizon!

Politically Incorrect Xmas

I started to include the abbreviation “Xmas” in the title of my last blog entry, but I came up with a better idea and changed it. Have you ever had anyone get pissed off about using said abbreviation? I have. Here’s the way it usually plays out. Said person will say, “I believe in keeping the CHRIST in Christmas” as if they have the moral high ground. Then you have to explain the whole thing that the Chi Rho (the letter P with X through it) is actually an abbreviation for Jesus Christ. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chi_Rho

Now that I’ve got that out of the way, it’s time to play my favorite politically incorrect holiday song. It’s just my opinion, but “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” doesn’t compare to Robert Earl Keen’s “Merry Christmas from the Family.”

There are so many great lines in this song, but “I can’t remember how I’m kin to them” is a safe bet. It covers a lot of the family gathering bases like chain smoking, new spouses, A.A., and runs to the quick shop.

In keeping with the politically incorrect theme AND the quick shop theme, I have to recommend “El Camino Christmas” for holiday viewing.

I’d go into more detail, but I cancelled my Netflix subscription awhile ago so I can spend more money on things like alcohol and extension cords.

Till next time, keep your Mojo on the Horizon!

YouTube Guitar, Part 3

Are you still wondering about your guitar lesson options on YouTube? Well, you’re in the right place. I’m still using the Lyrnyrd Skynyrd song “Sweet Home Alabama” to compare your options. To start, let’s check out Erich Andreas and his channel called YourGuitarSage.

How would I describe his approach? I’d say he has a certain energy in his delivery. As you can see he normally rocks a bedhead hairdo and often wears a necktie. Free-spirited musician type. Good stuff.

Another guy I’ve started watching more regularly is Jon MacLennan, which is also the name of his YouTube channel. He’s not wearing it here, but he often rocks a wide brim hat.

The same things I said about Marty, Justin, and Carl in Part 2 could be said of these two guys. They are upbeat and enthusiastic about playing and learning guitar.

Another option for viewers is a guy named Scott Grove. His channel is called Groovy Music Lessons. Grove is probably the biggest smart ass of any of the teachers I’ve mentioned, but I have learned plenty of things by watching his channel.

In some of his lessons, you’ll see Grove standing in front of his massive collection of guitars: Strats, Flying V’s, signature models. One thing I like about him is he isn’t afraid to share his opinion on different models of guitars, etc. In one video he mentioned that he will buy one model of guitar because the resale value is great, but the guitar actually kinda sucks.

Ironically, Grove markets his stuff as “lessons that don’t suck” and also caught my attention when he mentioned he is the #1 seller of guitar lessons on ebay or something like that. He has plenty of resources on playing guitar, bass and specific genres like country or rock.

There are definitely other channels/instructors I check out from time to time, but these are ones which cover a good number of mainstream songs. I’m usually searching for classic rock songs.

Till next time, keep your Mojo on the Horizon!

Evel American Nostalgia

Recently, I had the pleasure of visiting the Evel Knievel Museum in Topeka, KS. I know very little about motorcycles, but as a kid in 1970s America, you can bet I knew about Evel Knievel. As a matter of fact, I even had one of those action figures with the wind up motorcycle.

Naturally, one of the bratty neighbor kids had the whole Knievel-Palooza mega toy pack with that times ten.

As for the museum, it was interesting to see his different successful and less than successful jumps and the years they took place. His injuries are pretty well documented, too. For me, seeing his red, white, and blue motorcycle and matching jumpsuit reminded me of 1976 and America’s Bicentennial. Good times.

In the American way, he achieved worldwide fame and even appeared on a Wheaties box. More on his collectibles later. Unfortunately, the films about him or including him didn’t fare as well so in celebration of E.K., I’m including this song by The Road Vikings.

This song sounds like a combo of Iron Maiden and Ronnie James Dio to my ears. It rocks — which seems to fit the man. Another cool thing about the museum was the inclusion of his 1974 red custom Cadillac Pickup Truck. It looks like a pimped out El Camino, which somehow seems appropriate. Other items I saw included things like a pinball machine, a matchbook with the word “EVEL” on it, a zillion motorcycle toys, a tire shaped radio, and so much more.

As a person, I don’t think Evel Knievel was any angel, but he’s definitely an American success story. Give the guy credit. Most of us, myself included, don’t want to risk breaking most of the bones in our bodies to achieve our goals, but he was.

In the bigger scheme of things, thinking about Evel makes me think about a question I’ve seen on news reports and polls. The short version is most Americans don’t feel the U.S. is headed in the right direction. My response to that is, “Where/when did things start to go the wrong way?” I have joked with friends of mine about it in terms of pop culture, but was 1976’s Bicentennial our peak as a nation? Is there one event which derailed things for the U.S. of A.?

As an example, Knievel successfully jumped seven Greyhound buses in 1976, but he crashed during a separate practice jump in 1977. Should he have stopped in 1976? While I don’t think the 1977 movie “Viva Knievel” did him any favors either, I still say: VIVA KNIEVEL!

Till next time, keep your Mojo on the Horizon!

6 Degrees of Rick James

Sometime during the 90s, there was a book and a game called “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.” The idea behind it was Bacon had worked with a lot of people in Hollywood and was, therefore, connected to every actor out there via different degrees of separation. If he didn’t work with YOUR favorite director, he’d worked with someone who had. It’s a pretty interesting idea that could be applied outside of the film industry.

Initially, what made me think about this was an obscure band called The Mynah Birds. If you’ve never heard of them, you’re not alone, but their big claim to fame was the unlikely pairing of Rick James and Neil Young in the band’s lineup.

I’m not sure where I learned this random fact. It might have been in a Young biography or magazine article. (I think James had to do some time in the military due some arrests or avoid being drafted.)

Another interesting thing about James is he dated Linda Blair. She’s best known for playing the demonically possessed girl in The Exorcist. “Superfreak”, anyone? As I was scrolling through one of my streaming channels recently, I saw Blair was in a movie with David Hasselhoff. I don’t think “Bail Out” was exactly Oscar material.

The next logical question is, “Why hasn’t someone done a movie mashup where David H. (in Baywatch getup) runs in to save Linda Blair and she projectile vomits on him?” I mean these scenarios could just keep going. How about Neil Young strumming his acoustic guitar on a trailer while he’s pulled around by the Hoff in the KITT vehicle?

Incidentally, Kevin Bacon had a musical duo called The Bacon Brothers with his actual brother. I suppose everyone involved could form a supergroup.

Till next time, keep your Mojo on the Horizon!

Evangeline Robertson Longfellow

Do you remember the 1992 film “Scent of a Woman” with Al Pacino? It was the film where he played a retired military dude who happened to be blind and said, “Hoo Ahh!” about 99 times throughout the film. One thing I noticed the first time I saw this film was a brief scene where Pacino’s character is listening to the radio. The song which was playing in the background was “Evangeline” by The Band and Emmylou Harris. I first encountered this song while watching The Band’s farewell concert film called “The Last Waltz.”

It’s a fairly simple country song with some great harmony vocals from Harris and The Band, but I always wondered why “Scent of a Woman” director Martin Brest chose this particular song? Is he a Band superfan? Does he think Pacino’s character would have liked the song? I’ve always wondered about it. Stuff like that bugs me. Maybe I should try to track down Brest and ask him.

As for the song, I wondered about the origin of it as well. If I remember correctly, I was writing a paper in college and found out these reference books called Contemporary Literary Criticism actually had some reviews of music in them, too. That’s where I discovered the inspiration for the song was a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow called “Evangeline, A Tale of Acadie.”

I’m not going to pretend to understand the poem, but, from what I’ve read it’s about the Acadians being driven from their French colony in the Maritime provinces of Canada by the British. Longfellow’s poem and The Band’s song (credited to Robbie Robertson) are both told from the perspective of a young woman named Evangeline who is looking for her long lost love. It sounds like a pretty heavy concept, but I think the song’s story line is easy enough to understand.

In any event, this film-song-poem combo has been on my list for quite some time. Hopefully, you enjoyed it.

Till next time, keep your Mojo on the Horizon!

Y-Y-Z or Why-Why-Zed?

It’s official. For the first time in my life, I left the comfy freedom-laden confines of the United States of Murica to go to a work conference in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. To preface this, I will say I enjoy airline travel and and airports about as much as I do going to the dentist or the DMV. That said, I got my passport and booked a flight some months ago. At the time, I had a small epiphany. I realized the band RUSH’s instrumental called “YYZ” was inspired by the airport code for Toronto Pearson International Airport. Apparently, the intro is based on a Morse code thing for the airport. The song entered my mind several times.

It’s a cool piece of music and there’s no Ayn Rand involved. Getting back to my visit to Toronto, I caught an Uber from said YYZ to the hotel and heard “Sundown” by Canadian Gordon Lightfoot on the way there. Bonus! There was plenty of traffic on a Saturday night, which I found slightly odd, but I think the Blue Jays were playing. Former-Royal Whit Merrifiled homered during the game. (For the record, I actually despise the Royals, but Merrifield is a hustling type of player that I respect.)

I’d like to tell you I had oodles of time and energy to see Toronto, but I was actually part of a team running the conference so I didn’t. Naturally, I tried to make smart yet convenient food choices. There was a well-known coffee and doughnut shop Tim Horton’s location across the street and a place called Beaver Tails which served some scrumptious pastries shaped like beaver tails. I thoroughly enjoyed both. Another highlight of my trip was the view of Toronto Harbour from my room. It’s not just that it was a view of the harbour, but I saw a pirate ship and sea plane, too. The hotel had a few things named “quay”, which I will leave up to you to Google.

Eventually, I had to come back to Kansas City International Airport. Everyone here calls it “K-C-I”, but the actual airport code is MCI. That’s a good example of why I despise airline travel. Letters, numbers, abbreviations. You book a flight months in advance to save money. You’re assigned a gate number. Then said gate number changes. Kind of defeats the purpose of the initial gate assignment, don’t you think? Maybe airports could merge with casinos and passengers could just spin a wheel to see which gate they’ve been assigned. Everyone else could place bets.

When I finally got to the charter bus for my parking lot, the bus driver was extremely displeased that I didn’t have the 1 mm x 1 mm square with my assigned parking row and numbers. However, I did actually write down those crucial numbers on my 8.5 x 11″ printed reservation for parking. I explained to him the concept that the numbers written in larger print on a larger piece of paper were easier to read, easier to keep track of, and still contained the needed information. I actually, willingly chose to write it on unofficial parking lot paper. This shattered his entire universe, but I verbally dug in without having to apply any martial arts compliance techniques and actually got to my vehicle. By the way, I also resisted punching a work “partner” in his gritted teeth . He had a meltdown about me touching the conference badges while his beloved printer was doing its thing. This must be why I would rather live in my own music-laden universe and leave the letters, numbers, and meltdowns to everyone else.

Till next time, keep your Mojo on the Horizon!

Grunge-r Strike

Have you ever watched any documentaries or TV shows about the 1990s? One might start something like this… As the neon glow of the 80s started to fade, the Rubik’s Cubes and parachute pants made way for flannel, Doc Martens boots, and a musical revolution out of Seattle called “grunge.”

Speaking for myself, I normally resist whatever trend is current — especially in music. When grunge music was all the rage, I was probably listening to something from The British Invasion or Bo Diddley. I’ll say that I do appreciate some grunge music more now that some time has passed since the 90s. However, I didn’t “get” a lot of it or relate to those bands. One song from that time period I have always loved was written by Chris Cornell and recorded by a one album supergroup called Temple of the Dog. The song is called “Hunger Strike.”

Prior to writing this blog entry, I listened to this song repeatedly. Obviously Chris Cornell’s dynamic vocals are a big part of the song. I think you have to give him credit for not only his vocal range, but the emotional power in it.

Here’s another conclusion. “Hunger Strike” reminds me of Led Zeppelin’s approach to a lot of songs — soft acoustic intro, building into a hard rocking, dynamic finish. (Ann and Nancy Wilson of the band Heart were big Led Zep fans and copied this technique as well.)

There’s a whole back story about why the Temple of the Dog group formed and the inspiration for the album. I think what’s important, though, is it was made up of Cornell and several members of Pearl Jam including singer Eddie Vedder. I was never into Pearl Jam and really couldn’t relate to Vedder’s singing voice. That said, I think his Vedder’s baritone served as a perfect foil to the wailing voice of Cornell. Cornell sounds pretty amazing on his own, too.

If I had to pick a favorite song from the 90s, “Hunger Strike” would definitely be in contention. I think it has just enough Vedder vocals and just enough grunge guitar.

Till next time, keep your Mojo on the Horizon!

Rhoads, Romance, & Canon

I recently watched a documentary about guitarist Randy Rhoads who tragically died in a plane crash at the young age of 25. Rhoads is not only known for his association with Quiet Riot and Ozzy Osbourne, but also his background in classical guitar. I can’t say I’ve ever really been big into classical music, but I think Rhoads is an interesting example of bringing that influence into a hard rock musical environment. The easiest example to cite is the power ballad “Goodbye to Romance” off the Blizzard of Ozz album.

If the melody sounds familiar, that’s because it’s based on the popular classical piece “Canon in D” by Johann Pachelbel. The chord changes are basically the same. You might have heard it at a wedding.

Singer-songwriter Lisa Loeb also covered “Goodbye to Romance” for the album “Bat Head Soup: A Tribute to Ozzy.”

Frank Zappa’s son Dweezil played guitar on the track. I like both the Ozzy and Loeb versions of this one.

Incidentally, I never owned “Blizzard of Ozz”, but I distinctly remember buying “Tribute” which is a live Ozzy album featuring Randy Rhoads and also some big Black Sabbath tunes as well. I bought it at a Streetside Records location on cassette tape.

Not too many guitarists can pull off the look of a black Gibson Flying V guitar with white polka dots, but Randy Rhoads definitely did it.

Till next time, keep your Mojo on the Horizon!