Don’t you love compilations?

I was looking over my dashboard today and noticing still more hits on my “asking a girl out” pages. It’s funny to note that some of my earliest writing on this site still gets the most attention - because some things never go out of style, I guess. And some flop-sweating teenager trying to work up his guts to ask a girl out is one of them.

On a lot of levels, I like this. Even all the hits on my joke-page about the phenomenon…because, as I’m about to edit the post to say to all the guys who are finding it, the one thing you can take away from reading that is that you’re definitely not alone. Legions of nail-chewing guys have preceded you, and legions will succeed you. They’re all thinking that there’s something wrong with them, that most guys don’t have that problem. Wrong. Most guys do, it’s the rarest of guys that don’t.

But I’ve been thinking a bit more about my blog administrivia since the weekend, when my lovely wife and I were discussing it, and I showed her my stats page with my highest all-time posts and search terms. Sometimes it’s amusing to me. Probably only to me, but nonetheless…

So what the hell, I’m throwing the top 10 out there as a “greatest hits” thing, chosen by you, the readers. (I think it’s nicer to think of it that way than as the dreaded obligatory sitcom clip show.)

1. Asking a girl out - the high school edit
2. The Birthday Cake of Doom
3. How to ask a girl out
4. The fear of one’s self
5. The Taoist Biker Glossary
6. Taoist Biker FAQ
7. The Soundtrack of My Life
8. Are You A Nice Guy?
9. 2007 MotoGP Season In Review
10. When the tables are turned

A few comments on the top four:

If you add all the hits up, the “How to Ask a Girl Out” series would be #1. The “Table of Contents” page ranks third; the individual pages in this series would technically rank numbers between numbers 10 and 19, but I don’t think it’s fair to count them that way. Most of those hits are surely people clicking through.

About a third of the hits on “The Birthday Cake of Doom” came on one day, when someone on the QVC forums apparently linked to it and claimed the cake as hers. Fibber.

The hits on “The Fear of One’s Self’ are largely based off of the first-day hits when I linked it in a comment on Vix’s blog.

And “Asking a Girl Out - High School Edition” is the only one to actually receive at least one hit a day since I opened this blog. Whoa! I must have done something right.

Sadly, hits on my date application are outside the top 20, even once I deleted all the duplicate “ask a girl out” posts. *sniff* The under on the O/U line is still winning.

And just for laughs, the Google searches that most frequently brought people here: (including variations)

1. “motivational posters” including lots for “bikers” and “boobs.” The amusing part is that I’m nowhere near the top of the Google charts for this - how many pages are people willing to click through to find me?
2. “taoist biker”
3. “r2d2 cake” (or “Star Wars cake” etc)
4. “megyn price” (especially together with something about “boobs” or “tits” - seriously, my post mentioned her just for a second, and the word “boobs” is nowhere to be found. Celebrity droolers can be scary.  Ms. Price, if you’re reading this, I think you’re wonderful, and apparently a sizable number of people feel the same way about your breasts.)
5. “how to ask a girl out in high school”

After that, it’s a few searches on MotoGP and a bunch of people who pull up my soundtrack blog because I use the word “meaning” in it, and so it comes up when people google “meaning of” and the title of any song on the list…even though nobody’s ever actually emailed or commented to ask me about the soundtrack.

So there’s my Greatest Hits, Vol. 1. It’ll be interesting to check up on my first blogiversary (awww) and see where things stack up compared to now. I’m betting that the “Asking A Girl Out - High School Edition” will still be #1.

And that the unders will still be winning the bet on the application thread.

 

I brought it.

If I’d been within reach of a keyboard when this happened, I would have blogged it immediately.

Walking to the car last night, I called my wife. I had to run an errand after work, so I thought I’d ask if she wanted me to grab us some dinner out and bring it home.

“Hmm. Yeah. Ooh, Subway.”
“Not Penn Station? Not that Subway won’t be half the price.”
“Yeah, Subway.”
“What do you want?”
“Do you have the slip of paper from last time?”
“Nope. Better wait ’til I get to the car so I can write it down.”

Why? Because when it comes to food, my wife may as well be Meg Ryan in “When Harry Met Sally.” You’ve gotta get everything just right. It’s not for nothing that her mom gave her a pair of PJ’s with a fake name-tag that says, “Hello, my name is: HIGH MAINTENANCE.”

(Note: in this case, not only would that be classified as the pot calling the kettle black, it’s the entire goddamned pot cabinet calling the kettle black. My MIL is without a doubt THE most high maintenance person I’ve ever known in my entire life. So, you know, I could have it worse. MUCH worse.)

Anyway, I got to the car, whipped out a pencil and some paper, and called my wife back. I took her order for a veggie sub, complete with a 7 or 8-item list of what to have “extra” and what to leave off.

Finally, she asks, “Am I forgetting anything?”
“Damn, I hope not!”
“Well, okay, that’s it then.”
“Are you sure? I can’t get you anything else?”
“No. Hmm, mushrooms! Do they have mushrooms?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Nothing else, then.”
“How about a big ol’ helping of meat?”

Without missing a beat, she says, “You’re bringing that home already, babe.”

Damn. Beaten to a sexual innuendo by my own wife. I hang my head in shame.

 

Be careful with those things!

They’re dangerous!!

Oh Emm Gee. My motorcycle friends are fountains of complete batshit-craziness sometimes.

Click’em this link here. Mostly safe for work, I think. But not if you work in an elementary school or a church, probably.

(I hate to ruin the magic, but I think she actually is using her hand.)

I’d insert a joke here, but my wife could probably come up with a better one. If she could stop groaning in sympathy at the thought of hauling those things around without a forklift. And in this case, I most definitely agree. Certainly far, far, far too much of a good thing.

Reminds me of this motivation poster I saw a week or so ago (except not so much in the circus-freak manner displayed in the video):

Despite the best of intentions, we’ve been there, haven’t we, guys?

 

I am wary, let me rest.

We were watching TV this morning, and when I walked back into the room after combing my son’s hair, my wife said to me:  “I was never weary of soy milk before I ever tried it.”

“Wha-huh?”

“This lady on the commercial said she was weary of soy milk before she’d tried it.”

“Hah!”

Yes, it’s true, I’m married to a grammar nazi.  And it’s hell.  Actually, it’s not hell.  It’s not even heck.  It’s usually perfectly benign, even pleasant.

Except when I was working on my thesis, of course, and she made me debate every single comma, semicolon, word choice, or turn of phrase with her until I wanted to give myself a papercut with every single page until I bled to death.

My thesis advisor, beloved man though he was, also had the reputation of being the most viciously brutal editor in the department.  He’d earned his spurs as the editor of one of the field’s more respected journals.  After surviving my wife’s editing, he handed whole chapters back to me untouched as to grammar.  (Content, yes.)  She’s goooooooooood.

Anyway, the “wary/weary” thing is a sore spot to me, so I shared an anecdote.

“Did I ever tell you I lost a spelling bee because of that?”

She gave me the blank look.

“Yep.  The teacher gives the word to the kid next to me, and uses it in a sentence:  ‘We were wary after the long journey.’  The kid spells it:  W-E-A-R-Y.  Nope, sit down.  They turned to me.  ‘Weary.  We were weary after the long journey.’  I blinked, looked at them hard, figured I must have heard the girl next to me wrong, and tried again:  ‘Weary.  W-E-A-R-Y.  Weary.’  Nope, sit down.  The next kid spelled it W-A-R-Y, and yep, that’s what they wanted.”

My wife was flabbergasted.  “You’re shitting me.”

“Nope.  That’s where I grew up.  The teacher reading the sentences was an older black lady who pronounced that ‘ea’ as ‘a’ all the time anyway.  She pronounced ‘cheerful’ as ‘chairful.’”

“Oh my god.  You should have appealed it or something.”

“To who?  There were two other teachers sitting right next to her, and neither of them batted an eye.”

“Gawd.”

Yep.  Occasionally the stereotypes of the rural South are based in fact.

 

I hate politics.

I got a phone call last night from an opinion collector from someplace in Virginia.

Uh, yeah. The company that hired him was from Virginia, but the caller, not so much. Don’t get me wrong, I know there are people in every state in the Union with very heavy South Asian accents, but I’m also pretty sure that at one point I heard someone talking over his shoulder in Urdu.

It was, of course, a political push-poll. It was a smart one, too, because while I smelled a push-poll from the beginning, it was only really apparent in the end.

The poll started out as usual.

“How likely are you to vote in the election?” (Unless someone in my family is bleeding, I’m voting. Thank you, high school Civics class.)

“Which party are you likely to vote for?”

“Who are you more likely to vote for in the November election if the candidates are Barack Obama and John McCain?”

“Who are you more likely to vote for in the November election if the candidates are Hillary Clinton and John McCain?”

All standard stuff. Then they get into what the poll was obviously meant to do, talk about the race for the House of Representatives in my district. It’s not terribly important which party it was for and which party it was against, because in my humble opinion, they both suck. Let’s say the incumbent in my Congressional district is a member of the Rat party, and the prospective opponent is a member of the Snake party. The prospective opponent once held the seat now held by the incumbent, and is well-financed by the Snakes.

“I’m going to read a list of possible platform items for the Snake candidate for Congress, and you tell me if a person taking this position would make you much more likely to vote for them, a little more likely, a little less likely, much less likely, or no difference. Okay?”
“Sure.”

The list was pretty straightforward, I thought. All positions that the Snake candidate might or might not have taken. I smelled something rotten, but not completely out of line.

“Now I’m going to read a list of possible platform items for the Rat candidate for Congress, and you tell me if a person taking this position would make you much more likely to vote for them, a little more likely, a little less likely, much less likely, or no difference. Okay?”

“Go for it.”

Apparently the Rat party platform is a bit extreme. I’m pretty sure that somewhere in there I was asked if I’d support the Rat party candidate if he/she came out in favor of doubling my taxes in order to hand bucketloads of cash to the special interest of his or her choice, lowering the draft age to six, and killing puppies just for fun.

“Now, after hearing all of that, are you much more likely to vote for the Rat party candidate, a little more likely, a little less likely, much less likely, or no difference?”

“No difference.”

If anything, I’m more pissed at the Snake candidate now. And pissed off that apparently this kind of thing regularly works in swaying the electorate. I guess George Carlin’s old adage is true. “Think of how stupid the average person is, and then realize that half of them are dumber than that.“

It’s a sad time we live in.

 

I have two wives!

At least, two people are claiming me as their husband.

One is definitely the woman I sleep with.  I know, because she told me about changing the picture to a chick in person.  And she definitely looked like the woman I woke up with that morning.  Except, you know, less bed head at the time.

The other is, well, not.  In fact, she’s got a .cn web address, which as far as my networking classes were concerned, means her web site is run out of China.

I’m pretty sure that the lady I’m sleeping with isn’t running a side blog outta China.

Since I’m already on record on Matt’s blog as being anti-bigamy, I think I have to e-divorce my Chinese e-wife.  Can we agree on the application of right-wing Muslim divorce laws here?  Okay?  Good.  “I divorce thee!  I divorce thee!  I divorce thee!”

That was easy.  Too bad, though.   It’s a bit sad when you have to do that to someone who says “what a hunk my man is!” in her mouse-over text on your link.  On the other hand, the whole week we were e-married, she never e-put out, or even e-made me a sandwich.  So to hell with her.

And nice job on ripping off some innocent bystander’s blog posts.

(For the record, my own posts are regularly ripped off by motorcycle-related blogbots.  It’s so prevalent that I don’t even bother calling them out.)

 

Happy Mother’s Day

“I broke down and bought a pair of cargo shorts.”
She gives me the look.
“What?”
“Finally?  Let’s see ‘em.”

I changed.
“Hmm.  A little longer than I expected, even, but not bad.”
“I think you look good.  And sexy.  I like the way your tattoo peeks out there.”
“Be right back, I’m going to buy some more shorts.”

***

“Hey babe, I just saw a commercial and apparently if you drink Miller Chill you can turn me into a hot Latina chick.”

[pause]  “How much is it?”
“Well, I thought you’d leave immediately to go get some, so good for you.”

“Well, it is beer.  Just kidding, babe, I wouldn’t want to change you into a hot Latina chick.”
“Fuck that, what if I want you to change me?”

***

[Watching the movie Ghost Rider]

“I’m not drunk enough to be watching this piece of crap.”

(Later, still watching it)
“I wouldn’t drink Miller Chill to turn you into Eva Mendes, babe.  She’s not hot enough.”
“Yes she is.  You could turn me into Eva Mendes; that would be fine with me.”
“Well, she does have the boobs working for her in that dress…”

***

[Mother's Day morning]

“Hey, son, who are you talking to in there?”
“Mrs. Butterworth.”
Ah, okay, so we see those talking Mrs. Butterworth bottle commercials all the time on Nick.
“Is she talking back to you?”
“Duh.  No.”  He pauses, then leans in.  “TALK, MRS. BUTTERWORTH!  SPEAK TO ME!”  [shaking the bottle violently]  “TALK!!”

Yep.  My son interrogated Mrs. Butterworth.  All that was missing was the bright light and the Nazi accent.

***
My son addressed my wife’s Mother’s Day card to “Cuty Pants.”  Oedipus lives.

***

You’d think that “Tartar Sauce!” as an expletive wouldn’t get old.  It does.  In a day, even.  Thank you, Spongebob.

***

“Welcome to the Jungle,” “Superstition,” and “Misty Mountain Hop” are surprisingly fun to play on the drums.  Even a kiddie drum kit from Target that your son borrowed from his friend.  That the friend’s family put together all wrong.

***

My wife:  “What did you say, son?”
“I said [something, I forget.]“

“Oh, I thought you said ‘snot boxers!’”
A pause.
[as one of his Lego characters]  “Snot boxers!  What happened?”  [Answering himself as the other Lego character]  “Dude, the castle broke!”

***

“Hey, son, you want to play Halo with me?”
“Yeah, but you can’t shoot me.”
“Can I smack you with my energy sword?”
“Yeah, but don’t kill me.”
“Can I jump on your head?”
“Yeah!”
“Okay.”

***

“I know the noise is probably driving you crazy, but he’s down there playing the drum kit in a white T-shirt and his Pirates do-rag.”

***

Hope you all had a happy Mother’s Day.

 

Zzzzz, reprise

You know how I said I was falling asleep at the drop of a hat lately?

Well, Friday evening I came home from work, dropped some of my stuff, changed into a T-shirt and shorts, and talked with my wife for a while.  She adjourned to the bed for a few (she’d had a long day) and so I laid down beside her to talk to her for a while longer.

You can see where this is going.  NO, NOT THERE.  (Unfortunately.)

At about 6:30, she got up.  I said to myself, “Hmm.  I’ll just lay here for a minute.”

I woke up at 10:30, at which point I debated getting up, said “What’s the point?” and went right back to sleep until 7:30 the next morning.

After that, I felt a bit better.

(One would hope!)

 

Monday Music

I could explain this one in great detail…but you guys are pretty smart.  You can figure it out.

Alison Krauss & Union Station, “When You Say Nothing At All”

 

It Came from the 80s, Part 6

This is it, folks…we’ve come from Part 1 all the way here to the home stretch! Enough with the preliminaries, let’s get to it!

The Black Crowes - Twice as Hard

Whoops. Turns out “Shake Your Money Maker” was released in 1990 and technically ineligible for this list. Somehow I think of it as a 1989 thing. Oh well. I love the chorus to this song. It’s just fantastically southern rock, and drips cool.

The Black Crowes - She Talks to Angels

If you don’t like this song, get out. Seriously.

Beautiful. And it’s always amusing when you figure out how badly you’ve been abusing yourself by trying for fifteen years to play it in the wrong tuning.

The Cars - You Might Think

Another iconic song and video. If you don’t see Ric Ocasek’s face on a fly when you think of this song, then you’re not an 80s kid. Or possibly you’re Russian. The Cars were always famous for their magnificent ability to merge synthesizers and rock guitars, and this is a good example of that.

The Cars - Magic

And this is another one. Boy, did I love this tune. The “Summer turns me upside down” theme can be detected throughout lots of these song entries, of course. Summer girlfriends and flirtations can do that to you.

The Cars - Drive

Now this is my favorite Cars song ever. Anachronistically, it’s more associated in my mind with 1986 than 1984 when it came out - largely because it was still on the radio in ‘86 because the song was so damned good, and largely because my good friend and I were both gawky eighth-graders, new to junior high, and minorly obsessed with cheerleaders who were (shockingly) dating jerks. This song seemed to speak to us, as I’m sure it speaks to Nice Guys everywhere. “Why do you do this to yourself, when it should be obvious who cares about you and who doesn’t?”

For the record, I think Ziggy Marley’s cover on the soundtrack to “50 First Dates” is outstanding.

The Cult - Fire Woman

Hell yeah. You can name this song in seven notes, if not less. The echoing, ringing guitar tone on the opening line is remarkably distinctive. And, if you’re like me, it makes the hair on your arms stand up and your guts signal to your brain, “Okay, damn it, prepare to rock.“

Great, great, great straight-ahead hard rock song from the late-80s hard rock Golden Age.

The Cure - Love Song

Whoops, Becca, I was wrong. Guess I got over myself and put this remix on here anyway. It is an awesome late-80s tune, and not including it would be remiss. I remember learning to play the little lead line on my crappy acoustic guitar from watching them perform on MTV once. It was when I was first learning to play, so of course I learned it all on one string, and still tend to play it that way.

The Eurythmics - Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)

When it comes to memorable early-80s images, where does Annie Lennox in her flaming red hair and black suit fit? I’m thinking definitely in the top 10. Good music + good vocal + good imagery = big hit. Very well done.

The Outfield - Your Love

This is another one of those “if you don’t like it, get out” songs. Classic, pure classic - ridiculously good, and fiendishly catchy. I love to hear it, love to play it, and can’t help but sing along to it whenever I hear it. It’s number 150 on the mp3 disc this list is based on. How do I know that? Because I HAD to be able to find this song whenever I wanted, that’s why.

I always thought this could be interestingly done as a male/female duet, actually. Guy takes the first verse, girl takes the second verse, they split the bridge and the last verse. Or, alternatively, split each verse. Either could work. What can I say, I sometimes think of weird things when I’m driving alone and listening to music.

The Police - Wrapped Around Your Finger

Were we talking of iconic images before? Sting knocking down the circle of candles ranks even higher than Annie Lennox in her suit, I think. The vocal melody on this song is one of the best of the 80s, I think. It suits the minor-key chord structure wonderfully.

The Police - Every Breath You Take

Musically not as good a song as “Wrapped Around Your Finger,” but much more popular. Probably the biggest stalker anthem of all time. (Sorry to Queensryche, whose “Gonna Get Close To You” just couldn’t get over the top.)

The Pretenders - Back on the Chain Gang

Not a great song, but a good one. It’s a bouncy song, and it works well with a good mood.

The Romantics - What I Like About You

My son loves this song. And who doesn’t? It’s catchy as all hell, and very high on the list of “best non-Eagles songs with the drummer on vocals.” Personally, though, whenever I think of The Romantics I think of their other hit, “Talking In Your Sleep.” Mostly because it was on the air a lot when I used to unwillingly share a room with my little brother, who did, in fact, talk in his sleep. *thrown pillow* SHADDAP!

The Smithereens - A Girl Like You

The Smithereens - Blues Before and After

The Smithereens’ solid album “11″ came out around the time I got my first car, and I remember hearing these two songs repeatedly as I was upside down underneath my dashboard trying (over and over and over) to figure out how to wire in my “new” Kraco car stereo into my ‘72 Nova. It took myself and my best friend about two years to finally figure all that stuff out, but by the time we graduated high school, we could install a full damn car stereo system, b’gawd. In one night, by flashlight, if need be.

“Blues Before and After” is by a good bit my favorite of the two, largely because it’s a little more aggressive, and I love the bass line. But “A Girl Like You” has good memories for me, because my wife used this song to audition as backing vocals for a rock band when she was in college (long before we met) and she can still sing the shit out of it.

Tina Turner - What’s Love Got to Do With It

I remember some guy on the radio saying about Tina Turner that she “was born to teach other women how to dance in high heels.” Hell yeah, she was. The whole “Private Dancer” album was killer. And don’t even get me started on Auntie Entity and her chain-mail top. “Two men enter, one man leaves!”

Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers - Don’t Come Around Here No More

Damn it, more imagery. Tom as the Mad Hatter. I don’t even like this song that much - Tom has much better songs from the 80s - but I use this one because the video was such a staple of the 80s.

Toto - Africa

Amusingly, I barely remember this song from the 80s. What I remember is me and a handful of my roommates borrowing our RA’s Toto Greatest Hits disc and drunkenly singing this song, over and over and over and over and over. Until we actually got passable at the harmony. To this day I can email my old roommate with “Gonna take a lot to drag me awaaaaaay from yooooouuuu!” and expect the next line in an email within 12 hours.

Tracy Chapman - Fast Car

I had to listen to the lyrics pretty carefully to decide if this Tracy was a guy or a gal. And even then I wasn’t entirely sure. But this is another one of those great 80s songs. It perfectly captures the evolution of an unfortunate relationship - we’ve got dreams to get out of our small town. Well, we’re out, but things aren’t quite ducky yet. But we’ve still got hope. Ok, fuck you you mooching lowlife, get the hell out of my house. I’ve got dreams of my own.

I really enjoy it, although I can’t say I liked her other work.

Twisted Sister - I Wanna Rock

Twisted Sister - We’re Not Gonna Take It

“I wanna rock! (ROCK!)” Yep, some of the original guys that your mama and Tipper Gore wished would just go ahead and overdose and die, already. Looking at it now, TS and their campy videos are pure comedy. It’s hard to recall a time when, OMG, these guys are a threat to our children’s hearts and minds with their evil heavy metal filth!!!11!!! Oh noes!!!!!

Much respect to Dee and the guys, though. They kept their heads up and kept their sense of humor and their integrity. By doing it all with a wry self-conscious smile, they kept from taking themselves too seriously…but when questioned by Congress, by God, Dee proved that he could take himself and his art seriously. And surprise a bunch of guys who were surely expecting some drugged-out moron instead of an articulate artist…albeit with a near-fatal attack of the frizzies.

Van Halen - Jump

One of the biggest hits of the 80s, period. And it almost didn’t happen, because David Lee Roth hated the keyboards. Holy shit.

I briefly learned this song on the guitar (well, except the solo…no way am I that good, folks) while a freshman in college. My upstairs neighbor was a completely nutso VH fan, and he brought the keyboard and the sheet music downstairs one afternoon when my roommate and most of the other (actually talented) musicians in the dorm were gone to DC. (We weren’t cool enough to be invited.) We sat our misfit asses in my room and jammed for a few hours.

Later on that evening, I went through my bottle of Mad Dog. And was still so bored that I actually tried to choke down some of my roommate’s beer. And ended up getting invited over by a few of the girls down the hall. Supposedly my roommate returned to find empty alcohol bottles, no TB in site, and immediately went into “OH SHIT” mode. Luckily he found me before calling the sheriff’s office to figure out if I was in the drunk tank.

Van Halen - Panama

Damn skippy, one of the original Songs To Lose Your License To. The bridge is one of the best ever, ain’t it?

Van Halen - Dreams

I know this puts me in the minority, but I liked VH with Sammy Hagar better than with DLR. This song is one of the reasons why. DLR could never seem to look past his own dick when it came to writing lyrics. Sammy was much better at it, and even a better pure vocalist, even if he never had quite the stage presence as a frontman. Plus, Sammy could actually play an instrument.

Van Halen - Why Can’t This Be Love?

I love the synth tone on this song. And the slightly lagging beat is fantastic. One of my favorite VH tunes ever. Although I’ll confess, I don’t know why I ended up removing “Feels So Good” from this disc - that song is absolutely fused in my mind with weekend afternoons in the 80s, when my friend and I would ride our bicycles the two and a half miles to the local country store to play pool in the back room and listen to songs like this on the jukebox.

Katrina & the Waves - Walkin’ On Sunshine

Hey Laura, you asked! Yep, this one has a strong memory attached as well. That whole “every time I go for the mailbox, gotta hold myself down” would have strong memories for you, too, if the love of your life! OMG!! when you were 14 was your summer girlfriend who would write you letters in big loopy writing, spray them with her perfume, and cover them with lipstick kisses.

Whitesnake - Here I Go Again

Excellent use of keyboards to set up a kickass guitar-rock song. No matter how much of an asshole he may or may not be (the guy’s got a rep), David Coverdale can sing his ass off, and he can totally sell a lyric. This is a perfect example of that.

Whitesnake - Fool For Your Lovin’

Even better - Whitesnake with frickin’ Steve Vai cranking out the guitar! Damn, I loved this album. Probably a lot more than I should have. But I’ll always remember a quote from Vai about joining Whitesnake and recording this album. Vai was called in after the band’s guitarist had written all the songs and recorded basic tracks, but then somehow injured his hand doing isometric exercises(?). Vai’s quote: “Hey, these songs have balls! I’m just putting the hair on ‘em!”

Now that’s some classic rock n’ roll, there.

Whodini - The Freaks Come Out At Night

Old school, beeyatch.

I had a tape in 1984 or 1985 called “Street Rap.” This song was on it, as was “Roxanne, Roxanne,” “The Real Roxanne,” “Request Line,” “For the Love of Money,” and a handful of other songs that I remember snippets of but can’t remember the titles (if I turned off the Iron Maiden playing in the background, that might help - but nah). This song is a fantastic snippet of the very early rap scene. The lyrics about the club scene, the vocoder robot-voice, all of it.

Yes - Owner of a Lonely Heart

There’s 10 seconds of absolutely badass distorted guitar on this tune. And then it’s all keyboards and muted guitar. I don’t care, it’s still awesome.

Young MC - Bust A Move

If you don’t know this song, you must have been dead or not yet born in 1989. My best friend (the biggest white-kid rap fan I knew back then, which was saying a lot) had this album, and played it all the time. Not that he needed to. You couldn’t hide from this song back then. Flea’s bass line is ridiculously funky, and props up some fantastically funny-but-cool lyrics.
Can I tell you how pissed off I am that this song is starting to skip on the mp3 disc? Grr.

ZZ Top - Legs

ZZ Top - Gimme All Your Lovin’

ZZ Top - Sharp Dressed Man

What a note to end on - more iconic 80s images from an iconic 80s group. This is the “Eliminator” trilogy, folks. You know what I’m talking about. Good old working class guy is down on his luck and not getting the gal of his dreams, guys in long beards show up and give him the keys to The Eliminator itself, he gets gal of his dreams.

And the music kicks ass, too. Especially “Legs.” I LOVE to play this song on the guitar, because seemingly nobody expects it. Rip out a few beats of the opening chord, pick slide down, and launch right into the riff. It’s awesome.

But everybody could use the keys to the Eliminator at some point. Man, I know I could!

Well, people, that concludes this little musical jaunt through the 80s, guided by yours truly. Hope you enjoyed it.

What, are you kidding? The 80s were the decade when sequels really took off, after all. Oh yes, you know a Revenge of the 80s has to come at some point. I’ll just have to take some time off to regroup, rewrite, and then I’m back, baby. And it’ll probably strike when you least expect it…