11/26/06

I sat with my three year old in our swingset tower this weekend and watched the autumn sun set behind the trees and houses. Then we went down the slide together and played until the moon came out.

Happy Thanksgiving.

The Jimmyhead Top 10 Most Played Tracks

Ah yes. It's getting to be that time of the year again. Publications worldwide are making lists, ranking music, movies, books, performances and checking them twice. So I thought I'd contribute the top ten most played tracks on the ol' Jimmypod, now nearly a year old. Mind you, not a single one of these tracks was released this year, but that didn't stop me from enjoying them repeatedly since last January. I believe the Ipod has to play the entire track from start to finish (a partial play does not count) to get counted as a play. This may account for what seem to be a low number of plays for my favorites, because it seems like I probably listened to them more than is indicated.

1. I Second That Emotion (Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, 16 plays)
2. The Tracks of My Tears (Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, 15 Plays)

Wow, Smokey dominating the Jimmyhead top 5 with two of his biggest hits. Bob Dylan once referred to Robinson as "America's greatest living poet."

Take a good look at my face
You'll see my smile looks out of place
If you look closer it's easy to trace
The tracks of my tears.

Love that. These songs probably reached their lofty position on the list because I enjoy them so much that I often play them twice in a row. Also, earlier this year I was learning how to play the guitar chords for "I Second That Emotion" which I'm sure bolstered the play count.

3.Who Did You Think I Was? (John Mayer Trio, 14 plays)
Not a normal suburban child, the Fairfield County Kid channels Stevie Ray Vaughn on guitar, but his lyrics evoke the sharp wit of Paul Simon. On this track (which by the way comes closest in the list to having been released this year), he shreds what's left of his teen pop prodigy image, revealing a closeted blues freak.

4. Karma (Alicia Keys, 13 Plays)
This version, from the "Unplugged" album is white hot. Played short as part of a two song medley with "Heartburn"(which I would think gets played just as much, but must be excluded from this list due to some applause and banter at the end of the track that I skip over), this track shows off a well honed band with Alicia front and center. I once read that she initially had trouble communicating with her backing musicians. Problem solved.

5. (Don't Go Back To) Rockville (R.E.M. 13 plays)
This is my favorite R.E.M. song. Great lyrics about how depressing it is to live "Where nobody says hello, they don't talk to anybody they don't know." I consider learning the guitar part this year to be one of the major musical achievements of my long, slow, undisciplined journey to guitar mediocrity. Favorite lyrics:

At night I drink myself to sleep
And pretend I don't care that you're not here with me
Cause it's so much easier to handle
All my problems if I'm too far out to see
Something better happen soon
Or it's gonna be to late to bring me back

I love when Michael Stipe sings about getting shitfaced.

6. Baby Love (The Supremes, 13 plays)
Motown at it's finest. Diana Ross' voice is so sweet it sounds fake. I've actually played this one out a little bit.

7. Walk On (Live) (U2, 13 plays)
This song came out before 9/11, but when they performed it for the post 9/11 "A Tribute to Heroes" telethon it seemed made for the moment. Bono seems to be getting choked up during some of the verses, and the line "Stay safe tonight" always gives me a chill.

8. When I Paint My Masterpiece (Live) (The Band, 12 plays)
This is from the "Bob Dylan 30th Anniversary Tribute Concert" and features The Band with their 90's, post Robbie Robertson lineup, and Levon Helm in full voice before his health problems set in. Just a great acoustic performance of a great Dylan song with Helm on Mandolin and Rick Denko singing his signature harmonies. This whole album is a perfect example of how a great cover of a Dylan song can transcend the original.

9. Least Complicated (Live) (Indigo Girls, 12 Plays) Yet another live track. This from the Indigo's album "1200 Curfews". To start, one of the girls (I think it's the blonde one) tells this great story about buying a ring for her cute little fifth grade boyfriend and discovering that "it wasn't the cool thing to do", which the lesbians in the audience (and me) just love. This song is sort of about that story and the performance is incredibly powerful. A recent episode of "The Office" featured two guys drunkenly bonding while singing another Indigos song, "Closer To Fine". This scene made me feel like it was okay to be a heterosexual man and love the Indigos. They rocked when I saw them at the Lillith Fair.

10. I Want You Back (The Jackson 5, 12 plays)
If you want to understand what's wrong with Michael Jackson, listen to his vocal on this track. A normal 11 year old should not be able to summon the emotions required to get a performance like this on tape. Michael sings far beyond his years. Even at 11 there is clearly nothing normal about him.

Film Making and Finger Paintings

Recently, my wife and I saw "Thank You For Smoking", a disappointing comedy about a the Public Relations guy for tobacco companies. Directed by Jason Reitman, it had a great cast, but fell short as a cohesive film.

Last weekend, we saw Sofia Coppola's "Marie Antoinette"
an even more disappointing period piece starring Kirsten Dunst in the title role. It had a decent cast, beautiful art direction, but fell short as a cohesive film.

Both of these films were directed by the children of hugely successful Hollywood writer/producer/directors. Men who must have also found the films disappointing, but couldn't say so because it's a parent's job to encourage the creative ventures of his children.

I can relate. As a father of young children, I've often had to look at an indecipherable brown and black finger painting blob caked thickly onto a large thin sheet of newsprint and exclaim, "Oh sweetheart! This is beautiful!". So I can imagine Ivan Reitman feigning delight as the lights came up in his private screening, "Great job, Jay Jay! Love the talk show scene." while he must have been thinking, "I was about your age when I produced 'Animal House', punk". And Francis Ford in the screening room of the Coppola compound, wiping bread crumbs from his beard and exclaiming, "Sofia, what a beautiful film", but thinking "By the time I was 35, I had finished both 'Godfather' movies, little miss."

Of course, I'm sure both fathers are very supportive (Francis is an Executive Producer on "Marie Antoinette"). Even a black brown blob finger painting carries some level of achievement for a parent to find pride in, "Wow, you covered the whole page sweetie!" But in their deepest and most selfish of places, they must also find some comfort in the fact that their kids have not yet eclipsed their own achievements. No need to worry thus far, fellas.

Deli Math

I've recently taken to trying to order one third of a pound of certain cold cuts at the supermarket deli. A quarter often isn't enough and a half is too much. A third seems to fit our family's consumption quite well. But ordering a third of a pound certainly seems to throw a wrench in the works behind the deli counter. The people in deli management seem to have taught their hires only how to work in quarters, halves and wholes. Occasionally I get an enterprising person who knows that a third translates to roughly 0.33 pounds on the digital scale, but most of the time my request creates a small crisis as the poor clerk is forced to ask a co-worker how much a third is. It often takes two or three of the deli folks to figure it out if I don't intervene myself.

Waiting on line for cold cuts is boring. If there's any fun to be had it's in watching whatever small drama unfolds behind that counter while waiting for your number to be called. The search for a missing hunk of cheese, or the unpackaging of a new roast beef is always somewhat entertaining. So anyone who's paying attention to the deli stage would note the short math crisis behind the slicers. The clerk's poor math skills are suddenly on display for numbers 63 through 70 and for any nosey folks browsing the gourmet cheeses and olives.

So I get a pang of guilt every time my order causes such an exposure. But should I have to waste three slices of low sodium turkey breast (or worse, to come up short) to make the deli workers look smarter? I think not. I call on management to eliminate this painful interaction by better educating our deli workers in fraction to decimal conversion. I'm tempted to start ordering more complicated fractions, like a 2/3 or even 5/8 as a form of non violent protest, but that would truly be cruel, unusual, and sure to extend my time in line. Not to mention that my brilliant protest (which would surely make Ghandi and Dr. King proud) would most likely go unnoticed by the deli manager. Better to amuse myself by silently wondering what head cheese really is.