San Diego Zoo

San Diego Zoo
The 6ths (YouTube)

Met you on a traffic island
We were there all day
In the middle of the world’s highway
Summer left its light green lipstick on our war faces
Took us to all the pretty places

Highway 405 will take you from the Boom Boom Room
to Interstate 5 which goes right to the San Diego Zoo
San Diego Zoo San Diego Zoo
San Diego Zoo San Diego Zoo
How could I have ever left you?
How could I have ever left you?

Left you in a sidewalk cafe
I’m the restless kind
and I must have been out of my mind
cause I haven’t slept since Wednesday
I’ve been getting thin
I just want to see your silly grin

Highway 405 will take you from the Boom Boom Room
to Interstate 5 which goes right to the San Diego Zoo
San Diego Zoo San Diego Zoo
San Diego Zoo San Diego Zoo
How could I have ever left you?
How could I have ever left you?

They

I’m down to my last 15 hours of free Pandora for the month. Yikes! Guess I’m in their top 10% of listeners after all. If the music industry were smart (now THERE’S a ludicrous thought), they would comp Pandora’s licensing fees. No one markets music better than Pandora!

They (YouTube)
Jem (warning:self-playing music)

Who made up all the rules?
We follow them like fools,
Believe them to be true,
Don’t care to think them through

And I’m sorry, so sorry
I’m sorry it’s like this
I’m sorry, so sorry
I’m sorry we do this
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Dan Zanes

Dan_Zanes-20090718We enjoyed the Dan Zanes and Friends show at the North Carolina Museum of Art this evening. I’d been looking forward to it for so long (four years!) and Dan and the band didn’t disappoint. Their smiles becoming as infectious as the music.

Highlights were a cover of Wabash Cannonball, a whirling dervish end to The Monkey’s Wedding, and guest appearances by Raleigh’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Children’s Choir and the Durham Ukulele Jam Band.

Dan stayed after the show to sign autographs, which is very classy. But then again he’s just a great guy.

It was DZ and Friends’s first visit to the Triangle. We’re already looking forward to the next one!

Zydeco moon

Kelly and I had a chance to go on another date last night, so we went out to see the movie Moon (if you don’t mind spoilers, see the Wikipedia entry.). All the reviews were right: it was a very good movie. Actor Sam Rockwell had a huge burden, as he is the sole actor on screen for almost the entire film. He pulls it off, though.

We left the theater in time to head downtown to hear Zydecopious play at The Big Easy. We stayed out dancing past 1AM. Haven’t done that in a while!

Revolutionary Rocker

dan_zanes2A few weeks ago, Netflix delivered Revolutionary Road to our DVD player. During the middle of this excellent film is a bar scene with a band. As the camera focused on the characters in the foreground, I noticed the guitarist in the background looked oddly familiar.

Then I suddenly knew who it was: musician Dan Zanes, his trademark spiky hair combed into a pompadour for the role. In real life, Zanes has perpetual bed-head at all times, so it was just as amusing to see him spike-less as it was to see him at all.

Raleigh will host the spiky-haired version of Dan Zanes when he plays Saturday at the N.C. Museum of Art in a rare show this far South. It should be a good time.

Don’t piss off a musician

Flying to a gig, the band Sons of Maxwell were shocked to see their guitars being thrown around by United Airlines baggage handlers. When singer Dave Carroll’s guitar came back broken, United was apparently less than helpful in atoning for the mistake. That led the band to take their complaint to YouTube with a video and song called United Breaks Guitars

Catchy song, Sons of Maxwell! Bad, bad, PR move, United!

Update 11 Jul 2009: Taylor Guitars is having some fun with this, too! Also, check out Dave’s latest video statement.

The power of Facebook

A little thing happened with Facebook today that made me appreciate one of the best things about it: the ability of my friends to make new friends through me.

Whenever I want my Facebook friends to know I’m still alive but I don’t have much to say, I’ll sometimes post a song lyric as my status. Here’s one I posted this morning:

Mark Turner is a detective down in Texas.

It’s a song lyric from the Steve Miller Band’s Take the Money and Run. It wasn’t long before my friend Jon Carnes chimed in:
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Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett

Two 70s icons checked out today. Farrah Fawcett, sex symbol and actress, succumbed to cancer this morning at the age of 62. Before anyone could properly mourn her, news came that Michael Jackson had also died – heart attack at the age of 52.

Around 1979, these two among the most famous celebrities ever. Farrah as a pinup and Charlie’s Angels actress, and Michael for his never-ending string of hit singles. When I was ten it seemed that every boy on the block had a Farrah poster and a Michael Jackson album.

It seems that when your childhood icons pass away a little part of you goes with them.

Kodachrome

Kodachrome will be no more. Check out some reminiscences, the Kodachrome Project and Kodak’s Kodachrome Sildeshow.

Kodachrome (YouTube)
Paul Simon

When I think back on all the crap I learned in high school
It’s a wonder I can think at all
And though my lack of education hasn’t hurt me none
I can read the writing on the wall

Kodachrome
You give us those nice bright colors
You give us the greens of summers
Makes you think all the world’s a sunny day, oh yeah!
I got a Nikon camera
I love to take a photograph
So Mama, don’t take my Kodachrome away
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