Sunthing Special

I’m really not a Taylor Swift fan, but I just downloaded the third song from her – “22″. I’m not sure why — I’m WAY past 22 and even when I was 22 I was getting married and not “feeling 22″ like she sings about in her song. Maybe there’s a part of me that sometimes feels like reliving days I never had.

know of the term “torch song” but Bruno Mars “When I Was Your Man” is a really great one. But boy am I glad I don’t relate to any torch songs now.

I was in the Cuyahoga Falls Library music section yesterday. I hadn’t browsed in years, and I thought I might come across an old favorite or discover something new I might want to try. Instead, I saw the music CD Paris Hilton had made in 2006. Blech! How is it that that rates space in the library? And I’m hoping the library got a free copy of it and didn’t have to pay tax dollar money. Though I should be fair, I didn’t listen to it and reviews weren’t totally awful. It even reached no. 1 on the Turkish Music Chart. I tried to see if I could sample a song on iTunes, but searching her name in the iTunes store made the program crash. Twice. Seriously.

I have a good friend who, between her jobs, her husband’s jobs, and all her volunteerism, has enabled her to meet a good number of celebrities (authors, business people, distinguished actors, etc. – not the Lindsay Lohans of the world). And often she has her photo taken with the celebrity. I told her once she should devote a whole wall in her house to these photos because I think they’re pretty cool. In my case, in my previous jobs as a reporter and photographer, I have met some celebrities, but since I was supposed to be objective about the person, it didn’t seem right to ask them to pose with me for a picture. And even before that, I worked backstage at Blossom Music Center and crossed paths with many musicians. In those cases we were told it was against the rules to ask for autographs or anything. But now things are different and I get a kick out of asking to get my photo taken with someone famous/almost famous/may never be famous but I still think they are cool. It helps that now, as a member of 91.3 The Summit, I can go to recording sessions to see up-and-coming musicians perform and say hi afterward. On Thursday it was Matt Hires, who had the iTunes song of the week this week. It’ll be fun to watch his career explode (in a good way!!). 

I like to get some new Christmas tunes every year, and it’s especially fun to find nontraditional songs. I got “Love is Christmas” by Sara Bareilles, “30 Days” by Never Shout Never, “Peppermint Winter” by Owl City, “Christmas for You and Me” by Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors, and “Gettin’ in the Mood (for Christmas)” by the Brian Setzer Orchestra. I also got “Another Rosie Christmas” for $1 at a library book sale which is kind of fun.

A lot of times I don’t know much about the personal lives of the musicians whose songs I buy, which is undoubtedly a good thing. But I know about Chris Brown, and as much as I like his song, “Don’t wake me up”, I haven’t been able to buy it yet because I feel like I would be supporting someone I think does bad things. I’m not crazy about all the people whose music I buy,  but there’s something about Chris Brown that is different.

Madonna is going to perform in Cleveland tomorrow night. I’ve never seen her in concert. I would have in the 80s and early 90s, but now I can’t name one other song since her “Ray of Light” CD except “Music”. Anyhoo, although I do admire Madonna for certain things, the whole way she dresses and acts like she’s still in her 20s I find creepy. I actually don’t think I could even stand to watch her perform a show now, especially after I read about what she does in this one. But it’s the highest-grossing tour in the country this year.

One more quick blog about music: for some reason, maybe it’s the start of spring, but the last couple songs I downloaded have been music more appropriate for a teen than a middle-aged woman (especially one who sings along to them). I can’t even blame it on my kids as I control the radio stations and they get their music from me, not vice versa. Anyhow, I recently got: Cobra Starship “You make me feel”, Rihanna, “We found love”, Karmin “Brokenhearted”, Fun “We are young” and (I can’t even believe this one) Selena Gomez and the Scene “Love you like a love song”. Hey, it’s good to mix it up a bit, right? Actually, to balance it out I got a couple other alternative songs like Wilco’s “You and I” and Lana Del Ray’s “Video Games”. And, um, two songs from the movie “Rio” and one from “The Lorax”. Okay, anyone looking at my music collection would think I’m a multiple personalitied crazy person. Hmmm. I guess they’d be right.