I just wanted to inform you that the next couple weeks are going to be busy for me. My wife is having some surgery this week. I will be home helping her get around and taking care of the kids.
I hope to have all of my weekly features ready to go for the next two weeks. Hopefully, you won’t notice I’m gone. I am going to try to watch comments and interact, but I can’t promise anything.
In the meantime, I ask that you keep Sam in your thoughts as she has her surgery and recovers. Thank you in advance!
I recently finished The Author’s Guide To Murder by Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig, and Karen White. I’ve had luck in the past with books written by more than one author, but this one wasn’t all I had hoped for.
Before I give my brief thoughts, let’s looks at the Goodreads synopsis:
Agatha Christie meets Murder, She Wrote meets #MeToo in this witty locked room mystery and literary satire by New York Times bestselling team of Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig, and Karen White.
There’s been a sensational murder at historic Castle Kinloch, a gothic fantasy of grey granite on a remote island in the Highlands of Scotland. Literary superstar Brett Saffron Presley has been found dead—under bizarre circumstances—in the castle tower’s book-lined study. Years ago, Presley purchased the castle as a showpiece for his brand and to lure paying guests with a taste for writerly glamour. Now it seems, the castle has done him in…or, possibly, one of the castle’s guests has. Detective Chief Inspector Euan McIntosh, a local with no love for this literary American show-off (or Americans in general), finds himself with the unenviable task of extracting statements from three American lady novelists.
The prime suspects are Kat de Noir, a slinky, sexy erotica writer; Cassie Pringle, a Southern mom of six juggling multiple cozy mystery series; and Emma Endicott, a New England blue blood and author of critically acclaimed historical fiction. The women claim to be best friends writing a book a historical novel about the castle’s lurid past and its debauched laird, who himself ended up creatively murdered. But the authors’ stories about how they know Brett Saffron Presley don’t quite line up, and the detective is getting increasingly suspicious.
Why did the authors really come to Castle Kinloch? Is the murder of the long-ago laird somehow connected with the playboy author’s unfortunate demise? And what really happened the night of the great Kinloch ceilidh, when Brett Saffron Presley skipped the folk dancing for a rendezvous with death?
A crafty locked-room mystery, a pointed satire about the literary world, and a tale of unexpected friendship and romance—this novel has it all, as only three bestselling authors can tell it!
The fact that the synopsis refers to this as a “locked-room mystery” is a bit misleading. Perhaps it should have been referred to as a “Stuck on an Island” mystery because the characters are roaming all over the island, rather than being locked in a room.
I’m not sure I agree with the Agatha Christie or Murder, She Wrote nods either. I never felt like this book was close to either one of these.
For what it is worth, I liked the premise and it certainly had potential. I just never felt any excitement or that the story moved at all. There were parts I felt were unnecessary to move the plot along. Many of the situations were forced with awkward predictable dialogue.
Without giving any spoilers, some of the outcomes of the characters just didn’t make any sense to me. One minute they are normal, at the end, not so much. With the exception of one or two, the characters seemed flat or stereotypical. Not to mention the introductions of some of them with the “Oh my goodness, you are _______!” or “You and ________ are related?!”
Don’t get me started on the ending.
This was an example of “Too many cooks spoil the broth.” Each of these authors had written books, apparently some good ones. (I don’t know as I have never read them separately.) Three heads are not better than one for this story ….
I had forgotten all about this picture. I’m not even sure who took it, to be honest. This is me and my lifelong friend, Jeff, in the studio at WMXD in Detroit. The photo had to be taken around 1990.
This studio was tiny. Behind me was a wall that had the station’s CD’s. about 4 feet from where Jeff is sitting was the door to the studio. There wasn’t room for more than three people in there at a time. It got a bit close when the next air personality was getting ready for their show.
I love this picture because, while you can’t see everything, there is so much in this room. Behind me to the left is the reel to reel machine we used to record phone calls. Every once in a while, I would get called in to play voice cuts from jocks who couldn’t be there. They would prerecord the intros on the reel to reel and I would play it back on the air when they were normally supposed to be there live.
To the right of my head in this picture, on the top shelf is a cart machine. It had spots for three carts (one is in the machine in the photo). These carts were tapes that had our commercials on them. They also had the sweepers of our big voice guy saying “This is new music! On 92-3 The Mix!” To the left of the cart machine, you can see about 6 carts stacked up. That was probably the next commercial set.
Below that on the bottom shelf was the CD players. You can see one is playing and Jeff’s head is blocking the other one. In front of me was the control board. Oh, how I miss those slider pots. Each one of those colored sliders went to something – CD #1, CD #2, Cart #1, Turntable #1, Reel to Reel, etc…
Up above the board is a little shelf that held liner cards or station liners that needed to be read throughout the show. It would also hold your “copy” for news or weather. Anytime I wrote out something I wanted to say, it would sit there on that shelf.
To Jeff’s right you can barely make out that turntable. There were two side by side in the studio. When the Electrifying Mojo did his show, he played almost everything off of vinyl. There would be records all over the studio. He’d also have the heat cranked up in there. It was always an oven when I’d have to follow him on the weekend.
This picture brings back some great memories. Jeff used to come up and hang out a lot. We’d stay up all night and he was always trying to crack me up on the air. He did it more times than I could count! Lord knows if it was the other way around, I would have been trying to crack him up, too.
It was on this day in 1816 that Gioachino Rossini’s Barber of Seville premiered in Rome, Italy. It is considered to be one of the greatest masterpieces of comedy within music, and has been described as the opera buffa of all “opere buffe.” (For those wondering what an opera buffa is, it is “a comic opera (usually in Italian), especially one with characters drawn from everyday life.“)
Rossini wrote The Barber of Seville in just 12 days! On top of that, he wasn’t even 24-years-old and had already written 16 operas at the time! Wow! If you think you are unfamiliar with the opera, I assure you, you are wrong. You have heard it in one way or another in pop culture over the years.
The music of Rossini’s The Barber of Seville has been ingrained in popular culture longer than any of us have been alive! From Citizen Kane to Mrs. Doubtfire to Pixar’s Luca, Rossini’s famous comedy has been indelibly woven into film and television history. One of the most recent occurrences can be found in Seinfeld‘s “The Barber” in which the opera’s music replaces the incidental bass lines for the episode. Another was in The Simpsons‘ “The Homer of Seville,” in which the title character discovers his hidden talent for opera singing.
One of the oldest appearances was in the Little Rascals feature, The Our Gang Follies of 1938. In the story, Alfalfa quits singing pop music to become an opera singer. Needless to say, the audience didn’t care too much for his version.
The most memorable to me (and many others) came about in the cartoons. Woody Woodpecker gave it a try …
Tom and Jerry’s hijinks went on throughout their version …
The one that is the best, of course, belongs to Bugs Bunny. The Rabbit of Seville is a classic. Sadly, I could only find it on Youtube in 3 parts….
Who would have thought that a piece of music 2 centuries old would still be making us laugh??
Welcome back to The Music of My Life, where I feature ten songs from each year of my life. In most cases, the ten songs I choose will be ones I like personally (unless I explain otherwise). The songs will be selected from Billboard’s Year-end Hot 100 Chart, Acclaimed Music, and will all be released in the featured year.
We are in the home stretch, as they say. We’re closing in on 2025 and admittedly, the newer music is not as well known to me. Once I was forced into retirement from radio and mobile DJing in 2020, I lost touch with almost all new stuff. I am guessing as we get closer to the end, I may need to double up on years and maybe feature 5 from some of them instead of 10.
I was introduced to Colby Caillat when I worked at the Adult Contemporary station. There was something about her voice that really stood out to me. I Never Told You is a song that I like not because of the lyrical content, but because of her voice.
As I heard this the first time, there was just something that sounded “real.” It was like there was real hurt and real struggle to it. It was only later that I found out why. She told songfacts.com in an interview that it was “the most difficult song she ever wrote. “‘I Never Told You’ was a long work in progress, said the Malibu-based singer-songwriter. “I started it by myself when I was on tour in Germany. Then two years later I played it forJason Reeves and Kara DioGuardi when we were writing together in Hawaii for my album ‘Breakthrough’, and they helped me finish writing it that week. It’s now one of my favorite songs!”
I Never Told You
They say you are your own worst critic. When I listen back to my old radio shows, I think of how things could have been edited or worked with a better punch line. I’m fine when it is me telling myself what to do. Sometimes, however, there are people who think they know it all. They offer you this “sage” advice that isn’t worth squat.
That kind of situation led to my next song. I love the angst that you hear in the lyrics and voice of Sara Bareilles on King of Anything. She told Billboard magazine:
“It was the last song I wrote before we went into the studio, and I was at the point where I started sharing the music with my inner circle and started getting feedback. I remember having a very vivid realization of, ‘Oh, I forgot that this was a part of it. Everybody gets to tell you what they think about what you do.’ I could tell I was getting defensive. That song was a little bit of a pep-talk song-and that’s exactly what ‘Love Song’ was.”
She went on to tell PopEater:
“I’ve had more unsolicited advice on my life than I care to mention, and this was how I dealt with it. It felt empowering to turn that frustration into music, especially a song that doesn’t even sound angry. Apparently, I don’t get over things very quickly.”
She says that it is sort of an “F You” song. What do you think?
King of Anything
Adam Levine said that “‘Misery’ is about the desperation of wanting someone really badly in your life but having it be very difficult. Kind of what all the songs I write are about. I’m not treading on new ground, but I think a lot of people – including myself – deal with that all the time. Relationships are difficult, and it’s good therapy to write about them.”
I had never seen the video before choosing this one for my list. It’s loaded with some steamy scenes. Levine told MTV News about the Joseph Kahn-directed video.
“The cool thing is, when Joseph wrote the treatment after reading a few sentences, I thought it was really amazing,” he said. “Because it kind of turns the whole idea of the sexual energy between two people – a guy and a girl, a music video, you’ve seen that a million times – that exists in this video, but it’s turning it on its ass and having the girl be the more domineering one who’s trying to kill me.”
The song was one that really just stood out when it played on the radio.
Misery
I was still working at the Adult Contemporary station when I was going through my divorce. After it was finalized and Sam and I started to feel like there was something between us, I heard this song. The lyrics really struck a chord. I really did feel like a teenager again.
Katy Perry says that, “‘Teenage Dream’ is a euphoric feeling. It gives off this feeling that a lot of people have been through. I remember my teenage years, and I remember falling in love for the first time and how impressionable that was. How sensitive I was to every feeling. Heartbreak was really hard. Of course heartbreak is really hard now, and love is still intense, but it’s a different type of feeling, that teenage love. I want people to have that feeling again of falling in love unabashedly – those teenage dreams.”
This new love was unexpected, but made me feel giddy inside. It still feels that way.
Teenage Dream
In this world, we tend to beat ourselves up. We pick on ourselves. When we feel like doing that, we ought to remember what Mr. Rogers taught us. He would say, “I like you just the way you are. You’ve made this day a special day by just your being you.” That’s great advice for children and adults. That’s also why I picked the next song.
Bruno Mars conveys that Mr. Rogers message to his lady – “You’re amazing just the way you are!”
Bruno said, “I’m a big fan of simple songs. When we wrote Just The Way You Are, I wasn’t thinking of anything deep or poetic. I was telling a story. Get ready to fall in love!”
Sometimes the simple messages hit just right. The song went to #1 for Bruno.
Just The Way You Are
The Bruno Mars song was written with Cee Lo Green in mind. Cee Lo didn’t feel it was right for him, but he did feel like Forget You was.
Before I go on, I should state that Forget You is like the “Edited for Television” movies. If you replace “forget” with another F word, you’ll see what I mean. When I first hear this, I had no idea that is what the song was really called. The music service I used when DJing sent over the “radio edit” which had edited out the “s*#t” from “ain’t that some s*#t.” In the unedited version, Cee-Lo drops 16 f-bombs in just 3 1/2 minutes.
The song features Cee Lo’s Elektra labelmate Bruno Mars. It originated during a session in L.A. with Mars and Phil Lawrence.. The pair played to Cee-Lo a rough demo of a song they weren’t sure was worth completing. “When Bruno first sung ‘F—- You’ to me, they were still a bit indecisive on whether or not it could work at all,” Green told Entertainment Weekly. “I was like, ‘I like it. Let’s record it.'” The trio then completed the song with Cee Lo contributing many of the verse lyrics.
I loved the feel of this song and I was hooked from the line, “I guess he’s an X-Box and I’m more Atari!”
Forget You
A lot of folks dissed Michael Buble’ when he first came out. He was doing covers of old standards from crooners from the 40’s and 50’s. I guess they figured, anyone could do that, but Buble’ wrote some great original stuff. When his original stuff gained popularity, those folks shut up.
He has proven his talent and his fans love him. I love the arrangements he has come up with for his covers and his original stuff stands out, too. The guy is more than just covers and Christmas music.
Hollywood is not only a great song, but a great video. Michael likes to have fun and it shows here. His personality really shows through here I think. The video parodies several celebrities, including Canadian teen idol Justin Bieber. Speaking of the clip, Bublé told The Sun: “The video is about celebrity culture, people’s dreams about fame and what can go with it. You can see what fun I had playing the characters.”
Again, the song was different, fun and stuck out when it played on the radio, which is why I love it.
Hollywood
Christina Perri’s voice is very unique. It is almost as though it changes with each of her songs. For Jar of Hearts, I almost felt that it was deeper and darker than her other songs, if that even makes sense. I truly am mesmerized by her voice.
I have been accused by certain people from my past as being a “heart collector,” but that is really just nonsense. I was never a stud in school or afterward, and to say I was a Cassanova or Rudolph Valentino is simply hilarious. Anyway, in the song, Christina Perri looks to distance herself from a guy who is worse than a heartbreaker – he’s a heart collector, keeping them in a (metaphorical) jar and tearing love apart.
She wrote the lyric about a serial heart collector she once dated. On her blog, she told the story behind the tune: “I wrote the song after I went home to Philadelphia for the holiday last December [2009]. I sat in my childhood bedroom and hid from the boy (with the jar of hearts) who wanted to see me. My heart wanted to see him, my head knew better.”
I am aware that men are the more common keepers of “jars of hearts,” but I know at least two females from my past who were the same way.
Jar of Hearts
Train was really one of those groups I liked. I played a lot of their stuff on the radio and at parties and dances. This one, I found out, didn’t start out as Marry Me. From songfacts:
Pat Monahan got together with the producers David Katz and Sam Hollander to write the title track of the album, but their sessions also sparked “Marry Me,” which started off as a song called “Stay On Me.”
“It was absolutely beautiful and had the same longing melodies,” Hollander said in a songfacts interview, “but it just didn’t raise its hand. Then Pat went back in and flipped it to ‘Marry Me,’ and the emotion went a step further.
When Jonathan Daniel, Pat’s manager, played it for me, I had chills. I could not believe what Pat did with it. Sometimes you get those surprises. Sometimes a song never lives up to the demo in the room, but that one far surpassed it. He deserves the credit. That’s his heart – he’s a big-hearted guy with a really deft lyrical touch.”
I love hearing the origin stories for songs. I love the idea for the video, too. The video, directed by Lex Halaby, opens with a montage of real married couples telling the stories of how they met. When the song starts, it turns into a storyline where Monahan falls for a waitress, played by Anna Camp of True Blood and The Good Wife.
Marry Me
My final song is one that just “sounds happy.” What makes this unique is that instead of Tom Higgenson singing lead, guitar played Tim Lopez does the honors. Tim actually wrote the song. He told songfacts:
“It was written for this girl that I was dating while we were making our last album out in Malibu. We have a lot of history; I’ve known her since I was 11 or 12. I wasn’t really emotionally available to her at the time. I hadn’t completely gotten over my divorce, so when the band left on tour, I decided it wasn’t right to try to keep the relationship going so we called it quits. It was only over the last year or so that I’ve realized what I walked away from. The song was an attempt to rekindle things and win her back. She’s currently dating someone else, and I’m happy for her. But in case it doesn’t work out… who knows?”
The song barely cracked the top 40 (peaking at #38), but it is a song that sounds so good to me.
Rhythm of Love
With that, we wrap up 2010. Did I miss one of your favorites? Tell me in the comments.
Next week, we venture into 2011. Looking at the list, there is at least two ear worms; there are plenty of songs that I always played for one particular high school at their dances; and a song that I thought should have been a hit for a group who was big in the 80’s. I hope to see you next week.
Today We wish Juice Newton a Happy 73rd Birthday. She is one of those artists/songwriters who was very big in the 80’s and sort of disappeared. The truth is, she’s always been around, we just don’t hear her stuff thanks to a variety of things. One of those things is the mindset of corporate radio.
I have featured uptempo stuff from Juice before, but I wanted to feature her voice today. Her ballads really showcase her singing voice and one of my favorites is The Sweetest Thing. This song was written for Juice Newton by her music partner Otha Young (Robert O. Young) for her 1975 debut album Juice Newton and Silver Spur. She re-recorded it in 1981 for her groundbreaking album Juice.
Country singer Jamie O’Neal covered the song for her album of cover songs. She told songfacts.com:
“I think there’s songs, like ‘The Sweetest Thing,’ that’ll live on forever, and when you hear it, it takes you right back to where you were when that was a big hit for Juice Newton … I think that song stands the test of time and that’s what makes it a classic to me is the fact that everybody knows it. Not just in one little area of music, but across the board, everybody knows that song.”
The song was a Top 10 hit on three different Billboard charts: #1 on Adult Contemporary, #1 on Country and #7 on the Hot 100.
So this morning I was picking up groceries. My wife texted and said, “Can you stop at Bigby and get me a bagel sandwich?” I’d never had one of theirs, so I got one, too
When they handed them to me, they were each in a bag with ONE napkin. This has been something I’ve noticed over the last couple months. Why are places skimping on napkins?!
I’m not saying I’m a messy eater, but let’s face it some of these places make messy burgers. You need way more than one napkin to eat it!
I remember back in the day, you’d get a handful of them. I’d use them when I spilled something or when I had to blow my nose. Those extras came in handy.
God forbid you ask for extra napkins. The looks you get are nasty. It wouldn’t surprise me if they started to charge for extra napkins!
Is there a napkin shortage we are unaware of? Can anyone explain this?
It was on this day in 1995 that the Brady Bunch Movie was released to theaters. Rather than rehash the show in its own time period, producers placed the family in the 90’s…..and rehashes the show there.
Fans of the Brady Bunch TV show either loved or hated the film. I was actually impressed with how well the actors played the original characters.
It was also nice to see some familiar faces in cameo roles. Among those cameos were Davy Jones, Mickey Dolenz and Peter Tork of the Monkees. Some of the original cast appeared, too. Florence Henderson, Ann B. Davis, Barry Williams and Christopher Knight all appear in other roles. Drag Queen, RuPaul, has a cameo as a teacher/counselor named Mrs. Cummings.
I admit I almost picked Sunshine Day from the soundtrack. It’s the same song the original Brady kids did on the show. As I started to listen to it, I thought I’d spare you having to hear that one. Too cheesy. Instead, how about we feature RuPaul’s You Better Work? At least that one won’t be stuck in your head for 10 days after one listen…
FYI – the spoken lines at the beginning are said by Lawanda Page – Aunt Esther on Sanford and Son!
Back in August, I finally figured out a way to grab music from my broken iPod. When I finally transferred the music folders to my hard drive, the real work began.
I had about 50 folders of music, each containing about 100 or so songs. The problem is that not all of the songs were in a format I could play anywhere but the iPod. So I had to find a program where I could convert the songs in the Apple format to MP3. That wasn’t the issue. Actually, there were a couple issues.
First, there was no way to convert multiple tracks at one time. Each song had to be converted one at a time. The other issue was that when you put a song on your iPod, it changed the name. Example: She Loves You by The Beatles becomes ZQTD in the folder. When played in the car, the Title is correct, the artist is correct and the four letter new name is nowhere to be found.
Every song that I convert or transfer has to be renamed it’s original name. So ZQTD now needs to be renamed and saved as She Loves You. To say that the whole process is tedious is an understatement. We’re almost through February and I have just two folders left. The end is in sight.
Once I get all the songs converted, I have to go through the ones that transferred over that I cannot convert. These are mostly songs I purchased from iTunes. I think the count was 273 songs that I cannot convert. That list is one I will go through next. Some of the songs I have other places, and I can replace them quickly. The other’s I will have to look at the used CD place, or go through my CDs to see if I have them.
The reason it is taking so long is that I am doing this while on lunch at work. I can’t really find time anywhere else during the day. As I go song by song, I am finding songs that I can sort to other folders: Christmas, Christian, Classical and Songs I am not sure I still want. I can put all the Christmas, Christian, and Classical on separate thumb drives. The other folder, I will go through again for a final sort.
My wife suggested this book to me. She is really into Freida McFadden. She told me that she thought I would like it because it was “my sense of humor.”
It is a novella, so it is a quick read. My wife was right. It was a silly book with great satirical humor. There were many times that I laughed out loud.
The book is sort of a “throwaway” book in that it isn’t all that serious. You get that right from the beginning of the book. The humor, the ridiculous lines, the jabs at the author herself, etc… all made for a nice break away from the heavy novels I have been reading.
There is really no thinking necessary as you read this one. I looked at as a way to clean the palate for the next big book. So here is the Goodreads synopsis:
My husband is dead.
I attended his funeral. I watched his casket be lowered six feet into the ground. (Actually, it may have been only five feet, but that still seems like more than enough.) And then we ate an array of finger sandwiches and deviled eggs and miniature beef wellingtons that cost more than my first car.
My point is, Grant is gone. And so are all his many, many deep, dark secrets which I never really ever bothered to ask him about. He is never coming back.
So why do I still see his face everywhere I go?
The Widow’s Husband’s Secret Lie is an utterly addictive, unputdownable, nail-biting, absolutely gripping psychological thriller novella with a shocking, breathtaking, heart stopping, spine-chilling twist that you won’t see coming, will leave you stunned, and will literally have you picking your jaw up off the floor and bringing it to the nearest hospital for major facial reconstructive surgery.
The only issue I had with this book was that I wanted it to be longer. I can see myself enjoying a much longer book with the tongue and cheek stuff that was going on. Really, the way it ended, maybe there will be a sequel? Who knows? I really loved it.
Various Ramblings of a Nostalgic Italian 