I'm Sidetracked

Hey I'm back but I'm totally pressed for time since I got back but I'll be back on Wednesday night and I'll have new shiot up.

Remembering The Old College Days

Some things as of late have reminded me of my college days at Illinois State University, where I went from August of 2000 until May of 2004. My time there started great and ended horribly; don't ask for the details, but some bad things happened that ruined the experience. But, while there were things that I would do differently with hindsight, I still had many great experiences there, and being there and meeting so many awesome people helped me become the person I am now (for better or for worse!)

One great thing is that I found out about a lot of different music while I was at ISU. For example, it's where I discovered how awesome dance music can be. I'll put up one song that I marked out (and still mark out) for. While living or visiting people in the dorm rooms, I was able to hear tunes that were both good and bad. Eminem's latest album at the time (back before he turned horrible with the last album he put out) was cool to listen to, but having to hear Limp Bizkit's then current album… oh that was a painful experience!

At least my tastes were always different, but in a good way. I mean, except for hearing a random dude in a dorm room hall play some tunes one night before I went out for a party (I was a big part of the party scene, believe it or not), not too many seemed to be fans of Elvis. But, I was excited to hear the remix of the song A Little Less Conversation, as I thought it kicked ass. In fact, I bought the CD single of the song, and I'm putting up the 12 inch single version (or, as it's known, "The extended mix" rather than the radio version that you may or may not have heard. I don't know why the song tanked on American radio stations; I guess it was more important to play the same old one hit wonder rap or R&B tune at the time… at least it was successful in many different countries around the world, and the extended version of the song even had a music video.

I only found out this just now, but the guy who did the remix, JXL, is more commonly known as Junkie XL. Ahh, what a name!

Oh, and I was also reminded of this song when I was in a KFC/Taco Bell earlier in the month. I ate in the restaurant right before a wrestling show and they played the extended version of the song, much to my surprise.

Elvis vs. JXL-A Little Less Conversation (12 Inch Extended Mix) (8.49 MB, 192Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/2863250bfa0483/

I'll be back Monday night with a very brief update where I post some YouTube links; hey, I'll be gone from Friday to Sunday evening in South Florida, so cut me some slack here.

All My Work Is Never Over

After attending Mako's in Orlando on Friday night (it's a nightclub that I've described many times before as "a nightclub… on crystal meth; I say that as it's an assault on the senses, with the bartenders and the other female employees there laying down often… for bodyshots… CO2 being shot off at random times, paper being flung about, lights, noise… it's awesome. The best part, though, is the giant swing they have in the front; for 20 bucks you can ride it and a girl or two pretty much humps you the entire time! No I haven't ridden the swing… yet) I was inspired to do this entry. You see, they played quite the mix of music there, from Straight Outta Compton to rock tunes to a lot of other stuff, including playing part of Daft Punk's "Harder Better Faster Stronger" from their 2001 "Discovery" album (which I burned from a friend... er, I mean...), then playing a song I first heard earlier in the summer, which was Kanye West sampling (!) the song for the first single off of his new album. I don't know about you, but his "Stronger" sucks balls compared to "Harder Better Faster Stronger"! Not even the video is any good, despite Daft Punk's cameo in it.

Kanye West is someone who I haven't liked for a long time now. I first heard of him shortly before "Through The Wire" came out. I liked that tune but since then everything else I've heard from him, whether it's in public or through his music, has just been shitty. The page that I linked under his name does a great job of giving some brief examples of why he's a stupid ignorant asshole, which only adds to the fact that every other song I've heard from him after Wire has just been bad and not entertaining to me, a guy who tends to like more than his fair share of "popular" hip-hop.

Anyway, I figured the original song was worth an upload as with Stronger, a lot more people will be familiar with that wildly inferior tune rather than the great original song that Kanye used. Plus, will Kanye's song result in some random a capella group covering it to great effect? I think not!

Daft Punk-Harder Better Faster Stronger (192Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/28318484a31edd/

Here is another song from the Discovery album, but this time it wasn't released as a single. I mainly chose it as it sounds SO 80's that you feel you're on an episode of Miami Vice (either that or playing Vice City). Speaking of 80's, the title of the song has nothing to do with the movie of the same name. Still, I like more input, and as you can never forget, Los Locos will kick your balls into outer space.

Daft Punk-Short Circuit (192Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/2831957f1efa4e/

I'll be back by Thursday night with another dance tune.

Yet Another Rolling Stones Weekend

Remember how earlier in the year I uploaded quite a few songs from The Rolling Stones? I figured this weekend would be good for a one-shot where in this entry I post three new tunes on here, two of which are bootlegs. Hey, you can find a good or great song just about anywhere, a

The first one is "Claudine", one of the two unreleased songs, although it's rather easy to find online due to bootlegs. It concerns Claudine Longet, the ex-wife of Andy Williams who was convicted of killing her boyfriend… but was VERY fortunate to receive such a ridiculously light sentence (30 days!) as despite her claims, it was *not* an accident and she was helped more by an inept police investigation than anything else. As you can see, even back then it helps to be a celebrity when you're on trial… anyway, the Stones were going to put it on their Emotional Rescue album (which may have helped make that album not so disappointing) but then changed their minds as they did not want to get sued and deal with that hassle. It's a shame, as it has a catchy rockabilly rhythm to it and it's a pretty nasty take on the case, sort of an inverted version of Bob Dylan's "Hurricane". Once you hear about the case, though, what the song says is well-deserved.

Rolling Stones-Claudine (4.82MB, 192Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/2790204061e9c7/

The second song is "Highway Child", a song that doesn't have any sort of history behind it like Claudine does. It was just a jam done in the summer of 1968, but Goddamn does it ever rock. It's a fast-paced ditty where they just smoke through it and rock out with their cock out, to use as many clichés as I can. Yes, at one point it DOES resemble "Hold On Loosely"! It can be chalked up just as being a coincidence, though; at least that's what I am guessing.

Rolling Stones-Highway Child (7.21 MB, 192Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/2790128fdd0c28/

The last song is one that you can find on the Goat's Head Soup album from 1973. I'm sure that many people are familiar with two tracks on there, which are "Angie" and "Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker)", but I've heard some other good tracks on there, like "Silver Train" and the one I'm putting up, "Star Star".

By checking out this link you can see why it's one of the most notorious songs from the Stones and why it's something you never hear on the radio. The main reason why I'm putting this up, though, is that the song just f'ing rocks, man!

To alleviate possible concerns, the last line that you hear Mick singing in the song is "C'mon, little girl", NOT "C'mon, ni…", well, I don't want to say what I thought I heard, except that I had to rewind and go back and make sure that Mick didn't utter a racial slur! I know, what a thing to hear, but if you thought you heard it too, trust me it's not true.

Rolling Stones-Star Star (6.07 MB, 192Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/2790165282b4d7/

I'll be back on Tuesday afternoon with a dance track and a tale of my Friday night at a dance club.

When You're Feeling Lazy Today...

Unfortunately a feeling of malaise coupled with a lack of time has resulted in me being lazy and just offering you up a link I found yesterday in which you can download various dance songs. It is from Kiss Atlanta's website right here.

I especially recommend checking out this link from the blog, where offers up some remix of songs from The Killers. The song in particular that I want to point out is the remix of Mr. Brightside done by Stuart Price under one of his many aliases, this one being the Thin White Duke. It's some good shit, I tell you.

On Saturday I will have my next uploads; it will be more than one song so it will be worth the wait.

No I Do Not Know Why There's A Dog Barking In The Song!

I was at a pair of wrestling shows during the weekend; it was a tournament for a wrestler who passed away from cancer a few years ago when he was only 22 years old. It was a fun time overall. As has been an unofficial tradition, funny 80's songs are used by several wrestlers for entrance music. 2005 was Here I Go Again and Don't You Forget About Me. 2006 was Living On A Prayer. 2007 may have topped it, though. You had Goody Two Shoes one night, and then the next was Weird Science and then the topper, which was a song that even shocked me, the 80's music fan. Yes, a tag team actually used... Caribbean Queen! Yes, a song by Billy F'ing Ocean! "Wow" is the best I can come up with. It will be tough to top that.

As for the worst song of 2007 contest, I'm still sticking with Glamorous for now, but there is really tough competition from Beautiful Girls, Lip Gloss, and A Bay Bay. Jesus are those songs terrible; in fact, at the end of the year I may decide that one of those tunes will be my worst of 2007; I have the right to change my mind! I just pray that something even worse than that isn't released in this second half of the year.

Anyway, onto today's upload. There's not a lot that I can say about the tune I'm putting up, except that it's a song you'll recognize and probably love again right away once you know it's the theme song from the first National Lampoon's Vacations movies. Yes, it's the song by Fleetwood Mac member Lindsey Buckingham known as Holiday Road. C'mon, you know you love the song! Don't ask me why you hear an electronic dog barking in tune with the song; I'll never figure it out, although Fleetwood Mac still has the legendary reputation for snorting up cocaine like anteaters.

Lindsey Buckingham-Holiday Road (2.02 MB, 128Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/2716439934b203/

I'll be back Wednesday afternoon, I promise.

Commercial Endeavors

Here is yet another song that I heard on the Orlando radio station Real Radio 104.1, in the rare times they actually play music. Of course they never identify which songs they play on their station, whether it'd be on the air or even on their website, so if you hear a tune you like but don't know what it is then you have to do a Google search of it to find out what it is.

That's what I did recently when I heard an amazingly catchy little ditty one night. I thought it sounded familiar, and I found out why it was. The song was "Go!", by Tones on Tail. No I'm not familiar with that band or it's predecessor, Bauhaus, as I'm not an f'ing hipster. Still, this is a song worth getting, as it's as catchy as I said it was, and it was in more than one commercial back in the day. I remember Starburst and Dockers in particular. Plus, it has an electronic cowbell in it, and we all like cowbell, right? Actually, the sketch that introduced the cowbell love into popular culture is f'ing terrible and totally pointless... then again, that's what SNL has been for the past, oh what, 15 years now?

Tones on Tail-Go! (192Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/26791562e530c0/

I'll be back on Monday with a new upload. I'm not quite sure which song in particular it will be yet, but it's possible it will be an opening credits song from a pair of well-known 80's movies.

Speaking of 80's movies, I wish that I could find an MP3 of the theme song to Friday the 13th Part 3, or hell, even get to see that movie in its original 3D form; the former is much more likely than the latter. C'mon, don't tell me you think the disco theme song is bad now! Anyway, have a nice Friday the 13th.

Songs To Play To P*** Off Your Neighbors

I'm referring to the story I've heard in many different places (it almost seems like an urban legend) where someone would crank up AC/DC as loud as they could in order to upset their neighbors, especially if it was an apartment. The song I remember being connected to the story was "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap" (or if you're a lot of people, "Thirty Thieves And The Thunder Chief").

I bring that up as today I'm posting an AC/DC tune, but it's not one you hear on the radio, so you may be unfamiliar with it. It was very early on in their career, and wasn't even released in the U.S. until the 80's on the album Jailbreak '74. That album is short, but I've heard Jailbreak and the song I'm posting today, Baby Please Don't Go, and I like 'em both.

Baby Please Don't Go was originally a blues song written and first performed by Big Joe Williams, a guy I don't know a whole lot about, but the song was well-known to many, as it's been covered countless numbers of time, including here by AC/DC, who give it a great rock workout. If you want to f'ing rock, man, download this. It's not your typical sounding AC/DC song, IMO, but hey, it's pretty Goddamn good and very catchy, by my estimation. Plus, in one performance on TV, Bon Scott wore an outfit you'd have to see for yourself.

AC/DC-Baby Please Don't Go (4.43 MB, 128Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/2641417b1f9612/

I'll be back on Friday afternoon. It will be a song from the 80's that you'll probably recognize from its usage in some commercials a few years ago.

To Jump On The Bandwagon...

I apologize for taking a break for 5 days there, but I had many things on my agenda that made it necessary to not do this for a few days. For starters, I purchased a brand new car; lord is that ever an arduous process, all that paperwork and all that. But, onto the music. I actually have a story to tell from last night that goes along perfectly with this.

Yesterday my parents had over some guests that they knew back from they lived in Illinois. They were on vacation. I happened to be around. In a totally random discussion, the mom of one of the two kids there asked the 4 year old boy what his favorite song was. She said that it was Ms. New Booty. Yes, seriously. The kid said, "Oh no that's not it", to paraphrase. Instead, he sang the chorus to Girlfriend. A minute later it was stated that it was on Kidz Bop 12. In case you don't know, it's part of a series where kids sing cover versions of popular songs. Pretty much, it's not exactly my type of music genre; I mainly laugh at some of the songs they pick to put on there, like "Glamorous", also from 12, or their Halloween album having "Werewolves of London" on it, 9 having "Feel Good Inc.", 7 having "Float On"*, and so on and so forth. But, that's not really the point of this entry.

* Yes, a Modest Mouse song. Personally, I downloaded that version and thought it was better than the original, as the kids sounded a lot better than Isaac Brock, but I'm sure I'm in the minority on that opinion. I'm sure I'd also prefer the kids singing "Girlfriend", due to my opinion that Avril is tone-deaf.

Rather, it's to mention a story I heard on a forum a few days ago, which was that a band you, before a few days ago, probably never heard of, The Rubinoos, who I only knew of in the past for recording the theme song for "Revenge of The Nerds" (they sounded a *lot* different here than what I'm posting today), is suing Avril Lavigne. You see, this story, which is getting a lot of net publicity so you've probably already heard it already, but in case you haven't, is that the song Girlfriend's chorus rips off the chorus for their song "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend." Yeah, it's similar, for sure (although that's the only common thing those two tunes have in common) but as others have astutely noted, The Rolling Stones should sue both bands for ripping off "Get Off My Cloud." (No, the Stones haven't actually said they will sue both bands or the winner of the lawsuit between the two) Also, Toni Basil may want to see Avril too, for reasons that are so obvious they won't be mentioned here.

I didn't mean to continue talking about tunes that sound suspiciously like one another, but this story broke and I had to upload the Rubinoos song, as at least it's a catchy piece of pop-rock.

The Rubinoos-I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend (3.08 MB, 128Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/261825467d694b/

Wednesday I will be back with a popular rock band, but it's a song you probably haven't heard of before.

Happy 4th of July, Everyone

Finally I have some time to write a fitting final chapter to this phase of the blog where I talk about Florida Breaks. Unfortunately some delays and some tragic events got in the way, but at least I can try and make the end of it somewhat decent.

As I mentioned before I've seen DJ Baby Anne a few times. Speaking of her, I found out yesterday morning that that night, she would be performing in Orlando. But, that was hardly enough advance notice… I had shit to do so it was a no-go. But, I'm sure that eventually I'll see her again. Anyway, like I said I've seen her a few times. The one time that it was not at The House of Blues, it was at a club in Orlando known as Fusion. Well, during her set some people got on the stage, and no one got into trouble for it, so I figured I'd hop on it too. It wasn't too long after that, a security guard pretty much hiptossed a poor kid from the stage onto the floor! I don't know what caused it-the kid did looks like a spaz-but rough security was the least of Fusion's problems…

Back to the HOB… like I said, their service industry nights are a lot of fun. Besides watching everyone breakdance and having a lot of fun, you also see some strange and unexpected things sometimes. For instance, it was either the first time or one of the first times I was there, it was near the end of the night and I was walking in the area outside of the dance floor; it is tiered a few levels. Well, I was on the middle level and out of nowhere I walk pretty much right up to a girl and a guy… the guy has his hands up the girl's skirt, and her hand is guiding the way: that's right, he was fingering his girl, right out in the open! I couldn't believe it. I watched for a short while, and seeing that they still didn't care that I was watching, I walked away, but not before looking at the upper tier and seeing some guys intently watching the action just like I was, with big smiles on their faces. I still don't know how they didn't get caught, but boy was it ever funny.

Anyway, onto the one upload I am putting up today. It's yet another song from the Mixtress CD. This one is the best track on the album, which is saying a lot due to how great the entire album is. It's Jackal & Hyde's "Darkstar". No, it has nothing to do with the Grateful Dead song of the same title… a dance remix of THAT would be pretty f'ed up.

Jackal & Hyde-Darkstar (8.26 MB, 192Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/2562151676082f/

I was going to put up a DJ Z-Trip track but he has many free tracks available on the downloads page of his website. I bring up Z as at a benefit Service Industry Night for the Red Cross to help out with that hurricane in New Orleans, if you donated a dollar you got a ticket to the DJ Z-Trip concert that following Thursday. If it wasn't for that dollar donation then I never would've gone to the concert, and that would've been a huge mistake, as it proved to be an awesome time. The concert was some random DJ who wasn't that great, but then there was Black Sheep, a rap group I did not realize were that well known until after the fact, and then Z himself, who put on an audio and visual collage of images and sound. That's the best way of describing it. I mean, I shit you not, one gimmick was allowing a girl to play a game of Pac-Man on the giant screen! Yeah, corporate sponsorship was involved but these days that's expected just about anywhere. Near the end of the set you had people breakdancing, which totally shocked Z as that didn't happen too often on that tour. I tell you, that was an awesome night, and if Z-Trip is playing in your area, you'd better go and see it. Z isn't scheduled to play in Florida yet for his latest tour, but then again, given that they literally had to give tickets away for a dollar to get people to see him 2 years ago in Orlando, it's understandable why he wouldn't want to return (or maybe that the HOB doesn't want to book him again) even though many that saw them there in 2005 may be likely to go see him again.

I will be busy the next few days so my next upload will be on Monday. Till then, I'll wish everyone a good 4th and a nice weekend.

To Continue What I Wrote The Last Time...

When I last made a post on here, I mentioned the surprising epiphany I had when on Thursday night I was reading a forum and in a post concerning The Spice Girls reuniting, someone mentioned that the song "Say You'll Be There" seems to be a ripoff of the often misspelled (even by me!) Carl Carlton tune "She's A Bad Mama Jama." I know, sounds totally bizarre and random, and yet after listening to both songs back to back, that seems to be the case. Whether or not it's intentional or just a strange coincidence, I consider it to be funny if nothing else. It reminds me of the whole Dani California = Mary Jane's Last Dance controversy. I mean, that song is the only one from the Girls that I can really tolerate, much less like. I mean, the song where they tell their lover to use a condom... I don't think so.

I already posted the videos to the two songs, but now you can download the one Spice Girls song I like and the full rarely heard 6 minute version of the classic song from Carl.

Spice Girls-Say You'll Be There (4.5 MB, 160Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/2534411bd90162/

Carl Carlton-She's A Bad Mama Jama (8.08 MB, 192Kbits/second)

http://www.zshare.net/audio/25345210b0b28a/

Also, it appears that another Spice Girls song, Wannabe, sounds suspiciously like the Howard Jones classic, Things Can Only Get Better (hmmm; they also have a point there), but you can download copies of the songs yourself if that's what you desire.

I'll be back Wednesday night where I'll finally continue the dance theme I had started awhile back but then got sidetracked from several times.