I'm Just An Average Man With An Average Life

By the way, earlier tonight I heard a new song from Fall Out Boy from their upcoming album, to be released in a matter of hours. What stuck out for me (besides the song being terrible; sorry, FOB fans) was that it sounded like a copy of Personal Jesus! Honest. Yeah, it’s an album I won’t be purchasing. But, moving on…

Here is a song that I mentioned more than a year ago but didn’t upload myself. I’m bringing it up now due to its usage in a brand new commercial. Unfortunately, it’s a Geico commercial, and while it’s not one with those damned cavemen, it’s one with a stack of money with plastic eyes on top… yeah, that ad.

The song, though, is pretty cool. It’s a cover of the 80’s classic (if you stretch “classic” pretty thin) Somebody’s Watching Me, originally by Rockwell. The people who covered it, in contrast, weren’t the sons of then Motown head Berry Gordy. No, it’s not the Beatfreakz cover of the song, but rather another dance cover… this time, done by Germany’s Royal Gigolos. For what it is, it’s very catchy and I like it. I just wish it would be used in a better ad than one with money and plastic eyes.


Royal Gigolos-Somebody's Watching Me (4.5 MB, 192Kbits/second)

I'll be back Monday night the 22nd with an appropriate song for this time of the season.

Plagiarism?

Here is something that just broke a matter of hours ago; as someone who at least tries to be “hip” once in awhile, this is something I figure I should talk about on here. It revolves around the case of Joe Satriani suing Coldplay for allegedly ripping off one of his songs for their recent hit Viva la Vida.

It's certainly an interesting tale, but I think it's more coincidence or maybe even an unconscious ripoff rather than something deliberate. Say what you will about Coldplay (they're fine, I guess, but their music isn't really to my tastes most of the time) or Satriani (from what I've heard, the stuff he plays is technically fine, but not the most engaging stuff around), but I think that's the case. I also think that's the case with the OTHER cry of plagiarism revolving around Viva la Vida, as documented here.

If you want a recap of the situation (along with downloads), go here.

I'll be back a week from tonight (as I know this Friday will be busy for me) with a new song to spotlight (and probably upload).

I'll Be Back Monday Night

At the last minute I ended up going out last night, and I have stuff planned this weekend, so my newest upload will be up Monday night.

A Trio of Finds

Hello everyone. As I plan on mentioning in a blog that I’ll post on MySpace tomorrow night, my computer went kaput on Tuesday night, but the next night an El Cheapo model was purchased and it will be used until next summer, when a high end model will be purchased. At least now I will be able to continue to do these, and upload songs and burn them onto my computer.

This past Sunday I went to Best Buy to pick up Chinese Democracy. If you think of it as Axl Rose and a bunch of other guys, and don’t think about how much time and money were spent on it, and you don’t compare it to Appetite for Destruction, then it’s a good album.

Tonight’s upload… actually, it’s not an upload, but rather I’m pointing out a trio of songs posted recently on other blogs, and as of the past few days they have been very popular downloads.

The first one is a remix of Eleanor Rigby! Yes, you heard right. It’s by Soulwax, who earlier in the year did the awesome remix of You Can’t Always Get What You Want. It sounds sacrilegious, but to me I was never a big fan of that tune, and I think this instrumental remix is actually better. You can download it here.

The second tune I found on this page (try to ignore the frightening picture) and it’s a remix of a song (Cross the Dancefloor) by the Atlanta group Treasure Fingers. It’s a dance group and the remix is by New York dance dudes Designer Drugs. You can download the song on this page. It’s very cool, and has an 80’s electro feel to it.

The third song is from The Prodigy. Yes, the guys who did Firestarter and Smack My Bitch Up. The tune is Invaders Must Die, which is the title song from their upcoming album. It was released online (officially) Wednesday night. It doesn't sound quite like their most famous songs, but it's still pretty cool. You can download the song here.

On my mashups blog (which will be posted in about an hour or so), I will post a mashup of a song from Britney. Really. Speaking of her, I have to mention that Womanizer is HORRIBLE. Of course, Britney has a horrible voice and no audio effects can cover that. The rest of the song is terrible also. Hell, even I Kissed A Girl is better! Of course, Womanizer ended up at number one on the Billboard Charts, but the songs at the top this year… my God!

Reminds Me Of Childhood (Or College) Memories

On this day in which my computer is acting up yet AGAIN, I'm going to do something I rarely do, and that's post a track where I can't tell you the artist at all; I honestly don't know who did it. I downloaded it way back during my college days, meaning it had to be back in like 2002 or so. I never found out who did this cover, but considering what Sunday is, it's the perfect tune to post now.

As I'm sure everyone knows by now, Sunday is the day where *finally*, one of the most eagerly anticipated rock albums of all time (or any sort of album all time) is going to be released, and that is Guns N' Roses's Chinese Democracy. Until it was officially announced last month, I thought the Cubs would win the World Series before that damned album would be released. I've heard some of the bootlegs that have come out in recent years (and even wrote about it in a pair of posts here and here; the latter post still has working links to the bootleg tracks) and I personally preferred the "older" GN'R back even during the Use Your Illusion days. Hearing parts of all the album songs on their MySpace page, and I still agree that I prefer the older GN'R… you know, back when Slash and gang were in the group. I'll still get the album on Sunday, though, and until I listen to the entire thing, I won't say for certain how it is, but I think we all know that it'll be impossible to live up to the ungodly amount of hype it has gotten for all of these years. I haven't tried to find leaks to the album before it got released, which makes me better than the denizens on a certain messageboard…

Anyway, like I said I found a dance-y cover of Sweet Child O Mine quite a few years ago, and I don't know anything about the artist or artists involved, but I think it's an interesting (and good) take on the song (it's certainly better than a certain female singer's cover of it during the last decade), so up it goes.

Dance-y Version of Sweet Child O Mine (6.92 MB, 192Kbits/second)

I'll be back a week from tonight with something for you on the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. Check my mashups blog tomorrow night when I post something there. Due to my computer problems (thankfully there's no problems tonight) I won't risk it and I'll just post something there tomorrow night.

My Name Is Cooper... Alice Cooper

To stay topical, I will post a Bond song... or rather, one that never was but should have been.

I'm someone who enjoys the Bond movies and I've seen all of them at least once before. While their quality varies, just about all of them are at least entertaining in some way, but the best ones are a great time.

I saw the midnight showing of Quantum of Solace and I was more than disappointed with it. I mean, it sucked! That's something I rarely say for a Bond movie, but that simply sucked. Let's see, the action (which is plentiful) is done in the God-awful shaky-cam rapid-fire editing bullshit style, which means that you can never make out what's going on and it may even give you a headache. Then, the story is pretty abysmal and is a whole lot of nothing which barely has anything to do with Casino Royale, even though QoS is supposed to be a sequel. Many agree that it's less than CR, but I'm one of the few that had such a bad reaction to it. I don't know how people can give much of any praise to it, but to each their own.

Heck, I didn't even like QoS's title song, but then again I loathe Jack White and think he's totally talentless and tone deaf. At least the last title song was cool enough. These days they are trying to be "hip" with a certain segment by having alternative rockers involved. Back in the day, though, rockers with that kind of edge doing the theme song just wasn't going to happen.

For example, Alice Cooper. Now, Live and Let Die happened as Paul McCartney & Wings are pretty inoffensive. However, Alice Cooper was shocking stuff back during that time period. According to Alice himself, his version of Man With the Golden Gun was going to be used in the movie but then the producers got scared and instead you got Lulu's song of the same title, which is laughably bad and actually more risque than Cooper's track. I didn't even realize Lulu still had a career in 1974; so yeah, they should have gone with Cooper's song, which ended up on his Muscle of Love album. It isn't really what you'd expect from Alice, but it would have worked very well for a Bond theme.

Alice Cooper-Man With the Golden Gun (5.7 MB, 192Kbits/second)

I'll be back around this time next week with another song to spotlight.

Here Comes My Left Blow

Since I started the sabbatical, several music figures passed away, such as Levi Stubbs and Rudy Ray Moore. RIP to those figures. However, I'll talk about a random song here, and I thought about it after seeing a commercial earlier tonight.

I thought that way back when I posted a song from Eazy-E in this blog, but going through my list I have in a Word file, I don't see it anywhere, so maybe not. In any case, if you've seen even a little amount of TV the past few weeks it's likely you've seen a commercial for the videogame Saint's Row 2. That ad includes a section of the song known as Real Muthaphukkin G's. As you can probably figure out, they had to be careful in which section of the song to use, as it's filled with much vulgarity in its dissing of Dr. Dre. Then again, the entire album, with the one of a kind name It's On (Dr. Dre) 187^um Killa, is a giant diss towards Dre.

The song also reminds me of the former independent pro wrestler known as B-Boy, who used the song as his entrance music. I saw him wrestle a few times back in the day, and even now when I think of him or the song, the other comes to mind.

Eazy-E Real Muthaphukkin G's (7.6 MB, 192Kbits/second)

Say what you will about the man or his lifestyle, but he's a classic rapper that I enjoy listening to. It's a shame he passed away far too soon.

I'll be back around this time next week with a new ditty.