I realize this morning, with great excitement, that soon it will be spring. Spring means warmth. Warmth means warmer water temperatures. Warmer water temperatures means your plucky heroine can get back out on the water in her trusty Peinert racing shell and row her little heart out. This was the song that ran through my head when I first learned to row, and the song that is going through my head these days as I think about getting back out on the water again. C’monnnn spring.
badass
Funk Friday: “Concentration,” Quantum MC’s
StandardThis song is so wacky. (Then again, it was 1999.) It’s gotta be the most mild-mannered rap song I’ve ever heard, layered over a tight rhythm and feel-it-in-your-bones baseline. I recommend starting any conversation with, “Yeah-yeah, yeah, yeah…oh yeah.” Also, this has got to be the only song written ever, in any genre, that uses the lyric “flowing like soy milk over sweetened cereal.” Quantum MC’s were a great group that included two favorite artists of mine – Cut Chemist and DJ Shadow. I find that I tend to start the song fairly soft and then crank it by the time it gets to 3:37. What-what! Happy Friday, Tune-Up Fans.
Modernism Monday: “Knock It Right Out,” Paul Westerberg
StandardDudes and dudettes, I’m not going to lie – I’m a little grumpy. Who has two thumbs and doesn’t have the day tomorrow? This girl. I mean, it’s Presidents’ Day, for God’s sake. It’s a mattress holiday. Unfamiliar with this term? I coined it. Let me explain. A mattress holiday is one around which every major sleep accoutrement store in the country hawks their mattress for “40, 50, even 60 percent off!” Just turn on your TV or your radio and sit through an hour and you’ll see what I mean. It only happens around Presidents’ Day, Lincoln’s Birthday, and other interesting yet minor and ultimately “huh?”-inducing holidays. So while I am thrilled some of my readership is getting a third day of weekend, you’ll forgive me if I want to make the price of admission a perfect score on a fifty-question test on Chester A. Arthur.
Beyond my annoyance of having to go into work when the rest of humanity will be out buying TempurPedics (as our founders would have us do to observe this most august – oh the hell with it), this is going to be a bananas week for your Yankette. Work will go into hyperdrive, marathon training will go into hyperdrive, other things will go into hyperdrive – it’s just all going to be a little manic. I need a good, grounding, up-tempo, pump-up song to get me ready to suit up. “Knock It Right Out” will do just fine, I believe. Everything about this song – from the perfect swagger tempo, the shrieking guitars, Westerberg’s growly voice – says, “I got this.” So – bring it.
Enjoy your mattress.
Funk Friday: “Make Me Believe In You,” Patti Jo
StandardHappy Fear Day, Tune-Up fans! (Or, Valentine’s Day, if you’re committed to living a life of mindless literalism and social norms and having people actually understand what you’re talking about.)
Before you all inundate me with messages about the glories of love and life and birds and bees and whatnot, let me pause for a second. Love is great. Love is glorious. Love is also terrifying, difficult, and a royal pain in the ass. Think of all the hundreds of billions of inputs that endlessly feed into making you who you are – the person who takes their coffee black, who prefers staying up late to getting up early, who prefers big groups to small gatherings, and will never under any circumstances wear pleat-front pants. You and everyone you see every day are Olympic-sized swimming pools of memory-infused preferences and experience-born trigger points, some conscious and some so parked in your subconscious you don’t even know it. In a way, there are seven billion unique languages on the planet. And yet, in the midst of all of this, we meet people, we fall in love, and, sometimes, we find our languages have a common root. Amazing.
This is what I ponder every February 14th that rolls around, and it always makes me think of those people who are in the beginning stages of the whole love saga. No matter how much sang-froid one was born with, it’s impossible not to wonder about the future. And because, in my mind, V Day is also Fear Day, it does kind of put one on the offensive. Hit it, Patti Jo. “You’re gonna be downright in shame if I find that you’re playing any game. Make me believe in you.”
Modernism Monday: “Get It Up,” Santigiold + M.I.A. (feat. Gorilla Zoe)
StandardPSA: Before you press play, be alerted that this song contains some mild to medium swearing and vaguely salacious themes.
After a certain period of time, you realize that, man, life doesn’t get easier – if you’re lucky, skillful, and have the energy, you just get better at managing. 2014 is already going gangbusters for your Yankette, so Monday mornings are always better with a little extra something to go with my coffee. Santigold and M.I.A definitely deliver on this track, and it puts a little extra swagger in my step when I need it. “Always standing in the door, always the same reason you’re stuck: no guts. No guts. What will you get it up for? What will make you want it more?”
Funk Friday: “You Can’t Be Told,” Valerie June
StandardI worship at the altar of Valerie June. What a fabulously unique voice – so clear and sharp against the growl of the guitars. This song makes me want to be:
a) in a coordinated dance routine with random patrons at a crowded bar, and/or
b) in a slow-motion movie scene in which I, the film’s protagonist, a wise-cracking hitwoman, am walking down a street in a major metropolis dressed in all black. Plus aviators and heels. Natch.
As neither of these things is going to happen, at least not anytime soon and not without a lot of paperwork, I’ll settle for putting this on in the background to help me push through a grouchy Friday afternoon and into a much more fun Friday evening.
The Daily Tune-Up 