What's on your iPod? Part 2

It was so fun the first time that I'm doing it again...and I learned about some of you. Hidden depths, people, hidden depths.

Also, I'm procrastinating.

First 20 in random shuffle:

* Outkast, Dracula's Wedding: I love Outkast. I like to sing along when I'm alone in the car, but most of the songs are not singalongs for children and it's really hard to stop singing when Outkast is on.

* Bob Marley & the Wailers, Work: This makes me think of working at Glimmerglass Opera and staying in scary housing with a ghost cat who left fresh pee markings every time I left the creepy old house. Oh, and it was across the street from a graveyard.

* Parliament, Chocolate City: When I was in 6th grade, we moved from NYC to Denver. I got invited to my first party with dancing. I could not dance. Parliament was playing (the song was Flashlight). I was mortified. Shudder...

* David Bowie, Try Some, Buy Some: Let me count the ways...

* Pat Benatar, Hit Me with your Best Shot: Here's my big embarrassment for the day! And you thought it would be that I couldn't dance in 6th grade. Silly you! I like to sing along with this one, too. There. I have no pride left.

* Mos Def, Ms. Fat Booty: Not sure if I've even actually listened to this. Why, oh why couldn't something familiar and cool -- like Psapp or Phospherescent or Big Star...even Spacehog -- come next?

* Billy Bragg, A New England: I used to frequent a great show venue in Denver in the early-mid '80s -- the Rainbow Room (like my youth, long since dead). I saw fantastic shows there (Halloween night with the Cure and Siouxsee & the Banshees opening, front row for Psychedelic Furs and Richard Butler singing Pretty in Pink to me -- I was wearing a bright pink '50s cocktail dress with rhinestones, many early REM shows...) Billy Bragg opened for somebody (a band that obviously made a big, big impression). A lot of us would wait out all day for these shows, and Billy Bragg came out and played a one-man band contraption for the crowd waiting to get in. Amazing. And he gets extra points for his work on Mermaid Avenue.

* The Clash, The Prisoner: Also in Denver, I got to see The Clash at Red Rocks on the Combat Rock tour. I tried to sleep in the next day. Unfortunately, I was on the cover of the Rocky Mountain News Sunday edition and many of my parents' friends felt the need to call. I'm embarrassed to say that I had a total Molly Ringwald getup on. I was in the front row, though.

* Radiohead, Optimistic: We have tried to see Radiohead what...four times now? Tibetan Freedom Festival (stopped mid-show due to lightning striking a girl across the field during Herbie Hancock & the Headhunters' reunion performance of Watermelon Man; a 9:30 club midnight show announced at the last minute -- we happened to be in front of the club but had to go get someone at the airport; a field that flooded; and a near miss at Merriweather a few years ago -- what band starts on time? We were stuck in a long line of traffic waiting to get in...made it for the encore). I've given up on ever seeing more than 30 minutes of Radiohead live. Didn't even try this year. Charles thinks he spent time in a pub with some/all of them at Oxford. Call me crazy, but I have a feeling that there are a lot of pale, pasty shoe-gazing intellectual teenagers there.

* The Beatles, Thank You Girl: Yeah, yeah. I know. There's a whole lot of Beatles on my iPod. Actually, I really thought Wilco would be the winner. I may have to rethink my allegiances.

* Neil Young, I Believe in You: When we lived in San Francisco (Haight & Stanyan), Neil Young and Pearl Jam played a free show in Golden Gate Park. It was so loud. I was so annoyed. I was a music school snob. I am an idiot. The Grateful Dead also played a show in the park that you could hear from the Conservatory (19th & Ortega). I may not have been the right person to be living in San Francisco in the late '80s/early '90s...

* The Jam, The Place I Love: Loved the Jam, liked Style Council. Not so big on Paul Weller solo...

* Paul Westerberg, Something Is Me: I swear, he could breathe and I would love it. And listen to it over and over. And be oh so grateful. I am so easy to please.

* Blondie, X Offender: Do you remember when Debbie Harry was a guest on The Muppets? I do. We watched that show every Sunday night. I still can't really figure out how CBGB spawned such a wide variety of acts...

* David Bowie, Queen Bitch: Don't you feel just a little tough but glamorous when you listen to Bowie? My best friend in 7th grade and I certainly did. I still do.

* Chaka Demus, Twist and Shout: Ska, ska, ska.

* Echo & the Bunnymen, Rescue: I can still smell the aquanet. By the way, do you remember the old aquanet can? Long ago, it used to have a wavy top. My dad designed that can. I tried to find a picture on google, but no luck. But I did learn that you can make fairy dust using dried hairspray. So that 15 minutes wasn't a total loss.

* Skankin' Pickle, Turning Japanese: High school. A long trip on the bus from Denver to Muncie, Indiana for the International Thespian Conference. A lot of dramatic teenagers and one teacher. What in the world were our parents thinking? I did meet a great guy there -- Jim from Grosse Ile, Michigan. Jim actually came to visit me in Colorado. For some reason, I couldn't come out of my room that week, and poor Jim spent his whole trip with my mom in the living room. I am so sorry, Jim from Michigan. And Mom, too. I'm really sorry.

* Loose Fur, Carnival Knowledge: Charles tells me that the only reason that Autumn Defense is on my iPod is because of Wilco. I'll have to admit that I never would have picked it up without the Wilco cred. But I do like it. He says you can just imagine the sweaters and Ovaltine (note that he doesn't say "tea"). And poetry books and mumbling. I really like Loose Fur. They sound like the bar band you wish you'd tumble upon in a seedy bar on a winter's night. Glowing review, eh?

* The Who, I've Had Enough (from the Quadrophenia soundtrack) There used to be a theater on Colfax in Denver that did the midnight showing of Rocky Horror Picture Show (more nights that I care to admit...) For a time, they also did Sunday afternoon Quadrophenia showings. Denver in the early to mid-80s wasn't all bad...

So, what's on your iPod? And no skipping!