Addicted To Vinyl Musical thoughts from the open road, with headphones on

32

Written by: Mel

I swear if I hear one more techno beat, I might just die. Really, Mel? Did you just say that?

Vegas had speakers-plenty of dance music -- the blaring techno at 11 am at the Encore pool during a major hangover completely did a number on me. Throw in a relaxing sunset sit-down on the steps of The Venetian – with dance music echoing from Tao, I imagine, and it was cause to jump in front of a moving gondola. But because I rarely listen to others (or myself for that matter), here’s my birthday post edition for ATV with yes, a few dance numbers on the list.

On Saturday, I’ll be turning riper than that package of baby kiwi in my work fridge -- 32. I should probably be thrown away too. Surely, I am fishing for any-and-all birthday compliments, wishes and free offers of alcohol. I share my birthday with musical legends Billy Joel , Tommy Roe (singer/songwriter from the 60s – toured with Roy Orbison), Richard Furay (Buffalo Springfield), Steve Katz (Blood, Sweat & Tears) and Dave Gahan (Depeche Mode). And hottie John Corbett. Just saying. Perhaps my true astrological path is in music.

Last year I was humming along with Aimee Mann's "31 Today." Completely appropriate. While I haven’t had much luck in discovering a song that mentions 32, we’ll go with an assortment of birthday memories, mentions of the big day and the infamous, “That’s my birthday song!”

And no, “32 Pennies” by Warrant does not count, Matt.

Last year, I fell in love with the movie (and its subsequent soundtrack) “Once.” As luck would have it, Swell Season (consisting of Marketa Iglova and Glen Hansard – both actors/singers in the film) came into town last year for my birthday. How nice was that of the both of them? And with a mere email to my then-boyfriend, he bought me tickets to their show.

Glen Hansard became one of my favorite artists live that evening. Imagine being seated in the upper-deck of the auditorium, hearing full sound of Hansard’s voice and beat-up acoustic guitar. His voice carried straight up to our seats. An absolute bone-chilling performance. And that was just his opening number. There are not many artists who can move me emotionally. He did it.

If that’s not enough emotional creamer in your coffee, you need to hear the duet, “When Your Mind’s Made Up.”

Moving on to hornier more birthday memories, take a listen to Timbaland’s version of “Birthday.”

In the mood yet? This song is not a true story in its entirety. An ex-boyfriend reserved the “Indians Suite” at the Hyatt for a birthday present (I think it was my 27th?), to have all my friends over to celebrate, with a place to stay when the drinking was over. Everything was on him. Oh, it had the marble floors, the Jacuzzi tub (and a double-person, glassed-in shower), the King –sized bed. All of the five-star luxuries in which Timbaland refers to in his lyrics were utilized, but just by me. Because of an unfortunate incident with my sisters, I needed to leave my own party at some Liquid/PartyBus/Tramp-combo and return to the hotel. Nobody came for the after-party, and I was left to this GIANT three-room suite all by my lonesome.

It was awesome because I slept alone, diagonal on the bed. And had in-room breakfast with a paper in my Jacuzzi. Happy Birthday to me!

Speaking of amazing birthday gifts, I received a car as a surprise in one of my 20-something years. Seriously cool, right? Yeah, I think I was going through some quarter-life crisis, and doesn’t a red Cabrio convertible just change perspective on life? I had some awesome VW mix CDs of which I need to find.

Just think about these 2001 (the year of the car) classics: Fatboy Slim “Weapon of Choice,” Storm’s “Storm Animal,” the Discovery album from Daft Punk (featuring both “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger” and “Face to Face” which have received a surge in sampling just this past year), any DJs album coming out of Ibiza and the remake of “Smooth Criminal” by Alien Ant Farm. Stay tuned to future posts when I pull the variety of drive time CDs out of storage.

The Party People have arrived! Time to flip the tape…

My dance music inclusion: Cut///Copy – “Lights & Music .” The Boyz Noize remix is my favorite, but the original from In Ghost Colour album, is just as body-moving. Cut///Copy is an electro-pop group from Australia. They’ve been around since about 2004, but I never paid particular interest until mid-2008 – just in time to notice “birthday” in the lyrics in time for (duh) my birthday.

I’ll tell you what I hope to say on my birthday – “I feel fine!”

I over-killed it on my iPod. Even when this song comes up on shuffle, 60% of the time, I’ll forward it. I can only handle so much electro-pop – unless it’s Peaches.

YES! Peaches just released her new album this week – Internets are conflicting with either “Talk to Me” or “I Feel Cream” as the title. Anyone confirm? Here’s the (perhaps) album-titled song (uh, might be too sexy to watch from your work cubicle, unless you work where I do, and soft porn and/or partial nudity is strongly encouraged):

Zexy.

Now that I’ve been consistently singing “Happy Birthday” to myself, I’m fondly remembering an Imported CD I purchased from the old record store in Mentor Mall (man, I LOVED their import CD section) – it may have been Happy Hardcore (circa 1996). Anyways, there was a gabba-house song (maybe by Technohead?) called, “Happy Birthday” which I played in its entirety on my out-going voicemail on my first heavy-duty cell phone. People HATED this; I loved it – especially the time when I was dumped, and played “I Will Survive” (also in its entirety) on my out-going message. Be damned 30 second voicemails messages of today! But I digress… if anyone could replace that song for me in mp3 version, it would be a Happy, Happy Birthday, indeed!

And last, but not certainly least, The Romantics’ “That’s What I Like About You” is my birthday song. It’s a frightful memory, thinking back. I was at the Beach Club in the old Flats *gasp* at age 18. Yes, the big 18th birthday when you can finally party downtown! Not only did I hear that song at the club, but we also heard it on the way home. And then again on the radio when we attempted to sleep after being jacked up on all that Cherry Coke (ha, right). It has forever since been deemed my birthday song. I hear it EVERY year. No joke.

And don’t you dare even mention Paul McCartney singing, “They Say It’s Your Birthday.”

Lalalalalalalalallalalalalaa… Crap.