They Say My Music's Too Loud

The times, they call for it. A little Friday fun from RFB.



Previously in Jetpacks' Odd Pairings on YouTube:
Whole Lotta Rhythm Goin' Round
Sweet Soul Alabama

Peeps Aflame (Or "The Flaming Peeps")

I dunno. It felt inspired at the time. Damned Peeps in their Pure Sugar Evil sitting on the kitchen counter post-Easter, mocking Easter and Jesus and all that is holy, just asking to be toasted in the flames from whence they came.

Showed them.

Your Pre-Election, Halloween-Eve Music Video Break

The election season demands this

(You'll thank me when it's over)

Cringe with me, readers, as everyone's favorite diminutive funkmaster embarrasses himself 1988 style in that now-dead medium they called "the music video." It's still a great song if you close your eyes. And even if you keep them open, Prince is one funny, confident guy, graduating with honors from the Sly Stone-Mick Jagger-Steven Tyler school of showmanship. This guy should be in sales, what with all that confidence and stuff.



(I can't help myself. The funk itch must be scratched.)

Goin' Down to South Park Gonna Have Myself a Time

Actually, that's not why I took the picture. I was more interested in the guy's name. Missed his calling. It's one thing to nickname yourself Johnny "Guitar" Watson; something else entirely to be born with the name. And then to throw it all away and become a commercial real estate agent. Sad.

Then again, with real estate like it is right now, he could easily become a blues singer.

Open Mic Night - Opening the Mic

An Open Mic Night host who doesn’t share the mic is not really hosting an open mic night, but is instead subjecting you to his or her own creations ad nauseum. I have been guilty of this practice in previous open mic night posts and will now step aside for a week and treat you to a true master of the mic, Sylvester Stewart.

If you’ve ever tapped your foot to a Red Hot Chili Peppers* song; if you’ve ever said to yourself, “Wow, Prince has got real presence,”; or if you’ve ever appreciated how Aerosmith is so much funkier than other traditional rock acts, then you owe a debt of gratitude to Mr. Stewart.

I first heard this song as a narrow-minded little rocker kid, when a much more musically adventurous friend found it in the back of a bin at a seedy used record store on a dirty side street in Frankfurt, Germany, almost a decade after the song had been popular. In it I heard everything I liked in rock; prominent bass, an unapologetic attitude of self-assurance mixed with laid-back cool, and the ability to bend a single sung syllable into a contorted and drawn-out display of passion.

This is one of those songs that will never leave my iPod: Sly and the Family Stone’s "If You Want me To Stay." I would recommend you crank it up very loud. You can even unplug the headphones or earbuds and let your office mates jam with you. I would never suggest such a thing for my own music.

Find it at top in the sidebar until next week’s song replaces it.

Archived Open Mic Night music is found here

*They covered the song, but not nearly as well as the original.