Tuesday, September 4, 2007

"What's Puzzling You is the Nature of My Game"

The problem with iTunes is that they're never really my tunes.

My older son comes home from university periodically and decides that he needs to make some CDs to listen to, for those times when he confiscates his father's car. This means he dumps his entire iPod contents into my computer (he found an application which facilitates this), which in turn means that I either have to fine-tooth comb through my iTunes for songs I want to keep, and delete the rest, or acquire a taste for military marches.


My younger son determines that chatting on MSN, posting on guitar forums, playing Yahoo games, finding his YouTube favourites, competing at Warcraft, locating guitar tabs, downloading data, surfing the web and recording his own music is just a tad taxing for his own computer, so he figures that my Mac is a good place to collect some of his heavy metal musical tastes.

Imagine my frustration when one day last week I even had to wrestle my iPawd from the claws of my cat.



After cleansing my player of all unwanted material, I decided that my my own collection of songs were ready to help me keep up a steady pace as I walked in the park. Several tunes into the outing, I noticed a pattern between some of the different pieces of music that came up.

A few familiar lyrical snippets from eight different songs appear below. Can you figure out what they have in common?

1) "Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now."

2) "All in a dream, all in a dream
The loading had begun. They were flying Mother Nature's Silver seed to a new home in the sun."

3) "Don't cry.
Don't raise your eye. It's only teenage wasteland."

4) "It's time we stop, hey, what's that sound
? Everybody look what's going down."

5) "I am yours, you are mine, you are what you are.
And you make it hard, And you make it hard."
6) "McGuinn and McGuire just a-gettin' higher in L.A., You know where that's at. And no one's gettin' fat except Mama Cass."

7) "Meet me in the middle of the day.
Let me hear you say, everything's okay. Bring me southern kisses from your room"

8) "Slow down, you move too fast.
You've got to make the morning last. Just kicking down the cobble stones. Looking for fun and feelin' groovy."
I'm going to turn the moderation feature on, so your guesses will appear in a few days. Any comments that are not guesses will show up as soon as I get the alert. Good luck!

19 comments:

Frank Baron said...

I was gonna say "I give up" and leave it at that but I think I have it now.

In fact, I'm pretty darn sure I do but I'm gonna make you sweat.

Wait.

What if, while making you sweat, someone ELSE responds with the correct answer and wins the million dollars and the villa in Spain?

Crap. I'd better spit it out then.

Okay. Almost nobody refers to those songs by their actual title. For instance, "Baby O'Reilly" by The Who (your #3 song) is often called "Teenage Wasteland" and S&G's "59th Street Bridge Song" (your #8) is referred to as "Feelin' Groovy."

I want that cheque and the keys to that villa now.

And DON'T try to pawn off some dollar-store goodie bag like I did with Dawno!

Tink said...

Military marches? How many could there be?? :D

Hilary said...

Tink,

Far, FAR too many!

Crabby McSlacker said...

I actually like marches myself, not that I have any. Very invigorating!

However, I have not a clue about the lyrical commonalities of the songs on your list. (I did try but I'm clueless.) I just wanted to compliment you on the excellence of your musical taste! All but #3 and #7 are currently on my iPod too and I used to have #3 on an album. Great stuff!

Hilary said...

Crabby,

Marches certainly have their place but my iPod is not it.

Although quite familiar to me, I'm beginning to wonder if anyone else even knows #7. Possibly if you heard the tune.

Thanks for giving this a shot. And please come on back for a guess if the connection hits you.

Anonymous said...

not yet. been studying the list, though. hmmm.

I, myself, have a 15 yr old. And live in a house full of men. I found the solution is pink. Pink ipod. Pink laptop. Throw on a few rhinestones, and no one, not even the cat, will touch them. I know. On the surface all that girlie stuff seems a bit overmuch. But it's strategic. And works. :)

Hilary said...

Kelley,

With my purple-ish walls, all that pink would be like living in a sunset!

mogie222 said...

#7 Romeos tune!

My guess is this is not modern music. You are longing for teh music of your (recent)youth and have never been able to embrace your son's passion for death metal.

Anonymous said...

Something to do with getting older?
Andi

Anonymous said...

Is number 7 Romeo's Tune
Steve Forbert.
Sorry Hilary I can't see the connection between all the songs either, but they are all classics.

Al

Hilary said...

Frank,

You're on the right track... mostly.. kinda.. sorta.. ish.

Abby,

All of this is true.. but WRONG!

Andi,

Good guess.. but nope!

Al,

I was certain you'd know Romeo's Tune and you didn't disappoint me. As for the connetion between all of them, the new clues (other comments and song titles) might help now.

Anonymous said...

Okay Hilary, I can only think of two things. 1- Franks right and all the titles that people know them by (although wrong) are in the sentence. or 2- The most recognized and remembered lines from these songs are all from the chorus of these songs.

Al

Hilary said...

Al,

Again.. pretty close but nope. Frank is right.. but it's not exactly what I'm looking for.

Hint: Try approaching the relationship between the titles and the lyrics from a different angle.

Frank Baron said...

I got it.

:)

In none of those songs does the title appear in the lyrics.

I win!!!!!

Hilary said...

Woohoo you! You did indeed get it. I knew you would (of course I also thought I knew that Al would). What took you so long? :)

Frank Baron said...

When you're my age, you'll understand about things like brain cramps.

Oh wait. You ARE my age!

:)

Hilary said...

Frank,

From now on, I'm keeping score when we play cards. Your math skills leave much to be desired. I'm much, MUCH younger than you (like four whole years)!

Anonymous said...

This is Erin You have a really good site i am just trying to find the one of the street party soo if you could tell me which one it is

Hilary said...

Hi Erin,

It's the last post in August called "Neighbours and Friends." You can find it in the archives on the right hand side. :)