lumière des étoiles

Cooler Than Thou?
2004-07-16 4:44 p.m.

I was slightly perturbed before while shopping by how hard it was to find blank audio tapes. Right, like I'd take a cd player or anything else "flashy" to places where I'm a likely target for pickpockets.

I think half those kinds of crimes can be avoided if one is just careful. Maybe I'm lucky after all growing up in such close proximity to all these urban areas, and working in them for the last couple of years; it's a habit to lock doors, a habit to keep my hand over my bag and my bag across my chest, a habit to get my own back, a habit not to wear anything that says "I HAVE MONEY!". Maybe it's a good thing that we always appear so scruffy and carry such worn (yet trusty!) packs.

Alas, things can always happen anyway, so I will take along the bulky, plastic, circa '91 tape player I have, since it will not be missed if it...goes missing.

Making tapes has been fun - I included all the songs listed here last week, plus a couple of new ones off of albums I picked up the other day. We shall see how Morrisey fares in Budapest.

Making these tapes made me think about my music collection though, which led me to make a list of

UNHIP SONGS THAT I LIKE

(Or will I be hip since I like the un-hip? I don't know about such things, so someone's going to have to fill me in.)

"Whatever, Wherever", by Shakira. It's the pan flutes.

"Daydream Believer", by the Monkees. Yeah I know it's a made-up band, but then so is half the stuff the kids are buying nowadays. Besides, what's good enough for Marcia Brady...

"Good Vibrations", by the Beach Boys, although hipster kids started talking a lot about "Pet Sounds" a few years back. Is it still now-hip to like the Beach Boys? Or has associating the Beach Boys with hipness been once again forgotten?

"The Sign", by Ace of Base, because God-awful Europop makes me nostalgic for...er...God-awful Euro-discos.

"Papa Loves Mambo", by Perry Como. Well my mom likes Perry Como. And I think she's cool.

"Everybody Everybody" and "Strike It Up", by Black Box. Also, "Mr. DJ", by Zhane and "Never Gonna Get It" by En Vogue, cause there's a place in my heart for early 90's dance music. Wanna make somethin of it?

"Steppin' Out", by Joe Jackson. Though my brother informs me that this might also be cool again.

"Owner of a Lonely Heart", by Yes. My lone venture into this band's catalogue. It reminds me of being ten, at a time when MTV was still good and not overtly consumerist.

"Don't Stop Til You Get Enough", and "Billie Jean", by Michael Jackson. When I was teaching English at Malcolm X Shabazz High School in Newark, NJ, this is how my students would insult each other:

"You like MICHAEL JACKSON". "No, YOU like MICHAEL JACKSON. Matter fact, I saw yer CD collection, and you got most a his stuff". To this, I would say "Well I like Michael Jackson...", which would always be met with a chorus of screaming laughter and "no she dit-n't"s. Hey, whatever made the day go faster and made them happy. Some days, the above lines would be repeated using WIL SMITH. Oh yeah:

"Summertime", by Wil Smith/Fresh Prince. Shut it.

I'm still quite fond of John Mellencamp, John Couger Mellencamp, Johnny Couger, and any other such combinations of the man's name. I dig the mid-west, working-class rock, yes I do. Ain't That America? For You and Me? I also love Bonnie Raitt's blusey voice and the song "One Belief Away", I still shamelessly love Sting and all that "fields of barley crap", as my friend Jonathan puts it, and I'm a big fan of Emmy Lou Harris' "Red Dirt Girl", though I've been begged to "shut this adult-contempo crap OFF" by passengers in my car when putting the above artists/songs on. Offering to pull over at the next bus station for them as an alternative to my choice of music for the evening usually shuts them up.

I'm going to include Matthew Sweet's "Girlfriend" on this list, which Thomas insists "sucks so bad" that it "gives him a headache" every time he hears it.

I might also add that I'm consistently putting on foreign (usually African) music that "drives [some] people crazy", except for the stuff that closely resembles reggae or dancehall.

Oh well. I feel validated by my growing rare Go Sailor, New Order, Clash and Toots and the Maytals bootlegs, my useless knowledge of obscure German synth-pop and Brit-pop bands, and that Bowie 50th birthday concert that I somehow scored tickets to, where the man himself performed with Lou Reed, Robert Smith, Sonic Youth, Iggy Pop and Michelle N'Degeocello.

Or does that make me even more unhip?

Next time I'm by Shabazz HS, I'll ask the kids.

xo,