Mr. Moderator

When not blogging Mr. Moderator enjoys baseball, cooking, and falconry.

Most Embarrassing Song Ever Written in Tribute?

Jan 152013

I’m too busy to synthesize this piece on a song written by former NFL quarterback Donovan McNabb’s mom, but if you have even a mild interest in the cross-section between sports and smothering, well-intentioned motherhood I highly recommend you reading it.

Man, I am so thankful my Mom doesn’t fancy herself a songwriter.

What are the most embarrassing tribute songs, the ones the person being celebrated probably wishes were never written? For the purposes of this discussion suggest tribute songs to specific people. It can’t be any old creepy love song to an anonymous and possibly even imaginary figment of the songwriter’s imagination.

Rock Crimes: The Grateful Dead’s Cover of “Not Fade Away”

Posted by Mr. Moderator

Jan 152013

The other night my wife and I were watching TV when an ad came on for that new David Chase movie, Not Fade Away. As I was getting agita at the thought of soon hearing a patented, mouthbreathing Captain Obvious Fresh Air interview with another one of Terry Gross‘ darlings, something along the lines of her Fall 2012 interview with Stephen Colbert, which for some reason focused on his favorite musical artists, mostly obscure soft-rock pioneers like James Taylor and Dan Fogelberg, my wife distracted me with an unexpected question:

What’s this, a movie about the Dead?

I would never have made that connection, but I only saw the Dead once in college. She saw the Dead and assorted offshoot bands a total of 10 times before I knew her. That would have qualified her as a Deadhead, which helps to explain why I thought she was hot the first time I saw her. I always had a soft spot for Deadheads. Well, that’s not quite the right term, is it? However, by the time we met and started getting to know each other her Dead bootleg tapes were buried in a box of personal items, stuff I wouldn’t know existed for a few years.

For the next few days I couldn’t get the notion of the Dead’s cover of “Not Fade Away” out of my head. It gnawed at me, the way the thought of hearing Chase wax poetic over whatever obvious albums he grew up loving gnawed at me. I felt compelled to re-examine the Dead’s dreadful cover of one of the finest cover songs the Rolling Stones ever committed to vinyl. I got no further than the YouTube clip posted here: the Grateful Dead captured mid-jam. Note that the clip of this interminable cover is entitled Grateful Dead – Not Fade Away 12-31-78 – Pt. 2. The “Pt. 2” says it all: ROCK CRIME!

Incongruous Musician Names

Posted by Mr. Moderator

Jan 152013

Paisley and Urban goin’ up the country.

Country music has at least 2 artists with incongruous surnames: Brad Paisley and Keith Urban. Not the kind of surnames that make one think of the Grand Ole Oprey. Are there other musicians with names that are incongruous with the style of music they play?

This Is Your 6th Anniversary, Rock Town Hall: Happy Anniversary to Us!

Posted by Mr. Moderator

Jan 122013

Pope Benedict XVI serves up MAD PROPS for Rock Town Hall’s 6th anniversary of doing the Lord’s work.

Do you know what today is? It’s Rock Town Hall’s 6th Anniversary! Happy anniversary to us!

Rock Town Hall started as a private YahooGroup in 2002. On January 12, 2007, we opened our doors to the public with this stylish, passionate, humorous, even occasionally informative interactive blog. See our Welcome post here.

We really played up last year’s 5th anniversary, with a blog retrospective culminating in sammymaudlin‘s excellent introductory “sizzler reel.” Then-relative newcomers like tonyola and Happiness Stan were regularly contributing new threads, stirring the pot right alongside trusted veteran contributors, like hrrundivbakshi, cdm, machinery, oats, al, and 2000 man, not to mention sophomore Hall members like misterioso, bostonhistorian, and ladymisskiroyale. Who among us didn’t anticipate huge things for 2012: a slew of new participants, renewed activity from veteran contributors, media coverage, and maybe even a Wikipedia page?

Last Man Standing: Noah’s Rockin’ Ark

Posted by Mr. Moderator

Jan 102013

My younger son has gotten into The Fiery Furnaces. Last night, as we listened to “Tropical-Iceland” for the third time in a row it occurred to me that there probably aren’t too many songs that reference puffins. That got me thinking whether we could put together a special kind of Last Man Standing: Noah’s Rockin’ Ark. Here’s the deal:

Can we cite pairs of animals referenced in 2 different songs?
No pairs of animals may be repeated; once a pair of animals has been loaded that animal is accounted for.
If you know of 3 songs referencing a certain animal—or 300—we don’t care. Just list the 1 animal referenced in 2 songs.
To conserve RTH Rock Police resources, I will allow us to cite up to 3 different animals from the same song.

For instance, Noah’s Rockin’ Ark includes ponies: the ponies from both The Fiery Furnaces’ “Tropical-Iceland” and The Beatles‘ “I Dig a Pony.” Ponies are loaded on Noah’s Rockin’ Ark. Ponies are off the board. It’s time we move onto to a new pair of animals, perhaps puffins.

Here’s an earlier Last Man Standing that will get you half the way there.

Entries for this Last Man Standing will close at 7:16 am EST on Monday, January 14.

Overlooked Gems of The Beatles…Really?!?!

Posted by Mr. Moderator

Jan 092013

I guess no artist is picked over more than The Beatles. I still cycle through their works a few times a year. Well beyond my teenybopper years I’ve done things like sit on the floor with Beatles albums and books spread around me, pouring over them for new meaning, new connections—both to the band’s inner workings and my own wiring. We even talk about them here once in a while.

Your Rockin’ High School Hairdo

Posted by Mr. Moderator

Jan 092013

Watching this video over breakfast today made me nostalgic for my rockin’ high school hairdo. Maybe some of you reading this are still in high school or still rocking your high school ‘do. Some might say that, minus a few brush strokes under a blow dryer, my hairdo has barely changed. What rockin’ hairdo best represents your past glories?

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