Five Song Friday: You Are the Worst
This Week: Uncle Jesse, Codependent Adults and European Funk
Dear COVID,
I’m writing today to tell you that you are the worst.
You might not remember this, but we met once before. It was at a wedding at the end of last year.
You followed me home (uninvited) and hung out for a whole week. For seven days, you just lounged around making everyone miserable.
The last thing I said to you was, “Get out and STAY out!”
Obviously, you’re a terrible listener.
Because you came back.
You came back and you’ve mucked things up again for another whole week.
This time I won’t be so polite.
You’ve forced me to double click on the “Nasty File,” a folder full of industrial-grade insults that I keep on my desktop. These are things I would normally never say to my worst enemy, but you’ve forced me to make an exception.
Keep in mind that you’ve brought this upon yourself.
Since you can’t take a hint and don’t realize that everybody hates you, I will now unleash the raw power of the “Nasty File.”
Sorry, not sorry.
COVID, you are so ugly that you could be a catalog model for Tree Faces.
COVID, you are so dumb that you thought Paul Rudd was in Goonies.
COVID, your ankles don’t match.
COVID, your mom once told me that she cries herself to sleep every night. You know why? Your face.
COVID, you are so uncool that the National Model Railroad Association (NMRA) was like, “look at this dork.”
COVID, your beard looks like angry lettuce.
COVID, your credit rating is so low that they won’t even let you download the free app to check it.
COVID, you dance like everybody is watching.
COVID, your breath smells so bad that school children all the way in Colombia are like “¡Ay, Dios mío!”
COVID, you have bad posture and your stories are boring.
COVID, you are literally a disease.
I hope you get the message now.
You are not welcome here.
Please go, and stay gone.
Sincerely,
DJ CrankyPete
PS: Those pants definitely make your ass look fat.
Five Song Friday 026
“The Way I Made You Feel” - Ed Kuepper
Ed Kuepper is a founding member of the legendary Australian punk band The Saints. I don’t know Ed personally and I’ve never been to Australia, so the title of this song had me scratching my head.
How could he be singing about the way he made ME feel when we we’ve never even met? Did I meet him once and I don’t remember? Did I block it out of my memory because it was unpleasant or, God forbid, traumatic?
It really bothered me until I remembered how songs work.
What a relief to realize that he was singing about somebody else!
But then I couldn’t stop wondering WHO. Was it a past lover? A current romance? His dog? John Stamos? It was driving me CRAZY until I realized it was probably John Stamos and I should just stop thinking and enjoy the song.
“This Head I Hold” - Electric Guest
What do you think of when you hear the names Asa Taccone and Matthew “Cornbread” Compton?
If you’re me, you picture a couple of gangsters from the 1920s. Notorious bootleggers who’ve come down from the big city to stir up trouble. Their pictures are plastered in every post office and police station in the county. Don’t go looking for them unless you’re looking for trouble! That Cornbread, he crazy!
But if you’re a normal person, you probably assume Asa and Cornbread are two Los Angeles musicians better known as Electric Guest. And once again, the normal person answer is correct.
“This Head I Hold” is from their 2012 debut album Mondo. You can hear the same kind of catchy pop perfection that Taccone helped create as co-writer and co-producer of Portugal. The Man’s monster 2017 hit, “Feel It Still.”
You remember that song, right? The one that was everywhere for a full year? The one with over ONE BILLION plays on Spotify?
This song is like that song’s great grandpa.
“Baby Drugs” - Tristen
Tristen Gaspadarek is a singer-songwriter from Nashville. You’ve heard of Nashville. Not the movie by Robert Altman, I’m talking about the city in Tennessee. The one with all the music. That Nashville.
This song is from Tristen’s 2014 album, Charlatans at the Garden Gate. And before you get all bent out of shape, this is NOT about drugs for babies. I thought the same thing at first and I was like, oh boy, this is going to be upsetting. The last thing we need is for babies to hear songs that glorify drug use and encourage them to experiment with narcotics.
Babies have enough problems learning how to walk and going number two in their pants all day. It’s almost impossible to get babies down for a nap as it is. Can you imagine throwing crystal meth into the mix? Yikes.
Thankfully, this is just a normal song about emotionally codependent adults.
“Black Night Woman” - F.J. McMahon
F.J. McMahon released his first and only album, The Spirit of the Golden Juice, in 1969 after he returned home from the Vietnam War. The record was on a small label and didn’t make much of an impact then, but it turned into a proper slow burner and became a cult favorite among crate-diggers and folk-rock connoisseurs.
The album was reissued in 2017 and sparked new interest in the artist. You can find interviews with McMahon online, including one where he talks at length about his experience in the war, how it affected him and the way he captured some of those thoughts and feelings in songs.
In many ways, McMahon is like a folk-rock Rambo. But instead of coming back and destroying a small town and stabbing David Caruso in the thigh, McMahon crafts soulful songs about love, loss and the futility of fighting.
Which sounds much more fun than eating things that would make a billy goat puke.
“Beef Grinder” - Lexsoul Dancemachine
One of the things I do for “fun” is this online test about European geography. It’s a great way to spend eight minutes not working and it helps me realize that I’m much dumber than I initially thought.
But I get angry when the timer runs out and the correct answers are revealed. I yell at my computer and accuse it of “making countries up.”
Latvia? Moldova? COME ON, there’s no way that those are real. Slovakia AND Slovenia? Seriously? And I always forget about Estonia.
Forgetting about Estonia is something that probably breaks the hearts of the members of Lexsoul Dancemachine, who hail from that adorable little country tucked up in Northern Europe near Finland, Sweden and Russia.
Good news fellas! You can turn those frowns upside down, because thanks to your booty-wagging banger called “Beef Grinder,” I will never forget Estonia again.
Listen on Spotify
Listen on YouTube Music
(No link for the song “Baby Drugs” by Tristen, so YouTube Music folks get a video instead)
That’s all for now.
Thanks for reading!
“Virtually every writer I know would rather be a musician.” - Kurt Vonnegut