Shuffle shuffle

Children’s Story – Slick Rick
I actually first heard the beat on a 12” single by Capelton, a dancehall reggae singer. Then I heard Tricky’s remake. This is the best version. I’ve always liked the way Slick Rick raps, with that British accent he truly stands out.

Bang This In The Club – Girl Talk
Juan was right. His first cd isn’t as good as the second one, Night Ripper. This is from Unstoppable. It’s ok but like Juan said….

Float On- Modest Mouse
This is from a Mojo compilation selected by U2. This is from the album of the same name, released in 2004. Johnny Marr formerly of the Smiths is now in the band. It’s actually a pretty good song which I would have never heard if it wasn’t for the shuffle and U2, those bastards.

Psycho Killer – Talking Heads
One of their best known songs and hardly representative of what they really sounded like. This was a minor hit from 1977, but this is a version from their live album, The Name of This Band is Talking Heads, (1980-1981), which is when I saw them at the Wollman Rink in Central Park, August 1980 with my brother Frank.

Brooklyn- Mos Def
Another great rapper and a good actor as well. I bought this just for the cover, which is a deep photograph of his face, and it’s a handsome face, very unique. And his literate lyrics are cool too. A shout out to his borough.

Let’s Get Down – Toni Tone Tony
I love Raphael Saadiq’s voice and he definitely has a great stage presence. I saw him in Lucy Pearl at Irving Plaza about 6 years ago, he was all smiles. Currently rumored to be a part of a gay circle of friends, including Kanye West and John Legend, but of course that could just be jealousy on someone’s part, not that it would be a bad thing. On the contrary, it would be great if they were.

No Woman, No Cry – Bob Marley and the Wailers
Another world famous anthem from Bob. Never tire of hearing this one, but then again I don’t hear it as often as I used to. Also probably one of Bob’s most covered songs.

Pass the Pusheng Teng – Frankie Paul
A classic reggae song from the collection, The Story of Jamaican Music. I was with Julio trying to buy the boxed set only to find the last one snapped up by Richard Gere who was in front of us online at Tower Records.

House of the Rising Sun -Bob Dylan
The other Bob, from his first or second album. You can imagine Alan Price of the Animals figuring it out on his keyboard. I prefer the Animals version, not meant as a dis to Bob.

Romantic Rights- Death From Above 1979
Finally, something contemporary, from this century, courtesy of Juan. Heavy guitars and a great drummer. They probably are great live, very powerful.

That’s it shuffle wise. Today was very hot, I just stayed indoors and took a nice nap. I tried watching the Prestige, but it couldn’t hold my attention and didn’t really care much for the characters. Let me put it this way, when David Bowie appears as Nikolai Tesla, I pulled out my acoustic guitar and did a search for Bowie songs to play. Not a good sign when you’re watching a movie.

Friday. Took the day off. Last night hung out with Bill and Juan again, and we watched Four Brothers, by John Singleton. Just about everything about the movie was a film cliché. Easy to figure out who was going to get killed. It was the youngest brother. The gay one. Might as well have been wearing a red shirt ala Star Trek. It was ok though I only wanted to watch a little bit before something else, but Bill came home then Juan came over and they were both more into it than I was. Juan was good to say snarky comments with.

Then we watched a repeat of the Office, the Beach episode. Very good, followed by Scrubs, and you know how I feel about Scrubs. I was tired before Bill cam home and Juan came over, but a few glasses of California Chardonnay took care of that. Bill went to sleep a little before 11:00 and Juan left at 11:30. I had a good night’s sleep, thanks to the wine. Woke up at 6:00, without an alarm clock which sucked since I had the day off, but wound up going back to sleep after Bill kissed me good bye and he went off to work.

I showered, made some coffee and soon I was headed to Washington Street to get a bagel and the papers. The sun was damn hot at 8:30 and I could feel my skin being seared. Got a cinnamon raisin bagel and got the News and the Post and headed home. I decided to go to Radio Shack to get a small cheap speaker for mu iPod, thinking that it would be good for brother Frank to hear some music that he’s familiar with. After doing that it was all about standing in the heat watching every bus but mine go by.

I called up Bill and once again vented my frustration at NJ Transit. He listened and admirably played the role of customer service which was actually better than the real thing. He listened and looked up various other schedules, but the bus I needed pulled up. Luckily for me the driver was nice and dropped me off a block earlier which enable me to walk up the hill to Weehawken just as the 163 to Hackensack was pulling up. That’s karma in action I guess. The Karma Bank. Where it pays to be good.

I got to the hospital and Frank was sleeping in bed. That was fine, I just sit there and read the paper for a few minutes when he woke up. He was looking better than Monday for sure. I hooked up the tiny speaker and played an instrumental version of Darlin’ by the Beach Boys which through him for a second, but I think he enjoyed it since it was the first time in days that he actually heard some music. I enjoyed being the DJ for my brother. I’m glad I downloaded that song by Royksopp, Remind Me. It turns out he likes it and didn’t know that I had burned it for him on one of the discs I sent him last week.

90 degrees today.