McCain: Hip? Or hip replacement?
Courtesy of Blender, the candidates each provide their Top Ten Favorite songs.
BARACK OBAMA
1. Ready or Not Fugees
2. What’s Going On Marvin Gaye
3. I’m On Fire Bruce Springsteen
4. Gimme Shelter Rolling Stones
5. Sinnerman Nina Simone
6. Touch the Sky Kanye West
7. You’d Be So Easy to Love Frank Sinatra
8. Think Aretha Franklin
9. City of Blinding Lights U2
10. Yes We Can will.i.am
OK, isn’t the inclusion of Yes We Can a bit … narcissistic? Or is he just tweaking me? On the other hand, I would definitely crank up the volume for Aretha, Marvin Gaye and the Stones.
JOHN McCAIN
1. Dancing Queen ABBA
2. Blue Bayou Roy Orbison
3. Take a Chance On Me ABBA
4. If We MakeIt Through December Merle Haggard
5. As Time Goes By Dooley Wilson
6. Good Vibrations The Beach Boys
7. What A Wonderful World Louis Armstrong
8. I’ve Got You Under My Skin Frank Sinatra
9. Sweet Caroline Neil Diamond
10. Smoke Gets In Your Eyes The Platters
Not bad — I’d crank up the volume for Sinatra, Orbison and (surprise!) Dooley Wilson.
OK, so now I gotta ask: Who’s on your iPod?
Since I’m far to cynical to think that these lists made it out to Blender without their own vetting committees, focus groups, and pollster, I’ll just note the glaring omission. Not a single Elvis Presley song? WTF? These campaign are being run by complete amateurs.
McCain – Not a single tip to Motown? And you got room for 2 ABBA songs? One Abba song puts you in touch with the whole Mama Mia thing, 2 is creepy. Oh, and going esoteric with Roy Orbison is useless.
Obama – Bad U2 pick. Not enough pandering to the demographic groups he needs to pander to. Needed Springsteen and whoever, not just Springsteen alone. I’m pretty sure that he has the will.i.am contingent locked up.
I don’t have an iPod, Ara, put the CD player in my car plays .mp3s and the current disk runs the gamut. About 200 songs from the 50s through current day; rock, pop, country, Motown, some wall of sound stuff, a little swing (the newer stuff), I think that about covers it. Now, turn about is fair play, your iPod?
Random Ten:
Stranger In The House Elvis Costello
Montery The Animals
Tropical Hot Dog Night Captain Beefheart
Cancer Joe Jackson
Hold On I’m Comin’ Sam and Dave
Love Me Do Beatles
Good Better Than Ezra
Do It Again Steely Dan
Cheap Sunglasses ZZ Top
Danny’s All Star Joint Rickie Lee Jones
Whew. It could have gone much weirder.
MJ and I like to burn mix CDs every so often. So when we took a short holiday at Gulf Shores, we did a mix CD that went like this:
Vacation — Vitamin C
All I’ve Got To Do — Beatles
All U Can Eat — Ben Folds
Soulfinger – The Barkays
Decatur — Sufjan Stevens
Dress Up In You — Belle and Sebastian
Falling Slowly — Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova
I Heard It Through the Grapevine — Gladys Knight & the Pips
Smells Like Compton (NWA vs. Nirvana) — Cheekyboy
I Like It Like That, Part I — Chris Kenner
Jesusland – Ben Folds
Memphis In The Meantime — John Hiatt
Shakin All Over — The Guess Who
Who Knows Where the Time Goes — Judy Collins
Cuyahoga — R.E.M.
Still – Elvis Costello
The Last High — The Dandy Warhols
As — Stevie Wonder
How about the rest of you? Eric? Mark?