4 posts tagged “ben folds”

When we'd been dating about a year (and some change), my husband burned me a compilation CD, a.k.a. the late 90s version of a mixed tape, on Valentine's Day.  [These are the memories you have when you start dating in high school.]  He titled it "Our Songs".  I cherished that CD. 

We took it in the car with us on our date that evening, and when he brought me home later and walked me to the front door, I said as I lovingly looked at the CD in its case with custom cover printed out on the laserjet and folded into the front case panel, "I am going to be SO careful with this."  T-minus 0.01 seconds later, I dropped the CD, the case smashed in two pieces and the CD rolled out and eventually landed, face down, on the cement.  We both just stood there mouths agape, silent.  Then we laughed so hard we about peed our pants.

Music has been a common thread for my husband and I, even before we started dating.  In fact, the first time I ever remember hearing his name was in the same sentence as a Weezer song.  My friend Hollie in the seventh grade said, "My boyfriend, Andy, really likes the song 'Buddy Holly'."  My husband and I are approaching the 10-year anniversary of being together (dating, that is - we've only been married 2.5 years) and, what,13 years of knowing each other, I realized that there are 13 years of songs that touch different parts of my memory with him.

Case(s) in point, [I'll upload these tracks back at home if I get the chance later today]:

1. Pearl Jam: "Jeremy" is a dark schoolbus ride back from the University of Illinois after watching our high school football team play Champaign Centennial High at Memorial Stadium.  Everyone sitting two to a seat.  My friend and I passing the time singing songs that we knew.  We started singing "Jeremy" and Andy's head whipped around so fast his neck might have broken.  He never knew I liked his music.  Then he started singing too.
2. Barenaked Ladies: "One Week" is sheepskin seat covers in my coveted spot in the passenger seat of Andy's old rusty white Jeep Cherokee.  Windows rolled down, singing out the window with our other friends - in cars in front and behind us - all caravaning out to our spot in the country.  Most of us didn't have our driver's licenses yet, so we all hitched with our older, luckier friends.  Winning the front seat in his car was a prize to be much celebrated amongst the girls later.
3. Barenaked Ladies: "Pinch Me" is riding a ski lift in Breckenridge, CO, wiggling my toes to get the blood flowing again and singing so loud we feared we'd cause an avalanche.
4. Ben Folds: "The Luckiest" is hearing a song a hundred times, but listening to the words for the first time, together, live at a concert.  And the words hit home like a punch to the chest.

Pete Yorn is college dorm rooms, and Foo Fighters are a million mosh pits until mosh pits got scary - then they were assigned seats as close as we could get.  Pearl Jam is grassy lawns and blankets, and sometimes rain.  A lot of really wet rain.  Red Hot Chili Peppers' Californication album is the two of us steam-stripping really difficult wallpaper off my walls of the bedroom in my old house.

Ever since music became a part of my life, he was a part of my life.  And I was a part of his.  And we listen because it helps us remember what it felt like in the beginning and in the middle.  Someday this will be the middle.

I'm still here.  And I still have my job. Thanks to Runnergirl for pointing out that I hadn't made an update to that point.  :)

It just so happened that, on Black Thursday, I had the unfortunate coincidence of coming down with a cold.  In fact, my head is still so clouded that I'm pretty sure I didn't get that last sentence to my usual rhetorical standards.  (Is it possible to have an unfortunate coincidence?)  Regardless, I felt off on Thursday when I went in for my 5-minute "you still have a job" appointment, but Friday it blew up full out.  And I hate head colds.  The sore throat gets me the worst.  I stayed home on Friday, so I wasn't around for the cube-roaming and general gossip that occurs the day after a big layoff.  Now, a week later, I have a sinus infection, I'm on meds.  There's probably a good, nay, a hell of a good reason that my cold took a turn toward the antibiotics. 

Two concerts this week, ladies and gentlemen.  Of course, we don't listen to Brooks and Dunn or New Kids on the Block, so our artists of preference don't actually hit up the Dallas area on a weekend.  [Do you believe that we went to see the Stone Temple Pilots earlier this year on their grand reunion tour and the freaking concert hall was only 3/4 full?!?  Abominable.]

Concert Numero Uno: Weezer

Knee Pads!

They just came out with their third self-titled album (a.k.a. "The Red Album"), and this is their Troublemaker tour.  These guys - I don't really know how to say it, except - they are hilarious.  They remind me of my group of friends from high school.  Just a bunch of guys who seem to sit around and say, "You know what would be funny?  Fill in the blank."  The blank this time was:

• Rivers (the lead singer) grew a very scraggly mustache.
• There was an '80s single-trampoline on the stage.
• They all came out in white coveralls - Rivers was in a beige ski mask - then took the coveralls off to reveal matching red track suits.  Rivers' was torn through the knees to reveal underlying knee pads.
• From the stage, Rivers hopped on the shoulders of a huge bald security guard for a ride around the theater.  The sight of that shrimpy guy on the huge dude's shoulders reminded me of a guy riding an elephant.
• Weezer invited local, um, musicians to play onstage for a couple of songs.  Some of the more random instruments included the mellophone, the bass clarinet, the accordion and the spoons.

I'm With the Band

Concert Numero Dos: Ben Folds

What's in My Head

This concert was last night.  Held in the Palladium Ballroom - just a big huge room, the "seating" was General Admission, standing room only.  This, as we have gotten older, has become unbelievably annoying.  I used to enjoy thrashing around with the bodies of other sweaty teenagers, but now it just doesn't hold the same appeal, somehow.

But, between a choice of a mosh pit and no Ben Folds, I choose the mosh pit every time.  So we went.  And, well, Ben Folds' crowd isn't really a moshing kinda crowd anyway.

Missy Higgins

I think the highlight of this night was the opener, believe it or not.  Missy Higgins, an Aussie with an unbelievable voice, swept the crowd away.  She was cute as a button and her songs were both catchy and powerful at the same time.  Not often you're looking at complete strangers with wide eyes, shaking your heads at how amazing an opening artist's voice is.  Ben Folds, although originally from the U.S., now resides in Australia, his wife's native country with their twins.  He said he asked Missy to open for him on his tour merely because he was hoping she'd ask him to open for her tour next year.  She's apparently got a couple of albums out, and I'm gonna find 'em.  At one point in the show, Missy said, "I was on the Internet looking up slogans [I think she meant phrases] you use here in Texas.  There are a couple that we use in Australia too... like 'Reckon' and 'sugar'."  Then she went on to make a valiant attempt at using these phrases in context.  She finally wrapped before her next song by saying, "Y'all reckon this song'll sound like sugar?  HEEE-YAW!"  The audience was on the floor at the backward "yee-haw", just adorable.

Fashionable Frown

Ben Folds had just as much randomicity as the Weezer concert.  He had a token bassist and drummer with him, but there were two other guys on stage playing every other instrument in the book.  And on his song "Fashionable Frown", these two guys donned giant frowney faces and played the black and red key-tars - a Ben Folds staple.

Ahhhh, it was a good week.  And I'm on antibiotics to help my weary body fight off the infection that lack of sleep has allowed to take over.  Life is great.

Today is our second anniversary. 

Maybe not something to get all high-fivey about, but we've actually been together since 1998.  We were 16.  High school sweethearts and all that jazz.  No, we have never broken up.  Yes, we are the only really serious relationship we've ever been in.  (All our other 'relationships' before we started dating each other took place when we were 12 and 13.)  At random times throughout this year, we've marveled at the thought of being with someone for 10 whole years.  Our relationship has survived being teenagers in our parents' houses, starting college, being Greek (not so easy for the couples, typically), graduation, living long distance while he pursued career and I went to grad school, and relocating cross-country away from family.  All those major life changes and somehow we continue to manage to grow together. 

So since I'm feeling mushy today, I'll share our song.  This was what we danced to at our wedding.  The first verse hits home the most since Andy is self-admittedly one who bumps his nose a lot.  Finds 10,000 ways not to make a light bulb, that kinda thing.  But I've always been there, and I always will be.*

*I do so solemnly swear to get all this sugary sentiment out of my system today, and resume normal blogging procedures tomorrow.  ;)  But can I get a pass today?

The Luckiest

Ben Folds

Got the piano tuned on Wednesday, after two and a half painstaking weeks of acclimation to our home's climate.  The thing was out of tune when we got it.  It grew shriller and more discordant as time grew on.  Oh, and the Middle C stopped working too.

Thus, my beauty became the beast.  So much so that it sat lonely in the foyer for days at a time without being played.  I'd sit down and try once in a while.  The Forrest Gump theme, my go-to, gave me a headache, most of the notes running around high in the upper register.  I wasn't able to really, really learn anything new because syncopations, funky rhythms, and, oh hell, just basic runs are clunky and awkward when you hit a key like Middle C and you don't get any sound in return.  I squeezed Lennon's "Imagine" for all it was worth, being a pretty simple and straightforward song in the lower register where the tuning had stayed fairly stable.  There's only so far you can go with one song, though.

I just about kissed the piano tuner when he showed up at our house Wednesday night.  Not that I don't love seeing the guy anyway.  He's about our age, and a total musician.  Restores pianos for a living.  Not too many 20-somethings in that field.  He gave the piano some much needed TLC and now it not only sounds phenomenal, but it's easier to play.  The keys don't take as much force to depress, and I'm making fewer mistakes than ever.

I've got a half day Friday today, so I'm going to head over to the music store and peruse.  I'm shopping for two different kinds of classics.  Classic piano-heavy songs that my friends would know - think Elton, Lennon, etc - and Classical.  Except I've never had to pick my own classical before.  I've always had it handed to me, so I've played it, but never by choice.  My mom always loved Chopin and she had some Tchaikovsky stuff too.  Hmm, maybe I'll have to commiserate with her.  Then there's Gershwin and the like, older than Classic, newer than Classical.  Anyway, should make for a good discussion with the Friday afternoon music store clerks and clientele.

Last night, I tried my hand at a Ben Folds (Reinhold Messner) book that Andy bought me once upon a time.  I've been too chicken to play anything out of it before.  I quickly remembered why.  The guy is a mad kind of piano genius.  He doesn't read music.  Nor does he write it, on paper that is.  He hears it and his hands translate it.  Hal Leonard, aka a sheet music company - for those who aren't familiar, gets a big fat Kudos from me for even attempting a theoretical translation of Ben's art.  Slides, trills, 64th notes that you need to hammer with two pointer fingers, triplets comprised of 32nd notes, key signatures were you play all black keys except one.  The repeated measures aren't even true repeats.  They have one set of notes in a measure and a second set of notes in parentheses contained in the same measure.  The idea is to play the parenthetical set of notes on the repeat.  This makes me want to tear my hair out.  That is NOT a repeat.  Anyhow, enough gibberish.  There are probably no non-piano players still attempting to read this paragraph of nonsensical jargon.  ;)

So I'm off to the music store.  Wish me luck!  And if you have any suggestions/requests - shout em out!