Friday Random Ten

The Friday Ten is back with a vengeance. Here is what iTunes served up for me today.

"Rescue Me" by Geoff Moore and The Distance*, Pure And Simple
"Hat Tamale Baby" by Clifton Chenier, Zydeco Essentials
"J'ai Deux Amours" by Madeleine Peyroux, Careless Love
"To Life" from the Fiddler on the Roof* soundtrack
"Didn't He" by PFR*, Pray for Rain
"You Are the Best Part of Me" by Neil Diamond, The Essential Neil Diamond
"A Whole New World" from the Aladdin soundtrack
"Prom Night in Pig Town" by Trout Fishing in America*, Truth Is Stranger Than Fishin'
"Daffodil Lament" by The Cranberries, No Need To Argue
"Tears In Heaven" by Eric Clapton, from the Rush soundtrack

It has been a tough week in Heatherville, so this was a great combination of songs, especially "Rescue Me", "To Life", and "Didn't He", to jerk me up by my bootstraps and keep going. It's funny how the iTunes library does things in cycles, and I ended up with three songs from movies this week. More exciting, though, is the debut of Trout Fishing in America on The Ten. I was introduced to these guys by an old boyfriend in college who took me to a concert, and I was immediately hooked. I love hearing a band for the first time in concert. It just gives you a whole different appreciation for the music that you don't get from just hearing the songs. They are so funny to watch perfom. The band is just two guys -- Keith and Ezra -- but they sound like they have a whole band playing with them. Keith is a short guy (5'5"ish) who plays the upright bass, while Ezra is a tall guy (6'8"ish) who plays electric guitar. The contrast of these two guys standing next to each other with their ill-fitting instruments made me laugh the first time I saw them. And then you listen to their music and you can't stop laughing. They seemed to load that concert with their kids songs, and those are all funny. Great mental images created, so much so, that I'd bet they'd make nice illustrated chidren's books. The adult songs are generally still funny, but in a drier and more subtle way, while some are downright poignant and depressing. The particular song that made The Ten this week is a recreation of a prom night as most of us are familiar with from high school. But here, the pigs aren't graduating from high school -- they are getting ready to be butchered. Not sure if these guys are vegetarians, but it does seem they are trying to tell us something here.

* Acts I've seen live. I counted Fiddler on the Roof because I saw a live performance of it as a kid. Not really an act, but live, nonetheless.