As I got older and my virgin eyes and ears began to hit puberty I was drawn to a program on the USA Network called, "UP! All Night." It ran from 7 pm until the wee hours of the morning and was hosted by the skanktastic Rhonda Shear. Up! All Night was a weekly showcase for "B" movies and bad horror flicks. Since USA was a basic cable station these movies were edited down and didn't really have anything too intense or dirty but you still would probably not like to catch your children watching titles such as, "Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-a-rama." However, I defy you to find any kid who was between the ages of 10-17 during the 80's and 90's who didn't watch this show with some regularity. Even my sweet wife Wheels knew who Rhonda Shear was without any explanation and she was 7 when the show debuted in 1986.
So what does this have to do with anything? Well tonight I wanted to introduce another gimmick to the Skog Blog cannon. Friday Night Guilty Pleasures. Upon re-reading the blog post where I introduced the commenters on this here blog I realized that I had done a bad thing. I had broken promises and told secrets that were shared with me in confidence. It was not right that I told the blogosphere that Aaron Bell has a love that dare not speak its name with Amy Lee of Evanescense. Really he was trying to work through some issues and I was a bad friend. So to steal a phrase from Dr. Vanwarmer, "If Loving (whatever it is that you secretly love) is wrong then I don't want to be right..." That is my question tonight and every Friday night. Let's all share the things that we love but of which we are secretly ashamed. Let's help each other know that some of these things aren't so bad. Feel free to share with confidence the lame bands that we have on our mp3 players. The tv shows that we TIVO with shame. The shame ends tonight my blogger friends and readers.
So to start off I want to proclaim to you, the readers, that I love Air Supply. I'm not necessarily a hardcore fan but I'll be damned if I don't know every word to their greatest hits. I love that cd. LOVE IT. Perhaps it is because I have 3 older sisters who rocked the Good Air on vinyl. It might have been when my Grandpa's choir performed "You're Every Women In the World To Me" when I was but a young buck. Maybe it's the symmetry of their names (Graham Russell and Russell Hitchcock - you can't make this stuff up!) that intrigues me. I'm pretty sure, however, that it's their silky smooth falsettos and breath taking harmonies that make me swoon. So there it is people. Soft rock lives in the G House and thy name is Air Supply.
13 comments:
I am proud of all my musical selections, Beach Boys included. I have to head a different direction here and admit that unlike the rest of the world I cannot bring myself to like Jimmy Buffet or the Rolling Stones. I have tried and i just can't do it.
I tried to like the Greatful Dead, because after all, white poeple whi like Bob Marley are assumed to be the same ones who like the Dead. I can't do it. i don't hate any of them but after 1 minute of listening to any of these artists I realize I have been thinking about something else in the same way I could never pay attention while attempting math homework.
I will admit I had an INXS poster under my bead for two months before I got the guts to put it on my wall. My dad promptly asked me why I had a psoter of a girl on my wall...?
Ok, Ok, I probably shouldn't be proud of Natasha Bedingfield or Cham's Rude Boy Pledge.
I, too, love Air Supply and have their entire Greatest Hits Album streaming through my ipod.
But, how about this one - if loving Milli Vanilli is wrong, I don't wanna be right.
I do, I admit it...just blame it on the rain.
I am with you Ms. Corbie Jean. If loving Milli Vanilli is wrong then I definitely don't want to be right. Thanks for sharing that. I know it might have been hard to do so. Come on people keep sharing... this is therapy and it's free! While we are confessing pecadillos, how about this? If loving Milli Vanilli so much that you borrow their CD after you wear out your cassette from either Trent Maddox or Chet Hunter and then never return it is wrong then I don't wanna be right. I may have said too much.
By the way avid readers, I just got back from Albertsons and what tune comes on over the loudspeaker? "Lost in Love." I kid you not. Apparently the blogger gods have a sense of humor as well. Priscilla kept asking me why it was taking so long to scan and bag 1 can of baby formula and 3 bottles of Propel. It was all I could do to refrain myself from bursting into song. Frankly I'm ashamed that I didn't.
I believe there are levels of "If loving X is so wrong then I don't want to be right." You see, the group I like is so beyond anything you can imagine. I'm not sure I can even put it out there on the skogblog. I'm serious. As we speak I feel like I'm being peer pressured into revealing my darkest secrets..............I have a sick feeling in my stomach right now realizing that I'm about to admit something that very VERY few people know...........Ok, here it goes.............. if.....loving....THE SPICE GIRLS is wrong then I'm pretty sure I don't want to be right! There it is, alright! So call me a flamin' Brit, I don't even care. That's right, I'll tell you what I want what I really really want, and that is an occational tune or two from the Spice. Suzie even bought me some pencils when I was in collage. Each pencil had one of the Spice Girls on them. They were some real boss pencils.
By the way, Air Supply is nothing to be ashamed of. We've all been lost in love and didn't know much. After all, where else could a young man learn to 'konw just how to whisper, and know just how to cry, know just where to find the answers and know just how to lie. That one song taught us all so much. Kirk, never be ashamed of loving the good stuff. It could be worse, you could have a soft spot for uhem, the Spice.
After further review, I should have run a spell check on my post. Whoops-a-daisy.
Dave, just remember you can share anything (ANYTHING?) anything on the Skog Blog.
Okay, I have another one. If loving The Carpenters is wrong, I don't wanna be right.
And this has nothing to do with anything except that I feel confessional...if loving canned spray cheese on Chicken in a Biscuit crackers is wrong, I refuse to be right.
Wait until Spammon gets back in town...he has a few choice bands that should be therapeutic to confess.
Ok my most recent shameful secret was previously exposed by someone who I once considered a friend and confidant.
But now that we are confessing here goes.
My MP3 player adapter that runs from my MP3 to the cassette adapter (yes my car is cassette only) was not working one lovely spring day, the kind of day that you roll your window down and take in the Peach City smells.
So I had to use the ear-buds, and I was parked at a light in the fine town of Brigham City, Utah. What the other cars around me had the pleasure of hearing me pulling off a rather good rendition that started like this…
“HOW can you just leave me STAND DING”
“alone in a WORLD that’s SO COLD”
----world that so cold….
MAYBE I’M just to Demanding….maybe maybe….”
Maybe I’M JUST like my FATHER , tooooo bold
MAYBE I’M just LIKE MY MOTHER….”
Ok you get the picture, the 30 something mom with the two kids nearby were laughing a little but there was a hint of recognition in the woman’s eyes, a hint of excitement, something in her eyes that said OH yeah…I get what you are doing right now AND I LOVE IT!.
If loving the PURPLE RAIN album is wrong…I DON’T EVER WANT TO BE RIGHT.
You may mock me, but I have a feeling ALL of you are checking your music player (formerly known as an MP3 player), to see if you remembered to add a little PRINCE.
Well I raise my glass to you my shameful secret friends as we continue to make love out of nothing at all, because all we want all we really really want is to blame it on the PURPLE RAIN!!
Sidenote: My cousin Paul, and I survived a family reunion in Malad Idaho, that’s right…Malad, Idaho, because he had purchased Purple Rain album and we litened to it in his van for 4 hours straight.
Thanks again Paul, I raise my glass to you as well.
I have to admit I am a little surprised by kg's confession. I seem to remember a certain evening when Air Supply did not seem too enjoyable to you. Granted you had just had your wisdom teeth removed, were in a lot of pain, and Jenny and I had been singing Air Supply over and over with the newly purchased karaoke machine. But, how can Air Supply ever be wrong?
Carpenters - very good choice. No shame in that.
I have a problem. I am going to admit it here in this shame-free environment. I never ventured past my parents music taste. I am not proud of this. I realize that because of the company I am in most of my music listening will not be mocked: a little Barry Manilow, Neil Diamond, and Simon & Garfunkel. No problems there.
This one may cause a stir. If loving Bread is wrong, I don't want to be right. Now many of you may be confused by that statement. I am not talking about the bakery-bought sandwich-making goodness. I am talking about the 70s band. After one of my coworkers heard me listening years ago, they mocked me for months.
There is nothing like "Baby I'm-a want you; Baby I'm-a need you."
There you go. My Saturday night confessional.
On a side note, does anyone understand the song and title "Even the Nights are Better"? Wouldn't it seem obvious that the nights are better now that we're here together? Maybe a more appropriate title would be Even the Days are Better.
I justify my many guilty pleasures in pop music with a quote from Duke Ellington: "If it sounds good, it is good."
And Air Supply sounds oh, so good. Yes, I am an "Air" head like many of the rest of you. Air Supply was peaking during my junior high years, a serendipitous alignment that made Air Supply a part of who I am. I list a few outward manifestations of the influence that powerhouse duo has had on me:
1. I have seen them in concert not once, but twice.
2. I waited in line for over an hour after the show in Sandy to get my copy of the album "The One that You Love" (yes, the one with the hot-air balloons) autographed.
3. In eighth grade, I actively sought out Natalie Rogers to dance with when they played "Every Woman in the World" because I thought she was. As it turns out, she was more my fantasy than my reality.
I have to agree with Kim--Air Supply lyrics don't always make sense. Who among us has really laughed themselves to sleep and then woken up lonely? Why does he call her a "girl" right before he says she's every "woman" in the world? I don't let these things bother me; I just let the music wash over me in waves of vague romantic notions.
If loving syrupy music by an Australian Pop duo clad in red jump suits is wrong, I don't wanna be right.
Kim - An old college boyfriend and I decided that Bread was 'our' cd. We listened to it so often that we wore out one copy and had to buy another one. Then, when we broke up, one of the two cds of his that I had to return with his 'stuff' was Bread. The other was Soul Asylum which admittedly is an odd match but whatever. The point is, you aren't the only crazed Bread fan so you need not be ashamed - but thanks for coming out of the shadows so the rest of us feel safe to confess :)
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