People Who Understand You: Priceless

Had dinner tonight with Holly, one of my very favorite people on this earth — and one of Cup of Coffey's most loyal readers. It's liberating to spend an evening with someone who knows you better than most, who gets you, who just plain loves you. I'm one lucky girl.

The contentment of the evening reminded me of my favorite Mastercard commercial. I love these boys.



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R.E.M. :: Supernatural Superserious

The first single/video from Accelerate. Get up offa that thing and dance, kids!



When is the new album coming out? Have you superseriously not noticed the coundtown on the navbar?

Not long before I'm dancing on lawns in your East Coast town ...

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Mix Tape Friday: Guilty Pleasures

Sean at the palindromatic and entertaining Everything Is Pop, Pop Is Everything suggested a great mix tape: guilty pleasures. I love pleasures that leave me feeling a bit guilty, so let’s go there this week. There’s nothing more fun than a guilty pleasure song. You know it’s lame, you may be embarrassed if friends catch you listening to it — but you can’t help but sing along and give the tune your full music love and affection.

I have an electronic treasure trove filled with guilty pleasure songs — plenty to fill several mix tapes. But I reached out to the beloveds — Renae and the sister, HollyC and RCofCHS, French and Filegod, the Northwest Doppelganger and Swirlie Grrrl — to help me flesh out this week’s tape.

I’m dying to tell who suggested what, but their secrets are safe. I also wish I could tell some of the stories behind their choices — some are surprising, some are just damn funny — but those are their tales. They need to get their own blogs.

The beloveds and I are around the same age, so some of these — The Partridge Family, The Monkees, and Bread, in particular — were requested more than once. Interesting that a lot of our guilty pleasures are rooted in our childhoods; I hope you young’uns can appreciate the brilliance of this bopping banality.

Embrace your lameness!

Toni Basil :: Mickey

Avril Lavigne :: Girlfriend

R.E.M. :: Shiny Happy People (Hip Mix)

The Archies :: Sugar, Sugar

Shalamar :: Dead Giveaway

Josie Cotton :: Johnny, Are You Queer?

The Monkees :: I’m a Believer

Power Station :: Get It On (Bang a Gong)

Queen :: Flash Gordon

Def Leppard :: Photograph

Bon Jovi :: You Give Love a Bad Name

Lynyrd Skynyrd :: Gimme Three Steps

Tim Curry :: I Do the Rock

Kenny Rogers & The First Edition :: Something’s Burning

Lou Christie :: Lightning Strikes

Nu Shooz :: Lost Your Number

Mariah Carey :: Vision of Love

Christina Aguilera :: Dirrty

The Cowsills :: Hair

The Partridge Family :: I Think I Love You

Marshall Tucker Band :: Heard It in a Love Song

10CC :: The Things We Do for Love

The Fifth Dimension :: Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In

Wham :: Everything She Wants

Bree Sharp :: David Duchovny

Bread :: Baby I’m-A Want You

Barry Manilow :: Mandy

The Bee Gees :: Lonely Days

The Carpenters :: Superstar

Al Stewart :: Year of the Cat

And now for the lamest of the lame — and this one’s mine. I lost some of Favorite Boy’s respect when I ‘fessed up to this one:

Richard Harris :: MacArthur Park

We had the 45 of this Jimmy Webb classic growing up. The B-side was “Didn’t We”; I wanted to include that, too, but I couldn’t find a digital copy.

Bet you didn’t think I could pick an R.E.M. song that could rate as a guilty pleasure, did you? You underestimate me. Michael wanted to do an Archies-type song — and “Shiny Happy People” was born. Rumor has it he so hates the song, he gives all those residual dollars to charity. So we have Michael’s guilt and our pleasure whenever we dance to the song. This is a different mix, and it’s a bit more entertaining — especially when followed by the inspirational “Sugar, Sugar.”

“Everything She Wants” is one of my very favorite guilty pleasures. Whenever I hear it, I become George Michael. I emote. My hips move. I throw my arms wide and sing at the top of my lungs. It used to embarrass the Beloved Ex; he was always shushing me in fear that the neighbors would hear me. To hell with ‘em, I say!

If you monitor Shows I Gotta See on the navbar, you’ve probably giggled over this week’s show — a concert by one of this week’s guilty pleasurers. Yep, I’m goin’ all Manilow this weekend. The sister and I are taking my mother as part of her birthday celebration. Secretly, between you and me, I think I’m going to enjoy the show. Let’s hope this weekend’s snow forecast doesn’t shut down the Copacabana.

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Ryan Adams and the Beloveds

Is there anything better than a lovely autumn Sunday? It’s still a bit too hot here for October, but that didn’t stop my good day.

I spent the afternoon — the lovely, sunny, warm afternoon — at a neighborhood arts festival a few miles from my ‘hood. The Occasionally Beloved Engineer’s band played early in the afternoon, and I hate missing an opportunity to feed my inner groupie. The OBE’s band played a solid hour of damn good cover tunes — everything from The Clash to The Killers. I should pout, though, since OBE didn’t play an R.E.M. tune for me.

The Occasionally Beloved Engineer jams with his boys.

I also got a chance to hook up (and share a beer) with Scrivener and his daughters (his daughters drank apple juice) at the festival. His girls are lovely and lively, and I enjoy every minute I spend with Scrivener.

The heat and the beer went a bit to my head, but luckily I had just enough time for a late-afternoon nap before my night out.

Is there anything more luxurious than a Sunday afternoon nap?

And that night out was Ryan Adams and The Cardinals at the Fox Theater. Pal Cindee scored some good seats, and we prayed for weeks that we’d score Good Ryan.

We scored.

Ryan performed two sets, for a total of about two hours. He covered much of his catalog — “Sylvia Plath” and “Cold Roses,” “Two” and “Bartering Lines,” “Wild Flowers” and “Let It Ride” — and several more.

I think Ryan likes me. I’ve scored Good Ryan both times I’ve seen him — last night and last summer. Supposedly, Bad Ryan took the stage his second night last summer … because, I’m sure, he knew I wasn’t there.

My favorite song of the night closed out the first set. I went to the show with the most rabid Oasis fan in Atlanta, and the band starts playing the opening notes of “Champagne Supernova.” We’re squealing and jumping up and down — much like Scrivener’s daughters on the playground. But wait … the words aren’t quite right. Ryan and the band teased us with that opening to “I See Monsters.” Excellent!

Ryan didn’t talk much during the first set, but chatted a good bit during the second. He thought the Fox was “a nice joint.” He seemed relaxed and healthy. They didn’t play an encore and received some boos when they didn’t return to the stage — but a check of setlists from this year’s tour showed he isn’t doing encores this year. I would have loved to hear him play “Wonderwall” — but I’m glad he played well.

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