Sheila E. was born on this date in 1957. A handful of track from her are included on today’s playlist.
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Your (Almost) Daily Playlist: 9-5-22
Today’s playlist celebrates the September 5 birthdays of Queen’s Freddie Mercury, En Vogue’s Terry Ellis, Inner City’s Kevin Saunderson, Al Stewart, Loudon Wainwright III, and The Impalas’ Joe “Speedo” Frazier; and the September 6 birthdays of Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters, The Cranberries’ Delores O’Riordan, Jimmy Reed, The Cardigans’ Nine Persson, Macy Gray, Sylvester, N.O.R.E./Noreaga, CeCe Peniston, Nightcrawlers’ John Reid, Dum Dum Girls’ Dee Dee, and Foxy Brown.
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Throwback Thursday: 1992
It’s Throwback Thursday, and on today’s playlist we go back to 1992. Compiling this list made me notice (or remember) what a kickass year for music 1992 was. The success of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” a top ten pop hit around the world months after it was sent to alternative radio, came as a complete surprise to the band’s record label and management, and seemed to kick open the doors for weirdos and freaks (I use those terms affectionately) to find their place in the sun and on the charts.
The left field entries weren’t solely from the guitar rock field. Shakespear’s Sister’s “Stay” was a song (or two songs) that stood out from the pack and was not something one would have expected from a former member of Bananarama and someone who co-wrote and sang backup on Eric Clapton’s hit “Lay Down Sally.” And Right Said Fred’s “I’m Too Sexy” endures all these years later.
To me this era was a golden age for hip hop. Arrested Development, Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth, Kris Kross, Das EFX, Sir Mix-A-Lot and House of Pain hit creative peaks, while rap duo P.M. Dawn hit number three with “I’d Die Without You,” an unexpected ballad with nary a hint of the hip or hop.
Nineteen ninety-two was the year we met Mary J. Blige and Billy Ray Cyrus. It was the year many more people got to know Red Hot Chili Peppers, k.d. lang and En Vogue. And while new names were dotting the Hot 100, there was still room for more hits from Michael Jackson, Madonna, Prince, Whitney Houston and U2.
Here are thirty musical highlights from 1992, a year that most definitely was not wiggida wiggida wiggida wack.
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Your (Almost) Daily Playlist (9-6-20)
Inspired by the September 6 birthdays of Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters, Macy Gray, Sylvester, the Cardigans’ Nina Persson, the Cranberries’ Dolores O’Riordan, Jimmy Reed, CeCe Peniston, N.O.R.E., Foxy Brown and Dum Dum Girls’ Dee Dee.
It’s Alicia Bridges’ Birthday And I Need To Dance!
“I will never do a disco album. I’d prefer to do deodorant commercials. I didn’t sing since I was ten years old so I could stand up like a moron and go ‘Getfunkynow, getfunkynow, getboogie-woogie, getfunkynow’.”
– Alicia Bridges, Sounds magazine
Alicia Bridges. You know, the lady who sang “I love the nightlife, I gotta boogie on the disco round.” She co-wrote that song as well. That record is a disco classic, peaking at #2 on the Billboard Disco chart. It crossed over to the pop chart, hitting #5, and the r&b chart, where it reached #31. It was Bridges’ only top 40 hit on any chart. Nowadays she shills for Arrid Extra Dry. Not really.
Today, Alicia Bridges turns 63 years old. Friday is dance day at Tunes du Jour, and we’ll celebrate Ms. Bridges’ birthday with a playlist she’s bound to hate, full of disco hits, kicking off with “I Love the Nightlife (Disco ‘Round).” Getboogiewoogie!
Oh, and what is a disco round?
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It’s Cher’s Birthday And I Need To Dance!
In the early 1990s a demo of a song written by four men circulated through Warner Bros. Records. Though people at the label appreciated the song’s chorus, nobody wanted to record it.
Thinking that with some work the song may be good for Cher, whose last top ten pop hit was 1989’s “Just Like Jesse James,” Warner sent the demo to London’s Metro Studio, where two additional songwriters took a stab at improving the composition. Producers Mark Taylor and Brian Rawling created a dance track for the revised song, which they presented to Cher. She liked it.
She recorded the song. She and her producers played with a new technology called Auto-Tune, which added a robotic sound effect to her voice. When Warner heard that, they asked that it be removed, but Cher was adamant it stay.
In October of 1998, more than a half-decade after the composition’s original incarnation, Warner released Cher’s recording of “Believe.” On March 13, 1999, the song, the first pop tune to feature Auto-Tune, became Cher’s fifth #1 single in the United States, making her, then age 52, the oldest woman to top the US charts. It was her first #1 single since “Dark Lady” in 1974, the longest span ever between #1 records. It was the biggest-selling single stateside of 1999.
The record hit #1 in the UK, where it became the best-selling single of all-time by a female artist. It also topped the charts in Germany, Canada, The Netherlands, Australia, France, Sweden, Italy, Spain, Belgium, Norway, Denmark, Switzerland, New Zealand and Ireland.
Today the woman born Cherilyn Sarkisian turns 70 years old. Our weekly dance party kicks off with “Believe.” Have a superb weekend!
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Throwback Thursday – 1992
Prior to Nirvana, alternative music was consigned to specialty sections of record stores, and major labels considered it to be, at the very most, a tax write-off. After the band’s second album, 1991’s Nevermind, nothing was ever quite the same, for better and for worse. Nirvana popularized punk, post-punk, and indie rock, unintentionally bringing them into the American mainstream like no other band to date.
– AllMusic
It’s the Song that Broke Punk, the incantation about self-despising entertainment that turned a dead-end Aberdeen kid into a supernova, the very last rock song everyone could rally around.
– Pitchfork
The song that changed everything, “Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” was released as a single in September 1991. It reached #6 on Billboard’s Hot 100 in January of the following year, and kicks off this week’s Throwback Thursday playlist focusing on 1992.
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It’s Jesus’ Birthday And I Need To Dance!
Actually, today is not Jesus’ birthday. At least not Jesus Christ’s birthday. Maybe Jesus de la Guarda of East L.A. was born on this date in 1983 (happy birthday, Jesus!), but Jesus Christ was not.
Most likely, Jesus (Christ, not de la Guarda) was born in autumn, perhaps on November 18. Not only is December 25 not His birthday, but 0 was not His birth year, according to some scholars. The assumed year of His birth is 6 to 4 B.C. That means Christ was born six to four years before Christ! He was truly ahead of his time! Ba-dum-bump.
Regardless of when His actual birth date was, folks in many parts of the world celebrate it today, because nothing is open anyway so why not?
As for me, I need to dance! The Tunes du Jour weekly dance party kicks off with Snap!’s “Mary Had a Little Boy.” Happy birthday, Jesus de la Guarda!
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It’s Friday And I Need To Dance!
“You’re gettin’ busy like a bee and that’s the troof
I got a feeling there’s a fire on the roof.”
– “Wiggle It” by 2 in a Room
The phrase “busy like a bee,” or at least a variation thereof, dates back to the 14th century, when Geoffrey Chaucer used it in his The Canterbury Tales:
Ey! Goddes mercy!” sayd our Hoste tho,
Now such a wyf I pray God keep me fro.
Lo, suche sleightes and subtilitees
In wommen be; for ay as busy as bees
Be thay us seely men for to desceyve,
And from a soth ever a lie thay weyve.
And by this Marchaundes tale it proveth wel.
What on earth is he banging on about? Next time, Chaucer, use Spellcheck.
Per Wiktionary, the phrase “busy as a bee” means very active, working constantly.
The phrase is a bit of a misnomer, though. Not all bees work constantly. Take the drone. Unlike other bees, the drone does not collect nectar or pollen. The drone does not participate in the construction of the hive. Drones don’t have stingers so they are unable to cause pain to the frightened blogger who runs shrieking at the site of a bee. Per Slate.com, drones “don’t leave the hive until early afternoon, at which time they carouse around in packs, and when they get home just a few hours later, they rely on the worker bees to feed them.” Drones are assholes.
The drone exists to fertilize a queen bee. The mating takes place while the bees are in flight. Literally, they give a flying fuck. From penetration to ejaculation takes about two seconds, which to me is forty seconds shorter than sex should last. The drone dies soon after, as his penis and other much-loved body parts are ripped off during sexual intercourse. Any drones reading this, take it from me – no woman is worth that aggravation, and that’s the troof.
Friday is dance day at Tunes du Jour. This week’s party kicks off with 2 in a Room’s “Wiggle It.”
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