ken asked for it

So now everyone who reads this entire post will have to suffer the consequences of one person being curious about what has been on my mind, musically speaking, lately.

So, let's see. I've been thinking about what it must have felt like to be a wanted outlaw in the Olde West, for one.

Dang, those Jovi boys were so young and...big-haired. And glittery.

And I've also been thinking about what might be done with an inebriated seaman:

(I know for a fact this is a direct result of having SpongeBob SquarePants playing all too frequently in the background while I work). (There's also a "waddle, waddle, quack, quack" song that's been implanted in my brain by my daughter, who will be a pre-schooler for only one more week. Talk about bitter-sweet.)

Oh, let's see. For a whole host of reasons Wagner's Ride has been a recent cerebral staple lately (which sounds rather painful, I realize, after typing that). Maybe it's because Rush was playing some of his old bumper music the other day when I happened to be tuned in. Who knows.

Also, Shakira. Because it's one of the best running-on-the-prairie songs there is. Don't believe me? Come on out with your spandex pants and trail running shoes and try it some time. (That midget mummy in the video totally creeps me out, though.)

Speaking of Latin loveliness, nobody else brings it like The Gipsy Kings. Nobody. I saw them at the Greek Theater in Berkeley in another lifetime. They were amazing.

And finally: Dang it all if I can't stay away from this cutie pie. He makes it so durned hard to be glum (and is it even possible to resist someone who sings a line like, "Scootch on over closer dear and I will nibble your ear"?)

So, there you have it. A random look inside the musical mayhem happening inside my brain at any given moment. Thrilling, I know.

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dudes.

I'm so psyched. I'm sitting here in a Phoenix parking lot waiting for my husband to finish up one of his Microsoft re-certification tests, so I thought I'd get online and try to figure out who's going to be opening for Bon Jovi tonight.

It's DAUGHTRY!!!!!!!!

Okay, I thought I was excited before.....

:-D !!!!!!!!Follow @nicole_mcinnes

for those about to rock

I turn 38 tomorrow. Yup. Inching ever closer to the big Four-Oh. That's okay, though, because Oprah assures me that 40 will be the best year of my life. So, I'll have that going for me in a couple years.

For my gift this year the husband is giving us a trip down to Glendale to see Mr. Bongiovi and the gang. I can't wait. We saw them in San Jose a few years ago for the Have a Nice Day tour, and it was - DUDE - totally radical. I just hope Richie can hold it together long enough to play that night. Last time we saw the band he had just broken up with Heather, and it wasn't pretty. He still worked that six-string over, though.

I've been prepping my eardrums for the big event by traumatizing the speakers in my truck with the following:

A little Nickelback (because nobody holds a candle when it comes to Joseph Cambell-ish testosto-ballads. Gah - Chad Kroeger's voice makes me all goosebumpy. What a nice Canadian export.)

Queen (because Freddie was magic, and they walked the line of hard rockin' vs. sweet sentimentality so flippin' well)

Night Ranger (because, I'm sorry, who DIDN'T pound out this particular drum beat on their steering wheel in the 80's?) (Also, this video was partially shot at my high school's rival - Tamalpais High - which, incidentally, was where my junior year prom date went to school... and I've now officially crossed into TMI territory)

Finger Eleven (because they are essentially the love child of Franz Ferdinand and Metallica, with a disco ball hung over its crib. Also, David Sylvian - the patron saint of the Pretentious Twits of the Late 80's Association (PTL8A - of which I was a card carrying member) - has filed a paternity suit.)

And then I've been warming down with a little Jason Mraz, because...well, I don't know, actually. It could be that he has finally achieved universal domination by brainwashing all of us with this song. Even if that's the case, I still totally dig the chicken-and-egg theme.Follow @nicole_mcinnes

darlin', you give literature a bad name

As I said in an earlier post, we moved out here right around this time last year, when northern California was under water. Our son's new school opened a week later than it was supposed to after Christmas break (or whatever it's called out here - Religiously Neutral Holiday Vacation?) because of flooding and the subsequent Hazmat removal of simultaneously-discovered asbestos in the classrooms. The local library was another casualty of the floods, and since the town was already in the thick of a budget crisis and cutbacks to "non-essential" departments like the library, the beautiful old historic building was apparently really foundering. So, later in the year local writer Anne Lamott and a friend about whom she writes frequently, the amazing storyteller Neshama Franklin, held a fundraiser. (It was a cool thing to do, and I like A.L.'s writing. So don't think that I really think she gives literature a bad name, okay? I just think my choice of title is clever. Of course it won't be to those of you who weren't hair band fans in the 80's, but I'll just have to take my chances.) Though I tire more easily than I used to of having to endure Lamott's ideological rants in order to read her work, there's still something magnetic about both her prose and her person. For one thing, she's got the dry wit thing down pat. For another, she knows her audience and plays to them with flawless timing. So I suppose the onus is on me to understand that I'm likely to get less literary inspiration and more fawning over Ted Kennedy than I'd like when I read her work or attend her readings. And I'm not trying to pick on Lamott, by the way. My aversion to ideological ranting applies to writers and entertainers no matter what their political stripe. If you can protest in a way that brings something new to the intellectual table, I'm all eyes and ears. But just repeating your hatred for George W. Bush (or John Kerry, or Hillary) in the same way over and over again makes me want to - as Anne Lamott might say - stick a pencil in my neck (no matter how funny some of your other lines are). Now, Jon Bon Jovi bypasses this political proselytization tendency nicely, as my husband and I discovered during his Have a Nice Day tour back in February. There were no politics at the HP Pavilion that night - just tens of thousands of thirty-something rockers with their rocker children (and one enterprising guy in the lobby wearing an "I Love Hot Moms" t-shirt). I didn't even know JBJ was a card-carrying member of the Vast Left Wing Conspiracy until I saw a clip of his Oprah spot - and then again on Larry King. Which is fine - have at it when you're on the talk shows. Just remember that when I purchase tickets to your concert, I'm not looking to you for your political views. I'm looking to you to ROCK. ME. OUT. Which he did. And nicely, I might add.Follow @nicole_mcinnes