Musical Monday #167

Welcome to the 167th edition of Musical Monday, with the challenge, as always, to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs.

It's a single theme today, though #24 bends the rules a bit. Could have probably found several more good examples, but after three weeks, I wanted to get this posted today. Feel free, as always, to add bonus lyrics of your own!

1) "A sacred gift of heaven, for better, worse, wherever"
2) "Smile and grin at the change all around"
3) "All I need is a TV show, that and the radio"
4) "Your black cards can bring you money"
5) "And he just smoked my eyelids and punched my cigarette"
6) "Insisting that the world keep turning our way"
7) "You know the first time I traveled out in the rain and snow"
8) "But we both know the life I'm livin, and we both know the reason why"
9) "And I had to take it slowly just to make the good parts last"
10) "I lost him once through friends advice"
11) "No jolts, no surprises, no crisis arises"
12) "Or will I have to suffer and cry the whole night through?"
13) "Like a drifter I was born to walk alone"
14) "I can't remember half an hour since a quarter to four"
15) "You're messin' up my mind an' fillin' up my senses"
16) "Talk to me, like lovers do"
17) "Like a bird, you know she would fly, what can you do"
18) "See for yourself you have been sitting on a time bomb"
19) "Pay the grocer, fix the toaster, kiss the host goodbye"
20) "All the words have been spoken and the prophecy fulfilled"
21) "Chills my soul right to the marrow"
22) "All the empty yesterdays have disappeared"
23) "One day soon you're gonna reach sixteen, painted lady in the city of lies"
24) "To think that only yesterday, I was cheerful, bright and gay"
25) "Tried so hard to make you see, but I couldn't find the words"
26) "Staring at the green door living in the sky"
27) "But I put my heart above my head"
28) "So much of this left to begin; where would I be?"
29) "I try to forget and yet, still rush to the telephone"
30) "The way I hold you when the night just seems to fly"
31) "But like the sun we watched it fade away, from morning into lonely night"
32) "You get enough germs to catch pneumonia"
33) "A fool will lose tomorrow reaching back for yesterday"
34) "Don't stop the flow, we can't let go"
35) "Like Columbus in the olden days, we must gather all our courage"
36) "Been down one time, been down two times"
37) "Just string her along; it's just not right"
38) "C'mon you little fighter, no need to get uptighter"
39) "I played with your heart, got lost in the game"
40) "Every single time I roll across the rolling River Tyne"
41) "We lost what we had, that's why it hurt so bad, it set us back a thousand years"
42) "When ol' Lynyrd Skynrd's pickin' down in Jacksonville"
43) "Doctor, my woman is comin' back home late today"
44) "And still I head that sharp tongue talking, talking tangled words"
45) "There are times when I look above and beyond"
46) "There's no fight, you can't fight, this battle of love with me"

Good luck and enjoy!

Musical Monday #166

Welcome to the 166th edition of Musical Monday, with the challenge, as always, to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs. Sorry it's been a while since I've posted one of these! I hope to be getting to them out, if not weekly, then at least a bit more often than monthly. Meanwhile, here's today's! (The solutions to the last several MMs have finally been posted as well.)

Songs 31-35 this week form a separate sub-theme, similar but not quite the same as the main theme. Note also, song #30 bends the rules a bit.

1) "Hardly anyone has seen how good I am"
2) "But the point is probably moot"
3) "The National Guard stands around his door"
4) "Like a storm in the desert, like a sleepy blue ocean"
5) "Pisces, Virgo rising is a very good sign"
6) "With words that tear and strain to rhyme"
7) "Even though he could have smashed through any bank"
8) "Shreds of news and afterthoughts and complicated scenes"
9) "Suddenly the heavens rolled, suddenly the rain came down"
10) "There was a Checkpoint Charlie"
11) "I wanted to be the all American kid from New York"
12) "I open up the paper, there's a story of an actor"
13) "Conscience was related, man he was created"
14) "There was just enough room to cram the drums"
15) "I could tell she liked me from the way she stared"
16) "And the operator says, 40 cents more"
17) "I've gotta stand tall, you know a man can't crawl"
18) "There's a sadness hidden in that pretty face"
19) "Out on the train yard, nursin' penitentiary"
20) "Ohhh, to the hand that takes your dreamless soul"
21) "Wishing to avoid an unpleasant scene"
22) "Well, it hurt me so to see them dance together"
23) "But she grew up tall and she grew up right"
24) "I went to get some help, I walked by a Guernsey cow"
25) "Never mind the weather"
26) "I live in a silver mine and I call it Beggar's Tomb"
27) "Soldier on; only you can do what must be done"
28) "You're such a lovely audience"
29) "Laughing about the way they want him to be"
30) "Across from the medical center"

31) "But she knows what that'll get her"
32) "Her dog day's just begun"
33) "Cat somehow lost his baby down on Bleecker Street"
34) "I look in the poolhall. Is he here?"
35) "I walked to Apollo by the bay"

Good luck and enjoy!

MM #166 Coming Soon!

Yes, it's been a very long break since the last Musical Monday. I haven't quit, just been very busy. I do have #166 almost done and should be posting it this Monday 12/27. Others will hopefully follow, though I can't say at what intervals. Stay tuned for the tunes!

Musical Monday #165

Welcome to the 165th edition of Musical Monday, the (sometimes) weekly quiz that Soccer Dad and I (had) alternate(d) hosting. As Soccer Dad has suspended his blogging for the present, the future schedule of MM is somewhat in question. But meanwhile, the challenge today, as always, is to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs.

This is a theme I've wanted to do for a long while, but hesitated because there are so many songs that are borderline matches for the theme, making my selections perhaps more subjective than I usually like. Hopefully my criteria won't seem too arbirtrary!

1) "Can't trust that day"
2) "I go back to the top of the slide"
3) "Mr. M.D."
4) "They long to persuade you from my side"
5) "But now I'm tired and I don't want to walk anymore"
6) "I swear it's not too late!"
7) "Knock down the old brick wall, and be a part of it all"
8) "And love so distant and obscure"
9) "In a world of persecution, that is burning in its greed"
10) "Here we go again, asking where I've been"
11) "You say why, and I say I don't know"
12) "On the wind that lifts her perfume through the air"
13) "Dance to the Eurobeat"
14) "Mary, have you seen better days?"
15) "And we're on our way, no we can't turn back"
16) "Mercy woman, plays a song and no one listens"
17) "Kids are huddled on the beach in a mist"
18) "We were just young and restless and bored"
19) "The purple piper plays his tune, the choir softly sing"
20) "The devil he told me to roll-oll-oll-oll"
21) "Always know sometimes think it's me"
22) "I don't wanna be a candidate for Vietnam or Watergate"
23) "She's a juvenile scam, never was a quitter"
24) "Some of them cries about it, some of them dies"
25) "Use your mentality, wake up to reality"
26) "Dinosaur Victrola"
27) "And they've chained him to a chair"
28) "When mountains crumble to the sea"
29) "And she gave Tchaikovsky back"
30) "The drummer relaxes and waits between shows"
31) "A requiem was never sung, no elegy was read"
32) "Don't let them say your hair's too long"
33) "Keep on doin' the jerk"
34) "All the right words but still you run away"
35) "…the baggage retrieval system they've got at Heathrow"

Good luck and enjoy!

Musical Monday #163

Welcome to the 163rd edition of Musical Monday, the weekly quiz that Soccer Dad and I alternate hosting. As always, the challenge is to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs.

This week's theme is a joint effort of the two hosts, based on an idea first suggested by my co-host. Two quick notes:
- #36-37 have no lyrics quoted, hopefully by now you know what that means!
- #38-40 meet the theme in a different way than the rest.

1) "Some are satin, some are steel"
2) "I left my home in Georgia"
3) "All the school kids so sick of books"
4) "We’ll take your car and drive it"
5) "Said woman take it slow, it'll work itself out fine"
6) "But I'm trapped by your love and I'm chained to your side"
7) "But the press let the story leak"
8) "A pie in the face for being a sleepy bull toad"
9) "An August summer night, soldiers passing by"
10) "You and me chasing paper, getting nowhere"
11) "I was swallowing my pain"
12) "And I had a cup of tea and butter pie"
13) "I brought you a crate of papaya"
14) "Say the devil is my savior"
15) "Now it all seems light years away"
16) "You're always window shopping but never stopping to buy"
17) "He may have to litigate"
18) "I heard she threw the letter away"
19) "Once I'm begging you save her little soul"
20) "Willi is happy again"
21) "But tomorrow might not be here for you"
22) "Oh with an aching feeling inside, cutting me up, deeper and deeper"
23) "Vernon'll meet me when the Boac lands"
24) "She gives me a smile, and cuddles her cheek to my chest"
25) "And stories of old to be rolled out like carpets"
26) "She's passed out on the floor"
27) "Gore blimey, hello Mrs. Jones!"
28) "Oh arm and arm we are the harmless sociopaths"
29) "Wake up, there's a new kid in the town"
30) "If you knew my story word for word, had all of my history"
31) "From the corner of my girlfriend's four-post bed"
32) "You know I’m sorry, I’ll prove it with just one kiss"
33) "When you're feeling in the dumps, don't be silly chumps!"
34) "Try to be just like a cheerful chick-a-dee"
35) "Take the straight and narrow path, and if you start to slide..."
36) "" (1971) (Magic)
37) "" (1960) (TV theme, great fit for this MM)

38) "I'll watch the people go shuffling downtown"
39) "Keep pushin' for the fortune and fame"
40) "You were my thrills, you were my pills"

Good luck and enjoy!

Musical Monday #161

Welcome to the 161st edition of Musical Monday, the weekly quiz that Soccer Dad and I alternate hosting. As always, the challenge is to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs.

There's a single theme this week, but I cheated just slightly to make the last two songs qualify!

1) "To forget about life for awhile"
2) "In fact, it’s cold as hell"
3) "Knows not where he's going to"
4) "When will you pay them back?"
5) "Them delta women think the world of me"
6) "Played inside the months of moon"
7) "'fore I can talk to the boss"
8) "Has he thoughts within his head?"
9) "Forget your lust for the rich man's gold"
10) "White lace and feathers, they made up his bed"
11) "Cause never was the reason for the evening"
12) "Me and Sue, but that died too"
13) "I was educated from good stock"
14) "Like a coin that won't get tossed"
15) "Yes, I'm a sack of broken eggs"
16) "And I take myself out a nice cold beer"
17) "Call him Mister Eagle, dig his chains"
18) "Up with the sun, gone with the wind"
19) "Roll us both down a mountain"
20) "She dreams in color, she dreams in red"
21) "A beam of light will fill your head"
22) "Strapped to the wing with the engine running"
23) "But if you push me too far I just might"
24) "I took the prize last night for complicatedness"
25) "I went to night school for the blues"
26) "I got a lady in Cincinnati, a woman in San Anton'"
27) "You gonna run to the sea, but the sea will be boiling"
28) "In the customs hall the officer takes you to one side"
29) "And stamped a number over my face"
30) "Dip it in a dream"
31) "I was so surprised, I was hypnotized"

Good luck and enjoy!

Shabbos Rosh Chodesh Haftorah Question

It's been a long time since I've posted one of these liturgical quizzes - or for that matter much of anything besides my bi-weekly editions of Musical Monday. But here's an interesting question I thought up yesterday, relating to the special haftorah which was read for Shabbos Rosh Chodesh:

As it happens, this haftorah is actually ever read on just five out of the twelve months of a standard Jewish year. For which five months can it be read, and why is it never read on each of the other seven? Post your answers in the comments; a special Elie's Expositions no-prize to whoever gets the complete solution first!

Musical Monday #159

Welcome to the 159th edition of Musical Monday, the weekly quiz that Soccer Dad and I alternate hosting. As always, the challenge is to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs.

There's a single theme this week, but the last four songs relate to it in a significantly different way than the rest. And again, sorry for being a day late, not to mention probably a few songs short, but here goes!

1) "And my LP records and they're all scratched"
2) "Put a frog down my back at the Carroll County picture show"
3) "Left standing in the lurch, at a church"
4) "He freely gave to charity"
5) "That's what Mrs. Riordan said"
6) "Frameless heads on nameless walls"
7) "Lemon yellow sun, arms raised in a V"
8) "The worm he licks my bone"
9) "Through early morning fog I see, visions of the things to be"
10) "I don't care to know the hour, 'cause it's passing anyway"
11) "Hard to save money, when you're twenty years in debt"
12) "And the clocks waits so patiently on your song"
13) "Wine is fine but whiskey's quicker"
14) "Like the burning end of a midnight cigarette"
15) "Getting lost within myself, nothing matters no one else"
16) "Drying up in conversation, you will be the one who cannot talk"
17) "You could cut ties with all the lies"
18) "So take your lies, get off my case"
19) "I felt the earth on Monday, it moved beneath my feet"
20) "And my last ditch, was my last brick"
21) "I started a landslide in my ego"
22) "A rift in my family, I can't use the car"
23) "She has trouble acting normal when she's nervous"
24) "Now she's a swinger, dating a singer"
25) "I need a lawyer for my medical bills"
26) "Get your carpetbaggers off my back"

27) "Wait in your corner until that breeze blows in"
28) "Don't throw your hand, oh no, don't throw your hand"
29) "But we all bleed the same way as you do"
30) "Need some affection - you got it!"

Good luck and enjoy!

Musical Son Day IV

Here are audio links to the studio-mastered versions of Down the Road and Midnight In America, two original songs by my son Shalom's band The Flip.

For those in the NJ area, the Flip will be playing at the world-famous Stone Pony this Sunday, Sept 19, as part of their annual "Back to School Bash"! Time TBD - will update when known. Don't miss it!

Musical Monday #157

Welcome to the 157th edition of Musical Monday, the weekly quiz that Soccer Dad and I alternate hosting. As always, the challenge is to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs.

There are four separate song groups, each of which contributes differently to the theme. Despite an extra week off, as unfortunately that week didn't include much free time for me, this is a somewhat slimmer edition than average. Hopefully it will still present some challenge - more likely in the individual songs than the theme(s).

1) "We gonna do what they say can't be done"
2) "Put your faith in a miracle, and it's non-denominational"
3) "It was New Cross Station, I was going on home"
4) "There are giants out there in the canyons"
5) "I get the same old dream same time every night"

6) "Why do the white gulls call?"
7) "She lived all alone in Liddley Lane at number 22"
8) "Together we will love the beach, together we will learn and teach"
9) "I'll pretend my ship's not sinking"
10) "Over and over again, you're a fool-hearted man"
11) "Hundreds of flowers in full bloom, hundreds of people in each room"

12) "You may think the bands are not quite right"
13) "The iron ore poured, as the years passed the door"
14) "With George Pratt, his partner, and brother, Billy, too"
15) "Now the weight of intention carried the motion"
16) "Learned how to cry too young, so now I live to sing"
17) "Let’s show them Canada still cares"

18) "Got your hands full now, baby, oh as soon as I hit the door"
19) "And a little bit of raving madness"
20) "Tall white mansions and little shacks"
21) "Off the wind on this heading lie the Marquesas"
22) "Gonna make some front page news"
23) "Well I'm blue-collar branded and stuck in a mill"
24) "Free as a breeze, not to mention the trees"
25) "You sure have saved this man whose soul was in need"
26) "Out of self respect, I'm out of bread"
27) "But the days of our youth were numbered"
28) "Were we ever colder on that day?"
29) "First there came four pretty daughters"
30) "Elvin Bishop sittin' on a bale of hay"

Good luck and enjoy!

Musical Monday #155

Welcome to the 155th edition of Musical Monday, the weekly quiz that Soccer Dad and I alternate hosting. As always, the challenge is to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs.

A couple of notes on this week's edition. For any song below that may have multiple cover versions, I'm looking for a specific one, usually, but not always, the most well-known such. Also, although the songs aren't broken into separate sub-groups, extra precision will be required in correctly identifying the last few on the list. Finally, though I confess this edition required somewhat more research than usual, I'm equally sure that I forgot some really obvious candidates! Well, that's what you guys are for, right? :-)

Without further ado:

1) "Damn your love, damn your lies!"
2) "One more look and I forget everything"
3) "Take me to New York right away"
4) "On a boat with billowed sail"
5) "A kiss for luck and we're on our way"
6) "And your mind is moving low"
7) "Suspended under a twilight canopy"
8) "A butcher, a banker, a drummer and then"
9) "Some of them want to be abused"
10) "The babies just come with the scenery"
11) "I just can't believe the loveliness of loving you"
12) "Some guy brought sad into your happy world"
13) "I hold my pillow to my head"
14) "It's not for lack of bread, like the Grateful Dead"
15) "Mount your horses, draw your sword!"
16) "But some are altogether mighty frightening"
17) "Started out this morning feeling so polite"
18) "Let me tell ya', you are no exception to the rule"
19) "True love means planning a life for two"
20) "Lot of people take it for a game"
21) "Hear with your heart and you won't hear a sound"
22) "And when I'm sad, you're a clown"
23) "Then I never lost a minute of speed"
24) "You didn’t bat an eye, when I made you cry"
25) "Like a flower in a fairy tale I blossomed out"
26) "So don't refuse to believe it, by reading too many meanings"
27) "If you could return, don't let it burn, don't let it fade"
28) "Her weapons were her crystal eyes"
29) "Well, here's some spare change you can count!"
30) "No right no wrong you're selling a song"
31) "Now I don't want you back for the weekend"
32) "I got three passports, a couple of visas"
33) "Double cross the vacant and the bored"
34) "I ain't saying you ain't pretty"
35) "He smiled so I got up and asked for his name"
36) "You know you got it if it makes you feel good"
37) "Fat man sitting on a little stool"

Good luck and enjoy!

Musical Monday #153

Welcome to the 153rd edition of Musical Monday, the weekly quiz that Soccer Dad and I alternate hosting. This week we have a special guest contributor, TRN, who - as of course you already know - is one of our most avid weekly players! Thanks TRN for pitching in this week! And the best part is, now I get an extra week to play the game!

As always, the challenge is to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs.

1) ". . . a cobra snake for a necktie"
2) "If you want to keep something precious"
3) "There's a girl right next to you"
4) "We sang every song that driver knew"
5) "Friend only to the undertaker"
6) "I can't seem to stand on my own two feet"
7) "You don't have to shout or leap about"
8) "Are the stars out tonight?"
9) "Nobody calling on the phone"
10) "When I'm drivin' in my car and a man comes on the radio"
11) "Don't you think you want someone to talk to?"
12) "I just love when you call me lady"
13) "But the press let the story leak"
14) "For my darlin' I love you, and I always will"
15) "Tell me you love me and don't let me cry"
16) "I'll do such things to ease your pain"
17) "You'll never know it hurt me so"
18) "Could you be falling for me?"
19) "Sunday's on the phone to Monday"
20) "See I'd have all the money in the world"
21) "It could happen to us any day"
22) "I have scaled these city walls"
23) "Each time the doorbell rings I still run"
24) "But after all it's what we've done that makes us what we are"
25) "Are you somewhere feeling lonely, or is someone loving you?"
26) "We meet every day at the same cafe"
27) "To give away the day that you were mine"
28) "I wake up feeling sorry I met you"
29) "Any time we have a date"
30) "You darken my door"
31) "Whatever colors you have in your mind"
32) "I'd thank my lucky stars to be living here today"
33) "And it wants to have a snow day that will turn its parents into kids"

Good luck and enjoy!

Musical Monday #152

Welcome to the 152nd edition of Musical Monday, the weekly quiz that Soccer Dad and I alternate hosting. As always, the challenge is to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs.

There's a single group of songs this time representing a single overall theme, though I could have split it into several sub-themes.

1) "I don't know how someone controlled you"
2) "When you sing through the verse and you end in a scream"
3) "Catch as catch, catch as catch can"
4) "I hitchhiked all the way down to Memphis"
5) "Then he comes to town, and you see his face"
6) "Fortune of my ways, making of my days"
7) "It opened up her eyes and ears to me"
8) "Silently it waits for me; or someone else I suppose"
9) "He threw one down from the top of the stairs"
10) "Destiny, destiny, protect me from the world"
11) "And she's got everything that I have to live without"
12) "They call me dirty from the alley"
13) "As the smile ran away from his face"
14) "Your heart dissolves, while he tips you so gracefully"
15) "I've made fortunes, spent them fast enough"
16) "It's just that I am not in the market"
17) "I called upon my brother just the other day"
18) "I feel so frustrated; the boss is a jerk"
19) "So Mary marry me, let's not wait"
20) "Our finest gifts we bring"
21) "And my hands can't feel to grip"
22) "When you drop a coin you'll hear it sing"
23) "Listen to the tears roll, down my face as she turns to go"
24) "Through the coldest winter in almost fourteen years"
25) "The kids don't eat and the dog can't sleep"
26) "10 o'clock, nighttime in New York, it's weird"
27) "It really brought him down because he could not jam"
28) "You've got a hub cap diamond star halo"

Good luck and enjoy!

Musical Monday #150

Welcome to the 150th edition of Musical Monday, the weekly quiz that Soccer Dad and I alternate hosting. As always, the challenge is to identify the title and artist of each song quote below, as well as the common theme of the entire set of songs.

The songs this week are broken into four sub-themes, 1-8, 7-10, and 11-15, and 16-22. Group #2 is somewhat of a double theme, and the four groups in sequence form an overall theme. The total number of songs is also significant (though this negated any "super-sizing" in honor of the Musical Monday's sesquicentennial, and though there are doubtless other songs that would fit most of the sub-themes).

1) "Watched his hair been turnin' grey"
2) "Tell me why you're looking so confused"
3) "A dog started crying, like a broken hearted man"
4) "She breaks down and cries to her husband"
5) "The millions of faces, but still I'm alone"
6) "You can see it in my eyes, I can feel it in your touch"

7) "All the lights are changing green to red"
8) "Turn that jungle music down, just until we're out of town"
9) "Required from us a song"
10) "It's a fact of life, now man and wife, work full time to just get by"

11) "Take my hand and we'll make it, I swear"
12) "And make them softer for her feet"
13) "Before I put on my makeup"
14) "I have no choice, I hear your voice, feels like flying"
15) "This is the year of the hungry man, whose place is in the past"

16) "Trying to forget you is just a waste of time"
17) "Take your time, I won't go anywhere"
18) "For some California grass"
19) "Found a note there waiting, it said, 'Daddy, I just can't wait'"
20) "Nothing left to chance, all is working"
21) "Times have changed and times are strange"
22) "Like emptiness in harmony"

Good luck and enjoy!