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SONGSPEAKtake us down to the paradise city |
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Two misheard lyrics in one song! Last Sunday, we took Quinn to Southwick’s Zoo in Mendon, MA. On the way home, we were listening to the same mix CD that contains the iCarly and Drake & Josh theme songs that I made for our Lancaster, PA trip last October. Quinn is actually starting to enjoy some of the other songs on it now, and will request that we skip to a specific track. So part of the way home, we heard a request from the back seat, “Can you play the ‘great night’ song?” My wife and I looked at each other, confused. There were no songs we could think of with the lyrics “great night”, and Quinn couldn’t sing it for us. So we skipped through all the songs so she could tell us what she wanted, and just as we got to Grade 9 by the Barenaked Ladies, we realized what she meant. Apparently, she thought they were saying “great night baby”. We tried to explain that it was “grade 9″, but to no avail.

Ladies and gentlemen, may I introduce to you...Butt Queen!
So for the last week, Quinn has been making us listen to that track incessantly. On Saturday, she kept giggling at the line where Ed Robertson sings, “they called me Eddie”. I asked her why she thought it was funny, and she said because his real name is Freddy. I asked her why she thought that, and she said because she looked it up on the internet. Four year olds say the darndest things. Then yesterday, all three of us were in the car, listening to it yet again, and I was telling my wife how she likes the “they called me Eddie” line, and then Quinn started saying something about how “they called him butt queen for some reason”. It took us awhile to realize what she was saying (“butt cream?” “butt freak?”), and couldn’t understand where “butt queen” came from. Until we were listening to the song again, and got to the line where Tyler Stewart sings “they called me Buckwheat!”. Apparently Quinn thought he was saying “butt queen”.
I fear now that Quinn is listening to more music, the misheard lyrics will increase at an exponential rate.
Tags: 90s music, barenaked ladies, butt cream, butt freak, butt queen, drake & josh, ed robertson, freddy, grade 9, great night baby, iCarly, kids say the darndest things, lancaster, mendon, queen, southwick's zoo, they called me buckwheat, they called me eddie, tyler stewart
We hope all you Easter celebrators out there had a good Easter Sunday. My wife and I went to my mom’s house, where we ate a non-traditional baked scrod (or schrod, if you’re The 99) dinner. Afterwards we colored eggs.
Of course, later, my younger cousins wanted to play the game where each person holds an egg, counts to three, and then smashes egg tip to egg tip to see which one cracks first. The person whose egg is cracked has to eat the egg.
After my cousins did this, there was egg eating going and it was a little messy. When their mother came over and mentioned, “you got egg on your face”, my wife muttered “you big disgrace”, which prompted my other cousin to say, “wavin’ your banner all over the place”. Soon after there was some singing of Queen’s, We Will Rock You.
I’m sure J.C. would be proud.
Tags: big disgrace, coloring, easter, egg on your face, eggs, jesus christ, play the game, queen, schrod, scrod, the 99, we will rock you

Matt's ticket, which he promptly washed.
Flash! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
This past Friday night was a night 17 years in the making. Matt and I attended One Night of Queen at Springfield Symphony Hall in Springfield, Massachusetts. The ticket stub can be seen on the right. Would we play games with you?
You see, our relationship blossomed 17 years ago in high school, where we would talk about music on the bus ride home. Wayne’s World had just come out and repopularized Bohemian Rhapsody. This was my first real exposure to Queen, but Matt would tell me about all the quirky songs in their vast library of work, like Fat Bottomed Girls and Bicycle Race. This prompted me to get Classic Queen and Queen’s Greatest Hits on cassette. So when we found out that One Night of Queen was coming to Springfield, we realized that a bromantic evening of dinner and music must be had.
Before the show, we went to Theodore’s Booze Blues and BBQ. We started with a heaping plate of nachos, and we each got a ribs combo dinner. I opted for the popcorn shrimp, while Matt went with the brisket. Don’t we look thrilled?

After dinner, we arrived at Springfield Symphony Hall. The smokers were stinking up the front steps as we saw the huge banner for One Night Of Queen. We took our seats (after a quick trip to restroom to drain our bladders of the 3 or 4 soda refills we had at Theodore’s) and anxiously awaited the start of the show. We had been curious about what kind of crowd this show would attract, and it was surprisingly diverse. The audience was comprised of a few middle-aged folks dragging their kids to the show (and most of these kids couldn’t look less enthused to be there, and likely have no idea who Queen was), quite a few people our age, lots of other guys out for a bromantic evening themselves, and quite a few older folks who were probably our age when Queen was in their prime. Matt even spotted a celebrity in attendance; the guy from the local Bertera Chevrolet commercials. We found it odd that they were playing Queen songs over the speakers before Gary Mullen and The Works took the stage.
And speaking of Gary Mullen, he really channelled his inner Freddie Mercury. He must have really studied old Queen concert footage in preparing for this role. He leapt fabulously, pranced flamingly, slapped his ass, spit water, used the mic stand as a guitar, swung it like a golf club, drop-kicked his bottled water (Matt was slightly mad that he was drinking bottled water, as it didn’t exist in the 70’s and ruined the illusion of the era we were supposed to be in), supplied plenty of innuendo, and walked through the crowd, looking to have sex with anything that moved. At one point, he left the stage for an extended period of time while the band played. We assumed it was a costume change, but the only change we noticed when he came back on stage was that he had no shirt on.

The setlist was as follows:
Encore:
And here, my best friends, is choppy cellphone video for ya… (with annotations!)…
We were disappointed that Radio Ga Ga wasn’t performed. This was especially shocking considering Gary Mullen’s affinity for having the crowd put their arms in the air and clap to the beat. Of course, there’s Matt’s disdain for the presence of bottled water. We also weren’t thrilled that Gary Mullen forced us to stand for most of the show as he maintained that the seats were “redundant” and that we should be off of our asses dancing. We were also convinced that Gary Mullen was putting on a fake British accent to stay true to his Freddie Mercury character, only to find out that he’s actually British! And one of my personal favorite moments was near the beginning of the show, when he said, “How are you doing Springfield?” *crowd cheers* “Where’s Homer Simpson?” Who doesn’t love an antiquated Simpsons joke? It’s like having your grandmother forward you an email about how Bill Gates is going to pay everyone a bunch of money for forwarding said email. In other words, topical.
And good God, the guitar player sure did look like Dave Mustaine from Megadeth. But his name is really Davie Brockett, or so we’re told.
All in all, we had a great time, and it was much better than we thought it would be. Gary Mullen and The Works have been doing this for a number of years and are currently on tour. If you’re a Queen fan, you would be stone cold crazy to miss this show.
Tags: 70s music, 80s music, 90s music, bbq, bertera chevrolet, bicycle race, bill gates, booze blues and bbq, bottled water, brisket, bromance, bromantic, classic queen, dave mustaine, david bowie, davie brockett, elvis presley, freddie mercury, gary mullen, homer simpson, i'm going slightly mad, innuendo, massachusetts, megadeth, nachos, northampton high school, one night of queen, play the game, popcorn shrimp, queen, queen's greatest hits, radio ga ga, rapper's delight, ribs, simpsons, springfield, stone cold crazy, sugar hill gang, symphony hall, the works, theodore's, wayne's world, you're my best friend
Remember about 15 years ago or so when Pearl Jam was mega-popular? Flannel and grunge were in, and Kurt Cobain was still alive. As a matter of fact, Matt’s and my friendship blossomed in high school while riding the bus home together, talking about music. Mainly Queen, and this cool new band Pearl Jam.

That's right, bitches. I can hold 25 pounds of fish in my beak. Jealous?
Their debut album, Ten, was huge, and we would dissect every song. I remember being in college at WPI and how anticipated their sophomore release was. Both Matt and I purchased Vs. on CD (remember those?) when it was released, and though the general opinion seemed to be lukewarm, I thought it was a great album. I still hear many songs from it on the radio to this very day.
One of my favorite tracks from that album is Glorified G, where Eddie Vedder incessantly repeats, “Glorified version of a pellet gun”, except it really sounds like he’s singing “Glorified version of a pelican”. The song would be infinitely better if those were the actual lyrics, though, because the song itself is kind of a downer, being that it’s all about the testosterone-driven, paranoid, gun nut culture that we live in.
Anyway, I guess what I’m saying is: Pelicans are the shit.
Tags: 90s music, eddie vedder, flannel, glorified g, glorified version of a pellet gun, grunge, guns, kurt cobain, lazer 99.3, pearl jam, pelican, queen, ten, vs., wpi
There’s pretty hot songspeak action going on in the comments section of the Link Farm post about Barack Obama.

Besides numerous references to Def Leppard, there’s some pretty nice references to LL Cool J, Mr. Mister, B52s, Kiss, Queen, The Scorpions, and of course, The Rock. I think my favorite is “Obama Said Knock You Out”, a reference of course to Mama Said Knock You Out by LL Cool J.
Tags: 80s music, b52s, def leppard, dwayne johnson, kiss, ll cool j, mr. mister, obama, queen, scorpions
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