Oh Yeah, Ninja Baby!!!

Sunday Night Video Flashback Pt. 36!!!

Wow…another week has flown by. Hope you enjoy the videos!!!

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What I Like About You – The Romantics
“What I Like About You” is the title of a well-known power pop song by the American rock and roll band The Romantics. The song, written by Romantics members Wally Palmar, Mike Skill, Rich Cole, and Jimmy Marinos, is featured on the band’s self-titled 1980 debut album, and was also released as a single. Marinos, the band’s drummer, is the lead vocalist on the song. The band filmed a music video for the song that appeared frequently on MTV during the early 1980s.

“What I Like About You” was written by the group around a guitar part by Skill. The song’s “Hey, uh-huh” refrain was influenced by The Yardbirds’ “Over Under Sideways Down” and Chuck Berry’s “Back in the U.S.A.”. The group recorded the song and the accompaning album at Coconuts recording studio in Miami Beach.

When first released, “What I Like About You” was already a popular song on the Romantics’ concert playlist. In terms of record sales and radio airplay, however, the song was only a moderate success at the time of its release, reaching only Number 48 on the Billboard Hot 100. It was only towards the end of the 1980s, after the song had been licensed for use in television commercials for Budweiser beer, that “What I Like About You” grew to become one of the most popular rock anthems of all time.

“What I Like About You” has become a staple of modern rock, appearing on numerous compilation albums of 1980s pop and rock music hits and heard in frequent rotation on modern rock and classic rock radio. The song is also often played at sporting events, parties, and at bars and clubs. In addition to Budweiser, the song has also been heard promoting products, services, and institutions including the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team, Barbie toy dolls, Sea World and T.G.I. Friday’s restaurants. The song was also featured in TV commercials for Hampton Inn, Esurance, Papa John’s Pizza, and Toyota as recently as 2008. The song was also included in the 2004 animated film Shrek 2 and “Surf’s Up (2007).

Channel Ten Australia and Southern Cross Ten used the song to advertise their television channel in 2005-2006. They used three different versions of the song, all performed by Green Dragon. The first was from February – December 2005 was “What I Like About You (Rock Mix). The second, used from December 2005 – February 2006 was “What I Like About You (Dance Mix). The third, used from February – December 2006 was “What I Like About You (R&B) Mix, and this song was again used from December 2006-February 2007 in Ten’s summer promos.

The song was voted #97 on VH1’s television special The 100 Greatest Songs of the 80’s.

Kyrie – Mister Mister
“Kyrie” was a #1 hit song by the 1980s pop/rock band Mr. Mister, from their 1985 album Welcome to the Real World. Released in late 1985, it hit the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 charts in March of 1986, where it was #1 for two weeks. It also hit the top spot on the Billboard Top Rock Tracks chart, where it stayed at #1 for one week, and was also their only #1 single on this chart. In the UK the song peaked at #11 in April 1986.

Kýrie, eléison, which means “Lord, have mercy” in Greek is a part many liturgical rites in Eastern and Western Christianity. Kýrie, eléison; Christé, eléison; Kýrie, eléison is a prayer that asks “Lord, have mercy; Christ, have mercy; Lord, have mercy”.

The video for this song was directed by Nick Morris, and features the band in performance mixed with footage taken at the tail end of their Fall 1985 tour with Tina Turner.

Africa – Toto
“Africa” is a song by rock band Toto. The song was included on their 1982 album Toto IV, and reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in February 1983 and number three on the UK Singles Chart the same month. The song was written by the band’s keyboardist David Paich and drummer Jeff Porcaro. David Paich sings both verses of the song. Bobby Kimball, Steve Lukather and Paich sing the choruses.

Arguably Toto’s most recognizable song, “Africa” hit Number 1 on the Billboard Charts in February 1983. It was almost cut from the Toto IV record prior to its release. Having spent an incredible amount of time producing the tune, the band became so tired of the song that they didn’t want it on the album. The song itself was very different from anything the band had done before, and some members felt that it didn’t sound like Toto.

“I didn’t think it was very good,” said Steve Lukather (Classic Rock Revisited, 2003). “That tells you what can happen when we pick our own singles!”

David Paich, who co-wrote the song with Jeff Porcaro, said that it “could have been the beginning of a solo project [for me] because it was so different. I thought I’d save it…[because] world music wasn’t around then.”

The music video was directed by Steve Barron. The story is of a researcher in a library (portrayed by band member David Paich, looking for clues to a book called Africa. Many scenes include the band performing atop a stack of hardcover books.

Forever Young – Alphaville
“Forever Young” is the title track from German rock/synthpop group Alphaville’s 1984 debut album. Though it was not the group’s highest-charting European hit and failed to reach the American Top 40 despite three separate U.S. single releases, “Forever Young” became something of a pop standard and has been covered by numerous artists since its 1984 debut.

Originally released by Alphaville as a single in 1984, “Forever Young” was available in both its original mix and also in a dance version titled the “Special Extended Mix.” Over the years the band has released several remixes and demo versions of the song.

The song’s music video shows the band performing in one of the halls at Holloway Sanatorium in Virginia Water, Surrey, England. A number of ragged people ranging from children to the elderly awake to observe the band, then walk through a diamond-shaped glowing portal.

Bonus Video!!!

Here’s the “Special Extended Mix” of Alphaville’s “Forever Young.” Enjoy!!!

Auto-Tune The News…Hilarious.

This has gotta be the most creative thing I’ve seen in a long time.  Auto-Tune has been polluting our ears for so long we’re used to it and EXPECT it.

It’s nice to see it actually doing some good by making us laugh.

Auto-Tune the News #1: march madness. economic woes. pentagon budget cuts.

My favorite one:

Auto-Tune the News #2: pirates. drugs. gay marriage.

If you liked those, the guys at schmoyoho have a ton more cool videos on their YouTube page:  http://www.youtube.com/user/schmoyoho

Richard Simmons: Swearin’ To The Oldies

Who Knew?

Sunday Night Video Flashback Pt. 35!!!

Here we go again….hope you all enjoy!!!

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Money For Nothing – Dire Straits
“Money for Nothing” is a song recorded by British group Dire Straits, which first appeared on their 1985 album Brothers in Arms and subsequently became an international hit when released as a single. It peaked at number one for three weeks in the United States, becoming their most successful single, and also peaked at number one for three weeks on the U.S. Mainstream Rock chart. In the band’s native UK, the song peaked at number 4. The recording was notable for its controversial lyrics, groundbreaking music video and a cameo appearance by Sting singing the song’s falsetto introduction and backing chorus, “I want my MTV”. The video was also the first to be aired on MTV Europe when the network started on August 1, 1987.

“Money for Nothing” won the Grammy for the Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with a Vocal in 1985 at the 28th annual Grammy Awards.

99 Luftballons – Nena
“99 Luftballons” is a Cold War-era protest song by the German singer Nena. Originally sung in German, it was later re-recorded in English as “99 Red Balloons”.

“99 Luftballons” reached #1 in West Germany in 1983. In 1984, the original German version also peaked at #2 on the American Billboard Hot 100 chart and the English-language version topped the UK Singles Chart. The German version topped the Australian charts for five weeks and the New Zealand charts for one week.

When it made the charts in the United States, most US radio DJs incorrectly assumed that “99 Luftballons” translated to English as “99 Red Balloons” and spoke the number 99 in English, saying “Ninety-nine Luftballoons.” The original name of “99 Luftballons” is “Neunundneunzig Luftballons.”

The translation of the title is sometimes given as “Ninety-Nine Air Balloons”, however “Ninety-Nine Balloons” is also correct. A Luftballon is a colourful toy balloon, rather than a balloon for transport or research. The name is derived from Luft, German for air, but the meaning of Luft does not qualify the type of balloon. The title “99 Red Balloons” almost scans correctly with the syllables falling in the right places within the rhythm of the first lines of lyrics, with “red” replacing “Luft”. The only difference is the missing counterpart to the German syllable “-zig” in “Neunundneunzig”.

The Safety Dance – Men Without Hats
“The Safety Dance” was the best-selling single by the 1980s synth pop group Men Without Hats, written by frontman Ivan Doroschuk. Released in the United States on March 16,1982 and in the United Kingdom in September 1983, the song peaked at number three on the Billboard Hot 100 and number one on Cash Box, as well as number one on the Billboard Dance Chart. In the United Kingdom the song also proved successful, reaching number six. It was actually released three times before sparking an interest on radio play. The song is the only major international hit for the group. Their follow-up album, Folk of the 80’s (Part III), reached no higher than #127 on the U.S. Billboard 200 album chart.

The music video for the song is notable for its medieval imagery. It was filmed in the village of West Kington, near Bath, in south-west England. Ivan Doroschuk is the only member of the band to actually perform in the video; the other band members can be seen standing in the entry to one of the buildings in the town square. The dwarf in the video has been identified as actor Mike Edmonds. The identity of blonde girl in the video remains a mystery. The Morris Dance side performing in the video was Chippenham Town Morris from Wiltshire.

Dance Hall Days – Wang Chung
“Dance Hall Days” is one of Wang Chung’s most popular and best known hit singles. It was released in 1984 on the album Points on the Curve. Despite their being from the United Kingdom, this was their only song to make the Top 75 charts in the UK, narrowly missing the Top 20. In the U.S. it peaked at #16 on the Hot 100, reached #8 on the Mainstream Rock radio chart, and went all the way to #1 on the Dance/Disco chart, their highest showing on the latter two charts.

Two versions of a music video were made. The first version of the video, directed by Derek Jarman, is a collection of home movies with the majority of the archive footage consisting of a stage show with swimmers and fountains, and other World War II-era material. Apparently, the footage is courtesy of the director’s father, who was one of the very first people ever to use a color home movie camera. The toddler in the home movie footage is the director himself as a child. The home movies are interspersed amid footage of Jack, Nick, and Darren, lip-synching and playing the violin. The band is also dressed up as characters from The Wizard of Oz at the end of the video, with Jack Hues as the Tin Man, Nick Feldman as the Scarecrow, and Darren Costin as the Lion. The second version of the video is the most well-known, and received heavy rotation airplay at MTV. It is a magical fantasy concept video set in the 1940s, the heyday of dance halls. The video begins in black and white with Jack Hues picking up and reading a flyer outside the dance hall. The next scene, which is filmed in color, features the band performing at the dance hall as couples dance. Later in the video, there are scenes of a disco ball lowering on the dance floor and the emergence of a disco-ball creature sprouting from its egg. The video ends in black and white with Jack Hues leaving the dance hall onto the street, and a suitcase with legs following him. This version was nominated for Best New Artist at the 1984 MTV Video Music Awards, losing to “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)” by Eurythmics.

Sunday Night Video Flashback Pt. 34!!!

Here we go again…got caught up watching the Masters so sorry it’s a bit late!

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Centerfold – J. Geils Band
“Centerfold” was a single released by The J. Geils Band from their album Freeze Frame. The song is about a man who is shocked to discover that his high school crush did a centerfold spread for a male-oriented magazine. The song could be a reference to actress Angel Tompkins’ relationship with Peter Wolf.

It was released in autumn 1981, and eventually went to number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 in February 1982, and stayed there for six weeks, and also reached number one on the Rock Tracks chart for three weeks, and on the ARIA Chart in Australia. It was the first single released from the band’s album Freeze Frame and was an early staple on MTV. The band’s lead singer Peter Wolf revealed on In the Studio with Redbeard that “Angel in Blue” was going to be the album’s first single. Then during the “Angel in Blue” video shoot, Peter got a call from the president of EMI America Records suggesting that the band change the single’s title to “Centerfold”.

In February 1983, a year after the song hit #1 in the US Billboard Hot 100, “Centerfold” peaked at #3 in the UK Top 40, earning The J. Geils Band their only major hit single in the UK, although follow-up “Freeze-Frame” was also a minor UK hit.

The song lists at #52 on Billboard’s All Time Top Songs.

I Was Made For Loving You – KISS
“I Was Made for Lovin’ You” is a song by the American hard rock band Kiss, originally released on their 1979 album Dynasty. It was released as the A-side of their first single from the album. It was the band’s second Gold single, selling over 1 million copies. The single was certified Gold In the US on 1979-08-16 and in Canada on August 1, 1979. The B-side of the single is the album track “Hard Times”, which was written by Ace Frehley. The single reached #11 on the US Billboard singles chart. The song also became a top ten hit in Australia reaching #6 on the ARIA charts in 1979. The song fared the best in Western Europe (Where it became a top 20 hit in Sweden, a top 10 hit in Norway, made it to the number 2 position in France, Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, and in Holland it became a #1 smash.)

The song was one of the band’s few singles to chart in the UK in the 1970s, though only peaking at No. 51, where a 7 min 54 sec version was released on 12″ single in addition to the shorter 7″.

Our House – Madness
“Our House” is a single by English ska/pop band Madness, from their UK album The Rise & Fall and their US compilation Madness. Released in November 1982, it peaked at #5 in the UK singles chart and was their biggest hit in the United States, reaching #7 in the Billboard chart in 1983. Though Madness produced many successful singles over a period of twenty years, the enormous American popularity of “Our House” means that they are often regarded as one hit wonders in the USA (though technically they are two hit wonders in America, as their version of “It Must Be Love” also subsequently entered the US top 40). It won Best Song at the May 1983 Ivor Novello awards.

The video depicts the band acting out the song’s lyrics in an old mews. The song’s lyrics mostly describe the daily activities in the house, with some of the band portraying the “family.” The video cuts between scenes of the “family”, the band playing in a living room, and exterior shots of various other houses including Buckingham Palace.

Together Forever – Rick Astley
“Together Forever” is a song recorded by Rick Astley, which ascended to number one atop the Billboard Hot 100 on June 18th, 1988. It was Astley’s second and final US chart-topper. It uses the same chords and a similar melody to Never Gonna Give You Up, but different lyrics.

The popular Canadian teen drama Degrassi: The Next Generation, which is known for naming each episode after an 80s hit song, named an episode after this song.

In the early 1990s, an instrumental version of the song was the “Demo” song in many Casio electronic keyboards. The song was featured in the FX show It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia in the episode “The Aluminum Monster vs. Fatty McGoo.”

Sunday Night Video Flashback Pt. 33!!!

Here we go with another week of Flashback Videos!

Remember, comments and suggestions are always welcome. Throw me some curveballs!

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I Just Died In Your Arms Tonight – Cutting Crew

“(I Just) Died in Your Arms” is a power ballad written by Nick Van Eede and performed by his band, Cutting Crew. It was their biggest hit, peaking at #1 in the United States, Canada and Norway, and reaching the Top Five in the UK, South Africa, Sweden and Switzerland.

The words “I just died in your arms tonight” originally came to Van Eede while he was having sex with his girlfriend, “death” being an often-used metaphor for orgasm. Writing down the phrase, Van Eede later used it as the hook to “(I Just) Died In Your Arms.”

First released in Britain, the song peaked at #4 on the UK charts in August 1986. Upon its release in the United States, the previously unknown band’s debut single shot to number one on May 2, 1987, and stayed there for two weeks. It also reached #4 on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart, #24 on Billboard’s Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks chart and (in a remix version) #37 on the Hot Dance/Club Play chart. The song spent three weeks at #1 in Canada.

Foolish Beat – Debbie Gibson

“Foolish Beat” (Atlantic 89109; Atlantic UK A9059) is the fourth single, and the first ballad release, from American singer-songwriter-actress Deborah Gibson. Originally recorded in the winter of 1987 for the Dream Tour, months prior to its inclusion on her album Out of the Blue (LP 81780), this made Gibson the youngest person to single-handedly write, produce and sing a number-one single entirely on her own when “Foolish Beat” hit the top of the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 singles chart in the summer of 1988.

This single was actually released in Japan as the B-side to Atlantic Japan 10SW-15

“Foolish Beat” eventually won a dubious honor at Viacom International: this song actually made number thirty-three on VH1’s 40 Most Awesomely Bad Break-up Songs…Ever.

The Heat Is On – Glenn Frey

“The Heat Is On” is a song written by Harold Faltermeyer and Keith Forsey and recorded by Glenn Frey, from Faltermeyer and Forsey’s soundtrack of the popular 1984 film Beverly Hills Cop. It was a major hit single in its own right, reaching number two on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in March 1985. It was also quite popular internationally, reaching number two on the Australian Singles Chart in 1985 and gaining peaks of number 8 on the Canadian Singles Chart and number 12 on the UK Singles Chart.

The music video for the song received heavy MTV airplay. It showed a film editor assembling scenes for Beverly Hills Cop while Frey and a band played the song in the adjacent room, with action scenes from the movie then directly interspersed. Among the musicians shown in the video is saxophone player Beverly Dahlke-Smith, who did not play on the actual recording.

The recording subsequently appeared on Frey’s albums Glenn Frey Live (1993) and Solo Collection (1995) as well as on some various-artists ‘top hits’ collections.

The song was ranked 784th out of 2006 songs by voting featured in the Triple M Essential 2006 Countdown.

“The Heat Is On” is Ottawa Senators star forward Dany Heatley’s goal song. It is also the song played when the Omaha Lancers junior hockey team scores, making reference to the United States Hockey League. During the mid-to-late 1980s, it was also played at New York Mets home games following a home run by a Mets player. It is the walk-on music for English darts player Denis Ovens. The song’s title expression has been directly used in marketing slogans, such as for Australian television operations TVW and Seven Network.

Maneater – Hall & Oates

“Maneater” is a single recorded by American duo Hall & Oates from their 1982 album H2O. It reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart on December 18, 1982. According to John Oates the inspiration for this song was Kelly LeBrock.

The Hall & Oates music video opens with a woman walking down a red staircase, and the band playing in a dimly lit studio with shafts of light projecting down on them. This may be an attempt to mimic a bar-dance club setting. The band members step in and out of the light for their lip sync. A young woman in a short party dress is shown in fade-in and fade-out shots, along with a black jaguar, hence the song line “The woman is wild, a she-cat tamed by the purr of a Jaguar”, which likely refers to a gold digger who prefers to ride in an up-scale luxury automobile such as a Jaguar. The song refrain is “Whoa, oh here she comes; watch out boy, she’ll chew you up; whoa, oh here she comes, she’s a maneater”.

Twitter and Blogs…

Okay, so many of you know of my fascination with “the Twitter.”  I love that site.  It allows me to connect with people in “real time” and just have fun.

I’ve met some really nice people there, and in turn, learned a lot about them and what they’re into.

Last night, I asked people to send me their links to their blogs so I could share them here with my other readers.  I hope you find these links as interesting as I do and that you in turn try to find out more about each of these individuals.  The array of topics is wide, but hey…gotta have something for everybody right?

I’ve added their Twitter names so if you want to check them out, feel free to just click on them!

Here’s some music for you while you read:

1901 – Phoenix

@Sugarwilla: http://www.sugarwillaandspice.blogspot.com/

@DMBdork: http://dmbdork.soup.io/

@AllanGoesDMB: http://tinyurl.com/Allan-Blog

@DerekJTR2: http://www.myspace.com/privatestockmusic

@aht4005: http://iminmyownlilworld.blogspot.com/

@josephdevon: http://www.josephdevon.com

@mickgregory: http://sadbastards.wordpress.com/