John Mayer

I recently rediscovered John Mayer. I found his sophomore album 'Heavier Things' on sale in Target and bought it like two weeks ago and I must confess that it bumped 'Lost Highway' (the new Nashville inspired effort from Bon Jovi) from its position as most played recently acquired cd. By the way for all you Bon Jovi fans out there, this is no Dolly Parton album, yeah its a bit more 'stringy' with more pronounced fiddle, banjo, mandolin etc parts but thats it. Jon's tenor is still rich and slightly rough and the bands sound is essentially the same. Go get it if you haven't already.

Back to Mr Mayer, my favorite on 'Heavier Things' is 'Home Life' followed by 'Something's Missing', 'Split Screen Sadness', Clarity', 'Bigger Than My Body', 'New Deep', 'Come Back To Bed', 'Only Heart', 'Wheel' and 'Daughters'. I like the lyrics for 'Home Life' (see lyrics below) although it was his Sting sounding vocals on that particular track that initially caught my attention.

Think I'm gonna stay home

Have myself a home life
Sitting in the slow-mo
And listening to the daylight
I am not a nomad
I am not a rocket man
I was born a housecat
By the slight of my mother's hand

I think I'm gonna stay home

I want to live in the center of a circle
I want to live on the side of a square
I used to be in my M-Z now
You'll never find me cause my name isn't there

Home life
Been holding out for the home life
My whole life

I want to see the end game
I want to learn her last name
Finish on a Friday
And sit in traffic on the highway
See, I refuse to believe
That my life's gonna be
Just some string of incompletes
Never to lead me to anything remotely close to a

Home life
Been holding out for the home life
My whole life

I can tell you this much
I will marry just once
And if it doesn't work
Giver her half of my stuff
It's fine with me
We said eternity
And I will go to my grave
With just the life that I gave
Not just some melody line
On a radio wave
It dissipates
And soon evaporates
But home live doesn't change

I want to live in the center of a circle
I want to live on the side of a square
I'd love to walk to where we both can talk but
I've got to leave you cause my ride is here

Home life
You keep the home life
You take the home life
I'll come back for the home life
I promise

Music sweet music - An Update

Today I bought Dr Dre's 'The Chronic' and Bon Jovi's 'Slippery When Wet' albums. Both albums are on the '100 great albums youu shoud own' list (according to bmgmusic.com) which I am trying to make up, I am currently 64 albums shy of my goal, and I have promised myself I won't pay more than $10 (inclusive of tax) on each one. Wish me luck. So I am home, watching American Idol on mute (A well deserved win for Jordin Sparks) , rocking my 'new' Dre album, doing some work on the computer (pathetic I know) thinking why oh why is the cd player in my car not working? I had blogged earlier about the cd player in my car, till this day I have not taken the car in for the unit to be removed and sent to some 3rd party facility to be repaired primarily because I cannot imagine riding around in the car without music. I guess I was missing the cd player today because I didn't feel up to ripping my new cd's to my iPod. Ah well thats that, case closed. The I remembered I was out of hair conditioner and I needed to make a quick dash to Wal-Mart. I grabbed my bag and keys and on a whim the 'Slippery When Wet' album. 'Who knows' I thought, 'Maybe the yeye cd player fit work sef'. I start the car and slip the cd in the player ... it played! I was very happy I listened to my 'Church Mind' as I screamed along to 'Livin' on a Prayer' on the drive to and from Wal-mart. So what happened? Did the player just decide to start working? Perhaps it was working because I had a tape in the tape player. I ejected the tape, ejected the cd, turned off the ignition, turned it back on the slipped the cd in the player ... it worked. No I didn't do all that while I was driving! I performed my little experiment while parked in the Wal-Mart parking lot all the while looking left and right like a thief make dem no go car-jack somebody. Maybe its the particular cd, hmmm ... I waited till I was back at home to perform the second part of my experiments. I whipped out my cd case which holds like 20 cds but I have the sleeves holding at least 2 cds each so who knows how many cds are in it. Anyway I proceeded to try each one. Eject cd, turn off ignition, turn on ignition insert new cd, eject cd, turn off ignition, turn on ignition insert next cd etc etc. My ignition survived the experiment and so did the cd player. Yipee!!! I unload myself and my purchases and skip up to my apartment. Could the people at the dealership have inadvertently fixed the cd player? Who knows, who cares! My cd player is working.

P.S. I just remembered that Time magazine also had a list of must have albums (The All-Time 100 Albums) which they published in 2006. Bon Jovi didn't make it on the Time list, I ain't mad though.

Music sweet music

I am seated on my airbed in my living room listening to music playing on my spanking new Philips 100W 2.1-Ch Home Theatre System. Of course the speakers came with like 2 inches of wire so I am not able to position them for optimal listening pleasure even at that Seal never sounded so good. I like my iPod and all that but nothing beats being 'enveloped' in good music. I got the car jack for the iPod but the 7 yr old speakers made listening to anything other than the radio painful yeah I fiddled with the bass and treble and when I finally get it just right for a particular song, the settings are all wrong for the next one (I have the various media I have accumulated music from over the years to thank for that). Assuming that I was willing to tweak the settings for every single song I wanted to listen to (I am not) the risk of being involved in a totally different type of 'jam session' on the 405 is very high and at this time not desirable hence I have resolved my self to futility of the whole thing and embraced the radio. Of course I have to suffer through some peoples’ spelling lessons (notice how every other song on Fergie’s ‘The Duchess’ album has her spelling?) I am rewarded with gems from Robin Thicke (Lost without you) and Musiq Soulchild (B.U.D.D.Y). Oh did I mention that the cd player in the car is on the fritz and Honda is telling me they have discontinued this particular model so the only other alternative is to send it to a repair facility and it could take anything from 1 to 4 weeks to get it back? I am sure you guys would be like what’s the big deal? The earlier you get it sent out the better. I have already established that the deck wasn't the best anyway sound production wise, off or out it wouldn't make much of a difference abi? I am afraid I would go mad with boredom. Those of you who knew me in Nija would be quick to point out that my old car didn't have a deck. I would like to point out that I didn’t need anything to distract me then, the engine in a Beemer is one to behold and listen to especially when you are in the drivers’ seat. I can't wait to own one of the 98-05 (Koja) 3 series BMW’s, now those engines (Vanos introduced in 1992), they sing a pretty tune. I have really digressed haven't I?

The iPod works when I have the head phones on, but a times I want an all over body experience, from the crown of my head to the soles of my feet I want to be bathed, enveloped, cocooned, caressed by whatever I am listening to, be it Maxwell, 2pac, Evanescence, MaryMary, BonJovi or Lagbaja. *Sigh* Seal is tickling my feet right now, I feel like I won the lottery. I think it is safe to say that I did, my home theatre cost less than $90 minus tax. A couple of months ago I had a lengthy conversation with a dear friend about buying a home theatre system. I wanted to do the proper thing and buy a component system and the more I thought about it and researched it the higher the cost of acquisition became. The past couple of weeks had been really intense at work and every night when I got home I just wanted to be embraced by some classical music. By Wednesday I was ready to just go to Wal-Mart abi Target and buy a $30 boom box when I browsed the Best Buy site and found this gem. I initially meant it for my room but now I am thinking it can hold its own in the living room and my plans for the component system might be moved to the back back burner. Let’s wait and see what tomorrow will bring; I will buy more speaker wire and experiment with speaker placement and sound levels from the little I am seeing so far, I might still be buying that boom box for my room!