67: It's No Better To Be Safe Than Sorry

67. "Take On Me" by A-ha {#1; 7/85} [iTunes? Yes.] {Video: Take On Me. (One of the more famous videos of the MTV era.)}

This song came out just as I was leaving to go on my mission. I heard it a few times and probably saw the video once before coming home two years later. It's one of the most famous and creative videos ever, but there's more to it than that.

This song gets points in a lot of different areas. First, it's a great workout song, with a steady, fast beat that takes a good effort to stay up with.

It's also a great falsetto song. As the chorus goes on, the voice pitch gets higher and higher and higher until it reaches dog whistle or Olivia-Newton-John-on-Xanadu levels, making it fun to try to sing.

And then there's the lyrics. I'm really not sure what he is trying to say, and the lyric websites haven't been any help to me here, but at one point, at the highest octave possible, it seems like he is singing, "L-M-N-O-PEE!!!" (And I'm always up for some good alphabet singing.)

Fonzie must have been big in Oslo.

If people ever say, "Nothing good ever came out of Norway," you can rebut them with, "But what about A-ha?" Also, these guys have the best names this side of Diesel:

Morten Harket: vocals
Pal Waaktaar: guitar
Magne "Mags" Furuholmen: keyboards

(They can be used together in a sentence like this: "Luke Skywalker made sure to fasten his harket before climbing aboard the waaktaar for the four hour ride to Furuholmen.")

I didn't hear A-ha's follow up to "Take On Me" until several years later, but when I did, I thought "The Sun Always Shines On TV" was a very, very good song, too. Makes me wonder if I should listen to more Norwegian music.

COMING UP NEXT: Need a light?

68: Good Things Are Fantastic!

68. "I Love Things That Are Great (Theme from the Tony Bennett Show)" by Alec Baldwin (as Tony Bennett) [iTunes? No.] {Video: I Love Things That Are Great. (This is a video of the entire skit. Only the opening song is at #68 on the HondoJoe Top 200.)}

Nobody expected Alec Baldwin to be in the HondoJoe Top 200! Yet, here he is.

Back in the day, when I was single and had lots and lots of free time, I used to have a) the technology, and 2) the know-how, of how to take snippets of stuff off of the television and convert them to mp3 form that I could play as music on my computer. (In fact, that's how I got my version of "Girl" by Davy Jones, found at #106 on this list, from off of a Brady Bunch VHS that I bought, and "All Fall Down" by Electric Light Orchestra Part II, found at #171 on this list, also from a VHS tape I purchased.)

Unfortunately, now that I have been married for close to eight years, I'm not sure if I still have the technology to do that, but I am certain that the know-how to do it has been replaced by things like "how to properly change a diaper," "how to potty-train a boy," and "what to do when a diaper-change and/or potty train goes awry."

So, I'm lucky I got this song when I did.

Alec Baldwin is a bundle-full of happiness. Always.

This song comes from an episode of Saturday Night Live featuring Alec Baldwin portraying an upbeat Tony Bennett on a recurring skit called "The Tony Bennett Show." Here are the lyrics:

I love things that are great.
Good things are fantastic.
Guess what? I also paint.
Just a hobby, nothing drastic.
I dig everything except for things I don't.
And I'll try anything except the things I say I won't.
But one thing's for sure:
I love things (shu-dooba-du-bee-bop) that are great!

It's just a 55 second snippet of a song, but if it doesn't put a smile on your face, you probably don't know how to smile. In fact, before my original Mac desktop computer died, this song was the runaway leader in the "Most Played" iTunes category. (I'm not sure why it was the most played. Other than it's a good thing, and good things are fantastic.)

COMING UP NEXT: L-M-N-O-PEE!

69: Too Many Moonlight Kisses

69. "When I Fall In Love" by Rick Astley [iTunes? Yes] {Video: When I Fall In Love.}

This is, pure and simple, a great love song. And it has some very personal meaning for me from when I was a-courting my soon-to-be wife.

Now is where you are thinking, "Okay, I can understand that. But why the Rick Astley version? Really? Rick Astley???"

That's a valid question. In my vast record collection, I had many different versions of this song, including a fine version by the Lettermen, and what is probably considered the standard bearer for this song, by Nat King Cole. They're both great, but I prefer the Rick Astley version.

Why? I'm not sure. It could be the arrangement. It could be Rick's deep, rich baritone voice. It could be that if someone that goofy looking can sing this song so well, maybe there's hope for me. It could be all those factors and more. I just know that I prefer the Rick Astley version.

He's never gonna give, never gonna give you up.

Rick Astley was a  strange phenomenon. A dude who looks like Howdy Doody with a voice like Nat King Cole. Even when watching the video to this song there was a disconnect for me between the voice and the person singing. It looks more like someone's annoying nephew Nate lip-synching, not an actual recording artist. (I also especially like it when it appears Rick has violinists and harpists twirling around his head.)

(For the record, I do not have an annoying nephew Nate.) (But if I did, he'd probably look a lot like Rick Astley.)

COMING UP NEXT: Tony Bennett? Probably not.

70: Walking On the Water, Walking On the Air

70. "Heart and Soul" by T'Pau {#4; 5/87} [iTunes? Yes.] {Video: Heart and Soul. (The video is very important to the appeal of this song. I'll discuss it more below.)}

This song came out the last month or two that I was a Mormon missionary. The first memory I have of this song is at a Kmart in Fairmont, West Virginia, hometown of Mary Lou Retton. I'm guessing I saw an image of T'Pau lead singer Carol Decker from the video for this song on one of the televisions in the electronics department. Wow! (Do you remember where you were the first time you saw Carol Decker in the "Heart and Soul" video?)

A short time later I had full access to MTV at my brother's apartment back in Idaho, and I cherished every time they played the video.

That, my friends, is a beautiful woman!

Of course, at the time I thought the group T'Pau consisted of some random guys and two beautiful women, the gorgeous one (pictured above) who did the spoken word/rapping, and the not-quite-as-attractive tall-haired woman who did the singing.

Tall hair + big earrings = not quite as attractive.

It took me a while to realize that these two women were, in fact, the same person. (It's amazing what they could do with trick photography and video editing in 1987!) It was the close-ups of Rapping Carol Decker's face that had me mesmerized. 

Not only was she beautiful, but the way she pronounced words was hypnotic. "Walking on the water, walking on the air." I had never before heard anyone say the word "air" in such a way that it didn't seem to have an "r" in it. (The video ends with Carol asking "Must I beg you?" No, no you musn't, but I'd be fine if you did.)

Of course, the appeal of this song isn't solely that Carol Decker was an attractive woman. It was that she was an attractive woman who was actually a fan of Star Trek!!!

Yes, as we all know, the name of the group T'Pau was taken from a Vulcan high priestess from an episode of Star Trek. (Of course, the chances are that the group name was suggested by one of the nondescript, unimportant members of the band, and not by Carol Decker, but why spoil it with thoughts like that?)

T'Pau (I like the Carol Decker version better.)

Of course, any Star Trek fan worth his weight in tribbles is familiar with the episode featuring T'Pau. It involves Spock's seven-year sexual cycle, an arranged marriage, and a combat to the death between Spock and Captain Kirk. 

The subject of that arranged marriage was the beautiful but illogical T'Pring.

T'Pring! (I think that's the official name of my ring tone.)

For all their talk about logic, this whole episode makes the Vulcans seem pretty darn illogical and possibly downright zany. Spock ends up actually killing Captain Kirk, only for him to be brought back to life by some voodoo doctoring by Bones McCoy. The whole thing seemed a bit silly. The silliest part? That T'Pring would actually rather be with a doofus like Stonn instead of Spock. Highly illogical!

Even Stonn is questioning T'Pring's taste in men.

All that said, I think I prefer the earthbound, 1980s version of T'Pau:

Must I beg you?

COMING UP NEXT: It's Howdy Doody Time!

71: I Don't Know Why It Is

71. "She's Got a Way" by Billy Joel {#23; 11/81} [iTunes? Yes] {Video: She's Got a Way. (Not one of Billy's better hair days.)}

"Songs In the Attic" was a very interesting album. I'm not sure if it was a lazy album, a courageous album, or a little bit of both. I've never seen any other artist try to pull off what Billy Joel did with "Songs In the Attic." Whatever he was trying to do, for me at least, it worked.

At the time "Songs In the Attic" was released, Billy Joel was coming off one of the most successful three album runs that any artist has ever had, both commercially and artistically. "The Stranger," "52nd Street," and "Glass Houses" were all incredibly popular, and Billy Joel was flying about as high as any rock star could.

So, for his next album he decided to re-release a bunch of songs from his earlier, less successful albums.  In a way, it seems lazy. Why put out a new album when my hordes of fans will pay good money for a bunch of rehashed old songs?

I don't know what it is, but I know that I can't live without her.

Or, was it actually a bold move? Billy believed in these songs. He knew they were good, but they hadn't reached the audience he would have liked them to. Couple that with the fact that some of those original recordings didn't showcase the songs to Billy's liking because of the use of session players instead of his own band, and he thought new, live recordings of the songs would sound better.

When "Songs In the Attic" was released, I was unfamiliar with any of the songs on it. I bought the album, listened to it, and loved it. I immediately went back and bought copies of his pre-"Stranger" albums "Piano Man," "Streetlife Serenade," and "Turnstiles." (I would have bought "Cold Spring Harbor, too, but it wasn't available at the time.)

So, the "Songs In the Attic" idea certainly worked on me! I wonder how much the sales of those earlier albums were bumped up by "Songs In the Attic?" I'd bet it put a fair bit of money in the pockets of Billy Joel or whoever was mismanaging his money for him at the time.

"She's Got a Way" is a simple, beautiful love song. Just a man, his piano, and some words. It's a great song.

COMING UP NEXT: Are you out of your Vulcan mind?

72: I'm Newly Calibrated

72. "Better Now" by Collective Soul [iTunes? Yes] {Video: Better Now.}

I wrote briefly about Collective Soul way back at #192 with their first hit, "Shine." I really like Collective Soul. They seem a bit out of place when compared to other late-90s, early-00's bands. They weren't really "alternative." They were never "hip" or "cool." I'm pretty sure Collective Soul has never been called a "jiggy" band.

They just play the guitar and rock.

After they hit the scene with "Shine," they had several other minor hits. They quickly settled into a rhythm, where they would release an album and I would really like two or three songs on that album. These songs, like "Gel," "Heavy," and "Run," would all be really good, but just lacking some little thing to push them over the top to being great songs.

The song "Why, Part 2" almost made it to great status. It's a really good rocker of a song, and I actually included it in one of the rough drafts of the HondoJoe Top 200. But, eventually it missed the cut.

And then there's this song. "Better Now" is an excellent rock song. It has driving guitars. The riff is a little reminiscent of "Rock You Like a Hurricane" by the Scorpions, except better. The song has a bit of an optimistic feel to it with the whole "Better Now" vibe. (It also helps that lead singer Ed Roland has a low enough voice that I can at least attempt to sing along.)

But what really makes "Better Now" slightly better than all the other really good Collective Soul songs is the out-of-nowhere, totally unexpected saxophone. The song is three minutes and fifteen seconds long, and it is pretty much just heading for the closing fade-out when, with 38 seconds left, the saxophone comes a-blaring!

I've said before that I don't usually care for long instrumental fade-outs, but this is a definite exception. I'm not sure why, but that closing saxophone just really brings the whole song together and makes it awesome.

(I think the band added the sax on later, because if you watch the video, there is absolutely no one playing the sax at the end while the rest of the band plays on the guitars. In fact, a different version of the video features the song without the fading sax, and the song most definitely lacks without it.)

COMING UP NEXT: A song not sung by a chipmunk.

73: I'm Interested In Things

73. "Doctor Worm" by They Might Be Giants [iTunes? Yes] {Video: Doctor Worm.}

Sometimes it's good to be horny.

I know I go on and on a lot about the Electric Light Orchestra and their orchestration and violins and cellos and such. But, sometimes I like horns, too.

This song has some good horn work. They aren't overpowering horns, and they aren't particularly fancy horns, they are just good, solid horns that make up the backbone of this song. (Which is kind of funny since it's not a song about horns, but it is a song about playing the drums.)

Another big selling point about this song is that it is one of my favorite workout songs. It has an excellent pace for my workouts on the elliptical, and it works for me at whatever stage of working out I am in. It's slow enough that I can still keep its pace even when I haven't worked out for months and am just starting up again. And it's fast enough for those times that I have been working out for months and I need faster paced songs.

"When I get into it I can't tell if you are watching me twirling the sticks."

"Someday somebody else besides me will call me by my stage name."

COMING UP NEXT: Good, better, best! (Again.)