Sweet Summer Duet

If you like The National and St. Vincent, you’ll dig their sweet duet called, “Sleep all Summer.”

Take a listen. I’m biased of course, but don’t you love horns?

Sex, Candy and Friday Mornings / Like Disco Lemonade

If you have played organized sports, you know that the first two weeks of the season were murder. Two-a-day practices, and a body so sore you could barely complete essential activities like bathing and eating.

The last two weeks have been like that for me, but from a mental perspective. I didn’t know it was possible, but my brain actually hurts at the end of the day.

In a strange twist, D hasn’t been that busy. So while I’m suffering through new campaign launches and the markup of the Waxman-Markey climate bill in the House*, D is coming up with “sweet new mix tapes.”

Here’s a snippet of this morning’s conversation.

D: Last night I came up with the sweetest mix tape of all time. It will rival my “Don Henley Get Women in the Sack” mix.

M: Nice.

D: I’ll send you the track list. It started with one-hit wonders from our high school years, but had to add a few more. What do you think?

M: [reads track list] I don’t like [Rob Thomas'] Smooth. Or [Marcy Playground's] Sex and Candy.

D: You don’t like Sex and Candy? Boooo. That one’s staying for sure.

M: We’ve had this convo before!

D: No we haven’t.

M: YES WE HAVE.

D: We have never sat down and discussed the merits of Marcy Playground.

M: No, but I told you that the song was horrible and you disagreed. I think there was wine involved.

D: You’re delusional, woman. Regardless, how about you stop tearing me down and start building me up with additional suggestions!

My brain probably would turn to mush if I didn’t have him around to liven things up.

So I’ll start the weekend by amending his playlist (the parameters: hit songs from 1996-1999—feel free to leave your favorites in the comments!).  You can see the current playlist after the jump.

The rest of our plans include more hockey playoff games, baseball and getting ready for a visitor next week: My dad!

For now, it’s back to the climate bill.

*Before I moved to DC, I assumed any job I took would have no connection to the Hill. I made a very poor assumption.

Jam of the Day

It’s an oldie, alright. Not sure if it qualifies as a goodie. But it’s been in my head for three hours.

New Music Tuesday (Two Days Late)

Get excited—The Whitest Boy Alive has released  Rules, the follow-up to Dreams, which is still one of my favorite albums from the last five years.

Listen for free on Pitchfork, then pick it up on Amazon. It’s feel-good music that will make a great soundtrack for your first summer BBQ.

Also recently released: The Decemberists, Hazards of Love

Coming soon:
Camera Obscura,  My Maudlin Career, April 21

What are you doing next week?

Have an hour? Great. I have a homework assignment for you:

Go get your skin checked.

Bonus, if you schedule in the month of April, you’ll likely beat the rush of people getting screened during National Skin Cancer Month (May), and will get in ASAP like I did.

I’m rocking a belly full of stitches right now, but relieved that it’s over. So let’s hold good thoughts for my dearly departed skin abnormality over the next two weeks, which, might I add, is way too long to wait for a test result.

On a New Music Tuesday-related note, my doctor brought in his iPod to do the resection today and asked if I was familiar with Mason Jennings, which struck me as odd since I know one other person who knows of and enjoys Mason Jennings. It turns out that the doctor and Jennings went to high school together.  So we listened to some of his newer tunes,  which you can partake of on Jennings’ web site.

For now, I’m heading to D’s where I’ll continue  fretting that I have three weeks to live and will never see our wedding day or have our babies, and he’ll  cheer me up by making fun of my stomach.

Jams to Clean to

It’s finally feeling and looking a little like Spring here in DC. The cherry blossoms have exploded just in time for the National Cherry Blossom Festival and it feels slightly sticky outside (a sure sign that summer is just around the corner). I’ve spent most of the day cleaning the house, doing laundry and sweeping out the front porch after Ella took a roll in the dirt and ate a boxelder bug. I think she must have been a farm cat prior to arriving to the Dumb Friends League.

Anyway, spring cleaning calls for major tuneage, so I thought I’d share my favorites from the day.

Girl Talk, In Step (and Still Here and pretty much anything else by Girl Talk)

Dan Deacon, Get Older

You can listen to both of these songs (and others) free on Muxtape (which has, apparently, changed from a mixed tape service to a platform for artists to promote themselves).

New (is Old) Music Tuesday

Follow Songs You Used to Love on Tumblr for a new (old) jam every day. Trust me; guilty pleasures abound*. You’ll lose yourself in the music.

Flaming Lips Cover Madonna

Having a crummy week. This cheered me up. It’s the Flaming Lips covering Madonna’s “Borderline.” If you can hang in through the intro, you’re in for a treat.

A Jam for All Time

It’s not Tuesday, and it’s not a new song, but it’s got a spot in my all-time top 10. It’s Band of Horses, The Funeral. I still get goosebumps when the chorus comes. It’s the kind of song I would have declared as my personal anthem when I was 13. Good thing it wasn’t written then—now I can just enjoy it for what it is: a great, great song.

(Note: The band plays a shortened version on Letterman. Trust me when I tell you to buy it in full on Amazon—you won’t be disappointed. And if so, I’ll give you your money back. Which is technically like $10 since it’s album-only.)

More tuneage from LastFM.

It Starts

As you might’ve guessed, DC is getting crazy. There are an additional two million people in the city (safe to assume most of those are in the Northwest quadrant), and by this time tomorrow, all bridges in/out of the city will be closed. Metro was already at ‘crush capacity’ last Wednesday.

Did I mention it’s been abnormally cold?

D and I are braving the cold and the crowds and walking down to the Lincoln Memorial in 20 minutes for the Springsteen and friends concert that begins at 2:30.

Since TwitPic bit the dust (traffic overload from the US Airways crash), I’ll try to upload mobile photos to Flickr. After seeing John Kerry last night, I’m on the lookout for famous faces!

UPDATE: Ok, so AT&T is awful and I had no service while at the Mall. But suffice it to say that we’ll remember this for years to come. Flickr photos to follow!