LHOTR 2.0: I Get Knocked Down but I Get Up Again

We went up on August 2 to see the house before it was bulldozed. Time to let it and the novelty chain pull go.

Salvaging what we could from the house before she came down. Dave the Builder helpfully rescued the windows to see if he could reuse them. 

It didn't take long for it to come down.

Wow, it's gone.

We can rebuild the Little House on the River! 

Don't stop, keep it movin'; put your drinks up - we've got a floor! 

This already has me feeling so much better about everything. In the framing, you can see where the big picture window will be, the center swing double doors, and the window over the kitchen sink. 

Now it's time to shop for the roof, deck, and siding. 

Lipstick on the Mic: Cindy and Kate, B-52s

Kate and Cindy around 2010

The B-52's classic lineup is Fred, Kate, Cindy, Keith, and Ricky, RIP. When it comes to the vocals, Fred is the comic relief, while Kate is the heart, and Cindy is the soul. 

Formed in 1976 while drinking Flaming Volcanoes at a house party, the band drew inspiration from 50s and 60s dance, party, and surf music; their look came straight from camp culture. 

I discovered the band in the early 80s, when they made a cameo appearance as the party band in a couple of episodes of the soap opera The Guiding Light, and because my cooler-than-cool cousin Denise had Whammy! in her cassette deck when she dropped us, her younger cousins, off at the pool. Of course, they were among the first artists featured on MTV, with videos for "Songs for a Future Generation" and "Legal Tender." 

Cosmic Thing broke them from the indie college party circuit to being, well, everywhere. Love Shack is a party standard played at any GenX event. 

Kate became the duet queen of alt-rock in the '80s and '90s, pairing up with Iggy Pop for the song Candy and four songs with REM, including the hit Shiny Happy People. 

Cindy semi-retired to have babies at this time. 

She came back for their late '90s pop culture surge: soundtrack for The Flintstones movie, tributes to Debbie Harry, an anniversary greatest hits release, and a parody turn with the song Glove Slap on The Simpsons. The final party continues with a long goodbye, light touring with Devo - including here in Grand Rapids next week - and a residency in Las Vegas.

B-52 essentials: 52 Girls, Dance this Mess Around, Rock Lobster, Planet Claire, Give Me Back My Man, Strobe Light, Quiche Lorraine, Queen of Las Vegas, Legal Tender, Song for a Future Generation, Love Shack, Good Stuff, Hot Pants, Debbie. 

YA Book Club: Forever

Doesn't that hit right on the nose?

This is probably the GOAT of all YA novels... the one where the protagonist, Katherine, loses her virginity to her first serious boyfriend, Michael, only to drift apart at the end. 

No one dies (edit: I forgot about grandpa!), although we do have the complexity of Arnie's depression. 

Katherine does not suffer the devastating consequences that were threatened to all of us terrified Catholic school girls if we were to fall from grace by having premarital sex. 

As a matter of fact, Katherine and Michael grow together and establish a healthy and intimate sex life. What's more, the pacing of Blume's book is such that the two develop a real relationship from their first encounter at a friend's house on New Year's Day until their breakup in August, just before they leave for their freshman year at college. 

I resembled THAT in 1989. I've said this about one or two of my former relationships: just because it didn't last doesn't mean it wasn't real. 

This book is on all sorts of banned book lists for everything from the sex to the casual drug use (they smoke some weed), the language, the suicidal ideation, and probably the fact that Katherine doesn't end up destitute and paying dearly for her actions.

We loved it. 

So scandalous was the content that the girls in my grade got their copies smuggled to them from their older sisters. If someone didn't have an older sister, someone passed the book in secret, right under Sister Gloria's nose. 

Raised on Country Sunshine: Friends in Low Places

Friends in low places

The fun in country music is the whole idea of letting loose and raisin' some hell, even if that means you are preparing your V-8 juice and elbow macaroni hangover cure the next morning and paying a $100 fine for having a nuisance party. 

True story. 

Lots of these are also just fun to sing along to with friends, preferably at a loud volume. I currently miss hearing these at the river: 

Dolly Parton, 9 to 5

Johnny Bush, Whiskey River

Oak Ridge Boys, Elvira

Linda Ronstadt, When Will I Be Loved 

The Eagles, Already Gone

Chris Stapleton, Tennessee Whiskey

Pistol Annies, Got My Name Changed Back

Bellamy Brothers, Let Your Love Flow

Charlie Daniels Band, The Devil Went Down to Georgia

Garth Brooks, Friends in Low Places

That's It, Just One Line: Atlantic City

 

"We're going out where the sands are turning to gold."

Such a sad song with some vivid imagery. 

The Fifth Beatle: Billy Preston

Frofabulous

Billy Preston is one of the very few musicians to be given credit on a Beatles recording, which was done at the band's request on the 1969 single Get Back.

He was a child prodigy, playing by ear without having ever taken a lesson. The people he has performed with are a who's who of music: playing piano for Mahalia Jackson at 10; performing with Fats Domino at the age of 11; and starring in a movie as a young W.C. Handy at 12. 

And that's just the 50s. 

In the 60s, he performed with Andre Crouch, went on tour with Little Richard, and is on Sam Cooke's Night Beat album. Later in the decade, he played with Jimi Hendrix and Ray Charles. 

Whew. 

After the Get Back sessions in 1969, Billy joined the Beatles once more, playing organ on Abbey Road's I Want You (She's So Heavy). 

Billy spent the 70s recording with his A-list friends and for himself, including the massive hit Nothing from Nothing, and finding time to write You Are So Beautiful with Joe Cocker. 

Dude was everywhere: he was even the first musical guest on Saturday Night Live in 1975. 

I entered the Preston fandom circle in 1979, the duet he did with Syreeta, With You I'm Born Again.

The 80s weren't kind; he got into some trouble with drugs and booze, but recovered to become one of Ringo's early All Starr Band members in the 90s. He was an in-demand session musician in the 00s for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Norah Jones, Johnny Cash, and the Funk Brothers. He even made an appearance on American Idol!

Billy battled personal demons throughout his life, and... can't we just let people be who they are? He remained firmly in the closet his whole life and died of kidney disease in 2006. 

Lipstick on the Mic: Madonna

Chilling with Madge 

With someone larger than life, how do you gain a new perspective? Take one slice and look at that.  

I often joked in the past that Madonna was the patron saint of repressed Catholic school girls everywhere. And like her, I'm a Michigan-born Catholic who had to deal with a stern father. I reacted to her self-confessional songs on True Blue and Like a Prayer exactly because of that. While she rebelled against the patriarchal rigidity of Catholicism and questioned its teachings, she still longed to embrace what the Church had to offer. 

And yet, by following the teachings of the Catholic church and marrying Sean Penn, she did not get that love and protection in return, as she confessed in Til Death Do Us Part. Family conflict in the song Oh Father. At the time Like a Prayer was released, I was with someone who wanted to wait until marriage to consummate our relationship. I was surprised to realize I didn't, ready to express myself with someone whom I trusted with my body, heart, and soul, feeling it was not a sin. 

Sexual freedom came late, but it still came for me in 1989. 

Madonna went on to explore other avenues in the 90s, playing a 40s-era baseball player, a dominatrix, Evita, and embracing new age electronica. She's recently released Confessions II, her most celebrated album in nearly 30 years. But it's still her self-confessional period of the late 80s and early 90s that I loved her best. 

Happy birthday.