Do Re Mi

So my cousin, the one who was on Star Search three years ago, is now on Nashville Star. I refuse to watch American Idol, and I’m sure as hell not going to start watching this, but, you know, family and all. Hers is not really a style of music I care for, but she does an amazing job of yodeling that part of “Cowboy’s Sweetheart,” and I would say I’m pro-yodeling.

In other country-ish music news that’s a bit more my speed, I am also pro the new Drive By Truckers record. But like this was any big surprise. Those dudes cannot make an album I don’t like.

My co-worker has been listening to her Elton John’s Greatest Hits CD this week, which means I have been listening to her Elton John’s Greatest Hits CD this week. Three things:

• It never fails to make me laugh to picture Elton John returning to his plough, as he claims to do in “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.” Right. Your plough. You, Elton John, have a plough. That you are going back to. Because you have had enough of the penthouse. Okay, sure, honky cat.

• That part in the live version of “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down On Me,” when George Michael breathlessly announces, “Ladies and gentleman, Mr. Elton John!” and the audience freaks out. First of all, I love how George Michael says that. My friend Brian Byrne thinks that we should try to work this into regular conversation, like maybe when your waitress puts your food down in front of you. I’m pro this. But the thing that really stands out to me here is how crazy the crowd goes when he says it. Those people go absolutely apeshit. I cannot remember the last time I was ever that excited about anything, and that sort of bums me out.

• Another thing that bums me out is why the hell isn’t “Levon” on here? What a grevious oversight. That song is awesome. One time I personally led a revolt in the bar of a Holiday Inn Select when my friend Josh told the Elton John impersonator we were all there to see that it was my birthday, which it was not, and Faux Elton John held his microphone out to me and said, “Happy Birthday, how old are you, love?” And I shouted, “Thirteen!”, and then he told me I could request a song, and I said “Levon!”, and he put his hand over the mic and hissed, “I don’t do Levon, say something else.” And, because I was drunk and sitting at a table of at least ten other drunk people, I felt confident standing up and yelling, “Levon! Levon!” and then everyone started chanting it with me, and he ignored us all and launched into Philadephia Freedom for the second time that night, but then, in a beautiful moment of drunken solidarity, everyone else in the Holiday Inn Select bar started SINGING LEVON, totally drowning out Faux Elton John and his backing tape. Man, I love that memory! Now I’m not bummed out anymore.