SUMMER SONGS

Popular summer songs --
have you heard them?


I didn't plan to write about summer songs. but this picture in Time Magazine kept catching my eye -- the colors -- the cartoonish style. The credit says it's by "Love Dust." I found myself wondering what makes a pop hit worth turning the volume up, and driving along with the windows rolled down? According to movies I've seen, that's what people do, though it's not something I've ever done or will ever do, even with classical music that I love -- I don't like to inflict my music on passersby the way people with boom boxes did for years.

So here I am -- I've borrowed opinions and photos about the summer's top hits from Time Magazine's Website.
(#1) "Alejandro" -- Lady Gaga.
The review said, "If you like the spoken-word intros performed in terrible European accents, then this is the tune for you. But as catchy as this Ace of Base-esque radio hit is, it's also pretty depressing ... about broken hearts and forbidden love -- hardly the stuff of beach trips and suntans. And the bleak video, in which a pallid Gaga storms around in underwear and a PVC nun's habit, would be more appropriate in the dead of winter. Who's Alejandro, anyway?"

I agree -- I didn't love it -- I tried to like it but didn't enjoy it at all.

#2 California Gurls -- Katy Perry,
plus Snoop Dogg,
singing
"The girl's a freak/she drives a jeep ..."


The most outstanding moment was Katy Perry in a bra.
Yes, she was
definitely '
outstanding
while squirting
whipped cream
from her boobs.

The lyrics -- freak/jeep -- are not thrilling. The choreography was good. The dancers were raunchy. The costumes punctuated private parts in a Gaga gimmicky way, but not as innovatively. Even so, it was fun to watch.

Airplanes B.O.B -- plus Haley Williams.
It was described as "Southern Hip Hop, a tune
that could be the angstiest hit of the summer ...
the chorus about watching for shooting stars,
makes it an ideal excuse for
stargazing make-outs."

It made me sleepy.

"I like it" -- Enrique Iglesias
"He is good-looking, and ridiculously peppy,
in the kind of tune that gets played
at baseball games, as people
watch themselves dance
on the Jumbotron. It promotes
infidelity and its chorus is
just repetitive enough to get stuck
in your head for weeks."

It was okay. I don't remember the tune.

The other summer hits were by Drunk Girls, Tangerine, Waka Waka, Sprawl II, Rill Kill. If you've got a favorite, please let me know -- I'm trying to get educated, while ... um ... keeping my blog readers, young and old, more or less up-to-date with what's going on in our world.

I have to say, the summer songs were rather interesting, exciting, but it's not music that makes me feel like dancing. But that picture by "Love Dust" -- that's interesting and exciting and makes me feel like choreographing.