And now for the closet favorites from my deep, dark past...

Over the past two days I've been "major geesin" as my man, don E, in Tucson tells me. (His note after round two was, "Dude, you were doing some MAJOR geesin' here... I've only heard of ONE of those songs!"  And this from a MAJOR super guitar music man, too!)  And, if the truth be told, in addition to the fun/cool/hot songs from the past, there are also what some call "guilty pleasures" or what Black Pete in Thunder Bay, Ontario describes as "songs from our closet."  So, again, in no major order except general categories, here are my closet favorites from a deep, dark past.

+ POP AND BUBBLE GUM:  I admit it - some of these songs were SO damn infectious that they got inside my brain and WOULD NOT LEAVE.  Like "Sugar, Sugar" by The Archies - it doesn't matter that Wilson Pickett later covered it - it is mindless, addictive sugar-coated pop that I used to play in my bedroom obsessively, but NEVER with my band!  Into this category would also be "I'm A Believer" by the Monkees, "Yummy, Yummy, Yummy" by the Ohio Express and "Green Tambourine" by The Lemon Pipers.


+ NOVELTY TUNES:  I was a sucker for these bad boys - my first was Pat Boone's "Speedy Gonzales" which would NEVER pass the PC barrier today but which I played and played until I wore the 45 out.  Same with Sr. Sourire's song about the founder of the Dominican monastic order, "Dominque" along with the David Rose Orchestra's "The Stripper" and Suya Sakamoto's litte demon, "Sukyaki."  If confession is good for the soul, then I need to throw in Ray Steven's "Ahab the Arab" and "Suffer Bird" by the Thrashmen, too.
 
+ SEXY GIRL SINGERS:  What adolescent male in the 60s did NOT own a copy of Nancy Sinatra's "These Boots Are Made for Walkin?"  I owned her first three ALBUMS!  I think I bought Merrilee Rush and the Turnabouts version of "Angel of the Morning" for the same reason - although I really like that song - and would have to throw in the 45 cover of "Love Is Blue" by Paul Mauriat for the same reason.  And let's not forget Claudine Longet - once married to Andy Williams - until she started shooting at him while he was downhill skiing!  And in a category all by themselves are Kiki Dee's "I Got the Music in Me" and Kim Carne's "Betty Davis Eyes."  Too kewel for school!

+ NAUGHTY DISCO FUNK:  I was smitten with Donna Summer's "Bad Girls" and "Hot Love" but equally loved Def Leppard's, "Pour Some Sugar on Me" and "I Believe in Miracles" by Hot Chocolate.  The covers of most Ohio Players albums would fall into this category, too, even if I adored "Fire" (which is still a favorite!) and while I hated how the Bee Gees looked, I loved em! 
Last by certainly not least is a guilty pleasure that I don't know how to categorize:  Richard Harris' classic over the top, pop train wreck, "MacArthur's Park." Has there ever been another song quite like it?  I love it and hate it all at the same time and can recall singing it with my friends in the car over and over again.  And still when it comes on radio rotation, it makes me laugh and grow a little nostalgic and melancholy. What a long, strange trip it has been, yes?