Bigger is Always Better

Damn it. Now I'm going to have to learn to play air violin.

It's taken me years but I've mastered the intricacies of air guitar and now this CD has me wanting to spend the years and years it will probably take me to become a halfway decent air violinist. Itzhak Perlman couldn't get me to do it. Jean-Luc Ponty couldn't do it. Papa John Creach couldn't do it. Hell, even my man Charlie Daniels couldn't do (I'm always happy to play the devil's guitar whenever "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" is cranking on my stereo.)

(Okay, the Chieftains almost managed to get me to do it...but I decided I wasn't Irish enough and, reluctantly, I content myself to playing air acoustic guitar with them and hoping they don't mind overmuch)

But playing this disc (as I have often in the past couple of weeks), I'm ready put aside years of intensive air guitar training and take up this new form of imaginary musical expression. Damn you, "Goddamn Violin Solo", damn you! What has this woman done to me?!

There I was innocently surfing the ever-expanding "Blogoverse" (we're not really going to let that term stick are we?) when I, naive and trusting soul that I am, wandered into the lair of the self-styled Last Girl on Earth and I was lost for a good long while (yeah, I'm a sucker for clever writing, witty asides, and good music...I'm weak that way.)

Clicking on a link there, my speakers gave forth with a rush of potent, percussive pop wonderfulness (a wistfully bittersweet rocker called "Lie, Lie, Lie, Lie") that seized me by the lapels (not literally...but you know what I mean...) and wouldn't let go...the coda, the aforementioned "The Goddamn Violin Solo" sealed the deal. Here, devil woman, take money, send me more music.

I love music in all of its myriad forms but I hold a special place in my heart for great, full-bodied pop music sung by women with grand voices and distinctive points of view...for insightful, acerbic and charming and songwriting...for hooks that grab hold of you and make you want to dance but don't, in the process, overwhelm the lyrics and the vocals. Check. Check. Check. And goddamn violin solos to boot. (And we won't even mention the sly shout outs to David Bowie and the Commodores...nods to the immortal "Brick House" catch my attention every time.)

Go here and check it out for yourself. If you like cool music, you won't regret it. Tell her I sent ya.

(Where'd I leave that bloody air violin anyway?)

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Tracks in heavy rotation on MKW's music-playing thingees:
"Sunshine" (both mixes), "Lie, Lie, Lie, Lie", "Phat, Stoopid, Totally Def", "The Girlfriends of Dorian Gray", "Violin Girl", "Please Die for Me", "The Goddamn Violin Solo"