It all comes back.........

I was having some cellphone issues which forced me to go back to an old phone. After I got it activated, I was checking out my ringtone and realized that I had an Eagles song on it and after I listened to it, I decided to keep it as my ringtone. The song is called "How Long" and it was on the Eagles 2007 album called "Long Road out of Eden", this song has always bugged me as it sounded so familiar and I now know why.

First though, here is the lyric that I like:
Like a blue bird with his heart removed, lonely as a train
I've run just as far as I can run
If I never see the good old days shinin' in the sun
I'll be doin' fine and then some

When I heard it in 2007, I thought that it was a new song and I really liked it as it reminded me of the songs the Eagles did in the 70's. So as I looked into it tonight, I saw it was written by J. D. Souther and I figured that they must have had him write a song or two for the new album and since it was a Souther song that must be why it seemed like a song from the 70's. If you want to watch or listen to the song, here are the Eagles performing it at the 2007 CMA awards.


As I continued my looking around You Tube, I  found this version and it all made sense.

I am pretty sure that I had heard the song when I saw the Eagles back in the 70's as the above version seemed right to me, while the new version always seemed familiar but just a bit off and that's probably because it was missing some of the harmonies of the early Eagles which you can hear in this version.

Here is some additional info from Wikipedia on the "Long Road out of Eden" Album and Tour.

On August 20, 2007, the song "How Long," written by J.D. Souther — who had previously worked with the Eagles co-writing some of their biggest hits including "Best of My Love," "Victim of Love," "Heartache Tonight" and "New Kid in Town" — was released as a single to radio with an accompanying online video at Yahoo! Music and debuted on television on CMT during the Top 20 Countdown on August 23, 2007. The band performed the song as part of their live sets in the early to mid 1970s, but did not record it at the time due to J.D. Souther's desire to use it on his first solo album.

And if you want to hear the original, here is a copy of J. D. Souther's version

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 2011

I saw on the news that a few more acts were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. One of the acts had me flash back to high school where I remember the first song quite well. It was our anthem as school wound down for the year. Although I was never into his persona, I did love these two songs and remember cranking up the volume many days on my old Datsun 210 8-track player.

Another inductee, Dr. John, had this one great song, loved it then and still enjoy it now.

And a guy I learned to really dislike in college when I had a roommate listen to him all the time, every day, every night, every week. I would play the Eagles or Skynyrd and he would crank up Neil, I ultimately tossed a few of his albums out the window. I had a flashback to those days when I played this song and my computer froze but Neil still played on and I couldn't stop it.

Dreamin'

Our long range forecast is starting to look good but the short range forecast is still not looking great but ya gotta have hope and if I ignore the 3 to 5 inches coming tomorrow into Wednesday and the 6 inches I saw for next Sunday and just look out a few more days, well you gotta believe.

Mon 3/14/2011	43°	32°	0.09	0.4	A mix of snow and rain
Tue 3/15/2011	47°	33°	0	0	Partial sunshine
Wed 3/16/2011	53°	35°	0.19	0	A passing afternoon shower
Thu 3/17/2011	52°	28°	0.31	0.1	Rain

This forecast was from accuweather.com, granted, the other weather websites (weather.com and wunderground.com) don't have us getting out of the 30's during the same period (and yes they all call for more snow) but heck we all know that the weather forecasters are usually wrong, so who knows maybe the accuweather forecast will prove to be right. So since I knew I was pretty much dreaming of spring, I found a few songs to take my mind elsewhere, the first song is from Kelly Willis and Bruce Robison and is called Dreamin'.

Plus a song worth listening to from the CMA's

Plus a classic from the 70's

Think Spring!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Poco and Ultrarunning

When I was growing up and discovering music, one of the first albums I ever heard was from a group named Poco who I think may have created the song titles for the ultrarunning community, check out a few:

• You better think twice
• Keep on Tryin
• Follow your dreams
• Keep On Believin
• Hurry Up
• What a day
• Tomorrow
• Slow Poke
• All Alone Together
• Starin at the Sky
• Pickin up the pieces
• Here we go again
• Crazy Eyes
• And settlin' down
• I can see everything
• A good feelin' to know
• Rocky Mountain Breakdown
• Stay (Night until Noon)
• Just call my name
• I guess you made it
• C'mon
• Consequently, so long
• Heart of the Night
• Friends in the Distance
• Glorybound
• Footsteps of a Fool
• How will you feel tonight

Heck, I think you get my point, I am sure if you look up all the lyrics, the songs may not actually apply but based on the titles, I think many of the them will. For those folks that don't have a clue who Poco was (or is), here you go straight from wikipedia:

Poco is an American country rock band originally formed by Richie Furay and Jim Messina following the demise of Buffalo Springfield in 1968.^[1] The title of their first album, Pickin' Up The Pieces, is a reference to the break-up of Buffalo Springfield.Throughout the years Poco has performed in various groupings, and is still active today.

The original band had the following members,

1968–1969
Richie Furay – guitars, vocals
Jim Messina – guitars, bass, vocals
Rusty Young – pedal steel guitar, Dobro
Randy Meisner – bass, vocals
George Grantham – drums, vocals

You might recognize a few of the names if you are old enough but most folks aren't or you might have heard of the bands some of them played with before or after Poco, like Buffalo Springfield, Loggins and Messina, Eagles, Souther-Hillman-Furay Band. Through the years, Poco has had a handful of different members, I started listening to this collection in the early seventies by then Richie Furay and Randy Meisner had left to join other bands

1970–1973
Richie Furay – guitars, vocals
Paul Cotton – guitars, vocals
Rusty Young – pedal steel guitar, banjo, Dobro
Timothy B. Schmit – bass, harmonica, vocals
George Grantham – drums, vocals

An interesting side note, Timothy B. Schmit took over bass from Randy Meisner and then about 10 years later he took over from Meisner again, this time he quit Poco and joined the Eagles.

Here are a couple of old clips that brought back some memories from the early 70's.

Plus one more -

Running songs 2

I posted a few months back on a few running songs with the thought I would continue once every few months or so and I haven't posted in awhile but I came up with a few more as I was thinking about sending in the entry for Superior. Hope you enjoy them too.

A recent running song from a favorite artist (Martina McBride) might take a bit of a stretch to figure out but to help you all out, I figured I would try to explain (actually all of my songs probably take a bit of imagination, oh well). The song's title is "Wrong Baby Wrong", if only she would add the line "run baby run" it would be perfect but the chorus from the song is my plan for Superior.

Come on now
Everyone falls down
Everyone crawls now and then
Then they get up again
You cry if you want to
That’s what we all do
But if you think you’ll never move on you’re wrong baby wrong

Here is a link to the video.

The second song also applies to my plans for Superior and is a different spin on an old favorite (I like the old version a little bit better) from my high school and college days. The title of the song is the line that will resonate at Superior.

Might even apply to recent days, weeks and months at work.

And my third choice is from junior high (early 70's), yup that old. It too will probably apply to Superior.

Final choice - John Mellencamp Your life is Now

I guess this means it's time to sign up for Superior................

Sometimes it's the simple things

Work has been a bit intense and I haven't run since last Saturday. Normally things like this would get me a bit down and probably a bit cranky. But not today, yesterday we celebrated my wife's birthday by eating at El Tequila our favorite Mexican eatery down in Northfield with our daughters and my oldest's boyfriend, my wife opened presents from our girls as one of them had to work tonight (today is her official B'day), we had some cake and then later I figured out how to copy a ringtone to the latest phone I bought off of Ebay.

I like to buy used phones to avoid the contracts with Verizon and well, because it's cheaper too. The one thing I don't like are the canned ringtones on most phones and now I have solved it for my current phone. Now I can listen for my distinctive ring from Marshall Tucker. Just listen to the first 30 seconds and it should start to mellow you out, at least it does for me and guess what, no one else has a ring tone like this.

The other songs I have converted that I have on my phone are Marshall Tucker - Long Hard Ride, Martina McBride - Ride, Shania Twain - Up! (my final morning alarm song), Caedmon's Call - Lead of Love, Doobie Brothers - Long Train Runnin, Eagles - How Long, Bad Company - Bad Company. It's awfully nice to be able to convert any song I like to a ringtone (the power of the internet and Google will tell you how, even though Verizon tries to make it hard) and move them to my phone. Another nice benefit is that since my musical tastes are different than most folks, I can always hear my phone although sometimes I do like to just listen to it ring and I might miss a call.

For the moment, I will enjoy my simple victory over my phone and the joy of being with the family. Tomorrow I will run.

Happy Birthday Karyn......................

Running songs 1

I like to listen to music to get me going as I head out to run but I have to admit, music for more than an hour while running bugs me. Since I am sure the music I listen to will never be heard by the current generation of youngsters (like my daughters), I have decided to occasionally post the songs I like to listen to while running or while heading to a race to get my energy going. Since I have a lot of songs I will post 2 or 3 every so often.

Before I get to the songs, I need to insert the following disclaimer:
When I post a song I usually check the lyrics but I may not always do so, so be aware that like many folks it's the main chorus I focus on or maybe just a line or two in the song, not all of the lyrics, so please do not hold me accountable for any lyrics that offend or seem inappropriate in any way but you may hold me accountable if you happen to like any of the songs.

The first song is from a band my wife and I have enjoyed through the years and this song in particular seems appropriate for today's times when folks want to take the easy way out. The bottom line is that it pretty much captures my beliefs. The band is Sawyer Brown and the song is "Dirt Road"

The second song is from John Mellencamp (a fellow Hoosier from the town of Seymour, just south of my hometown) and it's a song that if I am struggling on a run, I love to hear it as it always gets me moving again. The song is called "I'm not running anymore", take a listen. The majority of the lyrics don't apply but if you are hitting a wall, you might get a smile over the chorus at least I do.



The third song, is a song I have always found helps get me energized and it reflects what I like to think we all do when we run marathons and beyond. It came out when I was in college and the name of the band is Molly Hatchet and the song is called "Flirtin with Disaster". I should add that this version is from 1979 so the audio is not the best but the more current version is from a later incarnation of the band and unless you want to feel old, you may not want to look at it, just in case here is a link.

Hope you enjoy but don't worry if you don't I will.