Soft Rock FM Queen

My music tastes are pretty damned eclectic. Rosemary, my wonderful iPhone, has one of the most random assortments of songs that one might think a person with dissociative identity disorder owned it. Take this current shuffled playlist:

1) So Nice So Smart - Kimya Dawson
2) Breathe (2 A.M.) - Anna Nalick
3) Doth I Protest Too Much - Alanis Morissette
4) Heartbeat of "Shinma" - Artistes Divers (from "Vampire Princess Miyu")
5) Barrel of a Gun - Guster
6) "Jem and the Holograms" Theme
7) Open Your Heart - Madonna
8) Infiltrate - Michael Salvatori & Martin O'Donnell ("Halo 3")
9) The Old Account - Johnny Cash
10) Teeth - Lady Gaga

And that only covers part of the randomness. Sometimes on the bus ride back to the apartment, I find myself thinking, "Huh, I totally forgot that song. When did I download that??" My musical moods tend to change fairly quickly, so I'll bounce from a Phillip Glass marathon to a string of songs by the Crystal Method. And it's usually a frenetic pace at which my mind is working.

Currently, though? I'm on an easy listening, soft rock kick. A few days ago, I found myself singing Michael Bolton's "Time, Love, and Tenderness." Why? I have no idea. I don't have a radio, and oddly enough, I don't have that song on iTunes.

Now, I have a soft spot for Michael Bolton. I have never hidden this fact. His voice is amazing, and he doesn't really take himself that seriously. For evidence, watch this, if you haven't already. Hell, watch it even if you have:

If anyone can sing about Captain Jack Sparrow, Forrest Gump, and Scarface in one song, all the while calling it a "big, sexy hook," you just kind of have to love him. Shut up. I love him. To my dismay, my collection of his songs that I had bought several years ago were on my computer that went to Hewlett Packard Hell (after barely a year of owning it), and iTunes didn't have iCloud or whatever the hell it has now. So there I was, with this growing need of hearing more Mr. Bolton, and I had no access, save for Youtube. And I don't have Spotify on my phone, because yeah, right, I'm not going to pay for it (yet).

Then, my brilliant brain thought, "Hey, I know! Pandora will be able to fullfil my need of Michael Bolton tunes!" So I went to the Pandora app on my phone, plugged in my headphones, and voila! INSTANT GRATIFICATION. To my delight/horror, I knew all of the words to every song. And then Peter Cetera made an appearance, and I knew his songs. This was followed by Phil Collins, to which I happily sang along, and then "I've Had the Time of My Life," and really, who doesn't know the words to that song? But it just kept on this way: I knew every single word of each song that came up. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. I was actually getting scared. Does this mean that I am old now??

I mean, seriously, I don't recognize a single song on the radio when and if I do turn it on in the car, which is why I usually tune into NPR. Or JackFM. But the second a liteFM song comes on? Oh, yeah, speakers to 11, windows down, me singing at the top of my lungs without a care in the world. I've tried getting on the bandwagon of new artists, but come on. The highlight of my year, minus the new Mass Effect 3 game coming out, was Madonna at the Superbowl.

Sigh. Where's my Gold Bond cream and diluted soda?

(True story: I really do dilute my soda. Too damned sweet.)