The Final Countdown Cover

I am totally impressed by this cover of The Final Countdown. It almost sounds Spanish here. He's not a bad singer either.

Teena Marie

I hate to admit it, but I am not a music expert.  When I heard that Teen Marie died, I had no idea who she was. 


I like her work.  This is "Ooh la la la."  I would love to see someone do a cover of this song. 


The video for "Lovergirl."  I love the fashion that the Teena and her band are rocking.  I'd love to wear a flashy blouse like that and the guy wearing the leather pants is really rocking them. 
One of the other things I love Teena Marie for is not having a perfect body.  So many of the images of women we have are really skinny and for most women, achieving that look means being abusive of yourself.  I love that Teena Marie is proud of her imperfect body and that no one in these videos seems to hate her body.

Pete Seeger and Friends

I've been listening to folk music tonight, so I thought I'd post some of them. 


I love "The Water is Wide."  I first discovered this song when I was about thirteen, through Charlotte Church, who did a cover of it.  Years later, I was in a choir that actually sang this song, which was really nice, because often when you're in a choir, you're learning totally new songs you're unfamiliar with (or at least I was), so it was a nice change of pace to sing a song I already knew and liked.  This is a cover by Pete Seeger.  I was reading about him today and the article noted he had done this song, so I knew I had to go looking for it.  I assume he's doing the guitar playing, since I don't really hear much of his voice.  He's talking in bits and pieces of it, but it sounds like a choir is doing the singing.  I would love to be in a choir that got to work with Seeger.  Given his speaking parts, I'm curious to hear this song done with more chanting than singing. 
What I really love about this song is how sad the ending is.  It basically says that love doesn't last, which is not a sentiment you hear very often in music, especially in what melodically sounds like a very peaceful and happy song.   

Charlotte Church and Enya singing "The Water is Wide."  This is the version of the song I first became familiar with when I was younger.  I'm not really sure why this video cited Enya as singing the song as well, since I don't hear her at all.  Perhaps she produced it? 



Pete Seeger's "We Shall Not Be Moved."

Pete Seeger's cover of "Somagwaza."  This is an African song, which really fascinates me, since I really enjoy African music.  This is from a concert that Seeger gave where the audience basically sang along with every song.  This audience sounds really good.  I wish I had been there at that concert, because it sounds like it was tons of fun.  Sadly, at a certain point this video cuts out and then suddenly picks up again.  Seeger singing the high part actually sounds really good.  A lot of men have a hard time singing high notes, but Seeger manages to sound like his throat is really open, making it sound natural.  Also, there is clearly a woman singing the high part too, and she sounds amazing too. 

Pete Seeger singing "Jacob's Ladder." 


Pete Seeger singing the folk song "Greensleeves."  I developed an appreciation for this song well before I knew Seeger had done a version of it.  I find this cover to be the most haunting version of it, especially since there are no words, just the humming.  The lute (is that a lute?) is also especially haunting.  This song is appropriate for the end of fall, just as winter begins to take over. 
As a final note, I'd just like to share with you a quote from Seeger I really enjoyed: "Us born-again atheists sing a lot of Christian hymns."