songs_i_sing_inside_my_head_to_stay_warm raze yesterday it was radiohead. "weird fishes". a song i first heard a few years before the album it landed on was in the world, when it was all dreamy drumless drift and ghostly orchestral lift. a little bit of mental math to make me move. today it's natalie imbruglia's "smoke". a half-forgotten single with a skittering programmed pulse and something hard and time-honed hidden in the hollows of its hands. a minor-key lullaby hung out to dry. i can't explain these things. even if i could, i'm not sure i would want to. my brain has always been a very strange radio. 251210 ... raze a rewrite of david bowie's "rebel rebel" that now tackles the slippery subject of squirrel gender: random, random silver squirrel i'm not sure if you're a boy or a girl 251211 ... raze martin page's "in the house of stone and light". i was so sure it was a sting_song when i first heard it on the radio as a ten-year-old kid that i went out and bought the "fields of gold" greatest hits compilation thinking it must be one of the two new tracks. i was wrong. as an act of silent protest, i've never listened to "when we dance" or "this cowboy song" again. 251213 ... raze "just another day" by jon secada. don't ask me why. 251216 ... raze "december" by collective soul. timely *and* catchy. 251219 ... raze there were a few today. the last thing i landed on was "dancing in the dark" by bruce springsteen. hey baby... 251220 ... raze "games without frontiers" by peter_gabriel. if looks could kill, they probably will. 251221 ... raze first it was "peg" by steely dan. then it was "hey santa" by carnie and wendy wilson. (it's all about those vocal harmonies over the "sleigh ride" coda. so tasty.) 251225 ... raze some days — and again, i can't begin to explain or understand why — it's "e.i." by nelly. i don't remember any of the lyrics. which is probably a good thing. i just whisper-sing a bunch of gibberish to the beat. 251227 ... raze "the hazards of sitting beneath palm trees" by hayden. i thought thinking about trees that are tied into images of warmer climates might help counteract the cold. the jury's still out on how well that worked while i was getting blasted with snow squalls. 251229 ... raze marc jordan's "charlie_parker_loves_me". but not the album version. the live performance recorded for "open mike with mike bullard" way back when. that's the ticket. 251230 ... raze "close watch" by john_cale. one of the best and bleakest love songs anyone has ever written, i think. 251231 ... raze james taylor's "shower_the_people". i sure could use some of that sunshine. 260101 ... raze "your beauty must be rubbing off" by hawksley_workman. (cacophony. kaka phoney.) 260103 ... raze "a night like this" by the_cure. all_this_time i was sure robert smith was singing, "you're just the most gorgeously stupid thing i ever got in the world." the actual line is much more evocative: "your trust, the most gorgeously stupid thing i ever cut in the world." 260107 ... raze "cold_feet" by jack ladder and the dreamlanders. (it's my toes that get the worst of it, if you want to know the truth.) 260112 ... raze "automobile noise" by the blue nile. (i am weary of this fighting. i'm weary of surrender.) 260113 ... raze "the next time i fall" by peter cetera and amy grant. holy blast from the past, batman. 260116 ... raze "wild thing" by tone loc, "down to the waterline" by dire straits, and "your love is my drug" by kesha. in that order. a little incongruous, to say the least. but it worked. 260117 ... raze the underworld theme from "super mario bros.", only it had lyrics (which were simply, "je m'appelle john," repeated endlessly). 260119 ... raze "georgy porgy" by toto. in another example of misheard lyrics, i've spent my whole life thinking the line was, "all i wanna do is hold you," when it's really, "i'm not the only one that holds you." 260121 ... raze "money city maniacs" by sloan. (and the joke is when he awoke his body was covered in coke fizz.) 260123 ... raze "my_favorite_things", as played by john_coltrane. 260127 ... raze pretty much the entire "greatest hits" album by electric light orchestra. but especially "strange magic". 260128 ... raze katy perry's "teenage dream". why, brain? why have you forsaken me? 260129 ... raze "the waiting" by tom petty and the heartbreakers. (you take it on faith. you take it to the heart.) 260201 ... raze "you're so clever" by pete townshend. 260208 ... raze "keeping the faith" by billy_joel. (you can get just so much from a good thing. you can linger too long in your dreams.) 260212 what's it to you? who go blather from