It's Beginning To Look Alot Like Christmas~Michael Bublè
It really is looking alot like Christmas! At the start of the week I was stressed as I wasn't finished Christmas shopping, still needed to post Christmas cards and had ran out of wrapping paper!
Yet between yesterday and today I managed to get everything done! Hubby as even managed to get tomorrow off work so that we can get Christmas food shop done
We are having a little Christmas day tomorrow with my family and friends
and while we are very busy from now till Saturday I am much more chilled
Looking forward to having a Baileys tonight and watching a bit off Bublè!
Fleetwood Mac's Tusk album for me is another one that I love to play in the Autumn time
My favourite songs on that album are mostly Stevie Nick's beautiful haunting songs, Angel, Sisters of the Moon, Beautiful Child and this haunting poem Storms are some of my favourite Fleetwood Mac songs ever.
When I was 15/16 I learn the guitar by ear by playing the guitar over and over again in my bedroom! It got to the stage that my parents bought me a pair of cordless ear phones to plug into my guitar so they didn't have to listen to an awful tuned gutiar, the wrong cords and the caterwauling of my 16 year old self trying to be Stevie!
This was also for me a song about my first love, over that summer I had my first taste of love he was alot older than then me. By the Autumn the relationship has fizzled out and was over. I poured my heart into learning these songs. Storms and Beautiful Child remind me so much of that time, even now sometimes when I hear them I can remember so clearly how heartbroken I was.
If I was to get the many lyrics I love of Stevie Nick's songs tattooed on me I would be covered!
Yet there something about these lyrics from Storms
"Never ever been a blue calm sea
I have always been a storm'
These lyrics seem to sum me up although I have mellowed a bit. I always seemed to be a bit of a storm!
Oisìn has been poorly the past week his favourite songs are Bob Marley songs!
His Granddad Pat (my Dad) thought him this song and he love the Wa Ya Ya bit!
We have been playing alot of Bob Marley to cheer him up specially this song!
This is my favourite song from Stevie Nick's since Fleetwood Mac's Rhiannon
I just love this finished song called Moonlight which has been a hit with fans since the mid 70's when the demo was leaked and it was called Lady From The Mountain. Stevie has tried to recorded it solo and with Fleetwood Mac down through the years but was either not happy with the finished song or else it didn't fit the feel of various albums.
When she started to work with Dave Stewart of Eurythmics she brought him this song
with some added verses. The added verses are from 2009 when Stevie saw the Twilight New Moon movie Stevie is a huge vampire fan she loves Anne Rice etc So some of the verses date back to the 1970's and some from 2009. The finished song is amazing and fits so well on the album
In Your Dreams which is my favourite Stevie Nick's solo album since Bella Donna.
The Gothic video goes so well with the style of the song it's classic Stevie and I love that Dave Stewart makes an quirky apperance too!
This is definitely one of my most played songs ever....it brings out the romantic in me!
This week has mostly been sponsored by the song.... Africa-Toto
I grow up listening to this song my Mam was a huge 80's fan!
This song was in one of the episodes of Stranger Things the show we are currently binge watching!
It's been in my head the past few days, so cheesy 80's and I love it!
The Skye Boat Song (Outlander Theme Song~French Version)
It's Outlander again! I still seem to have Outlander on the brain after last week's
season finale and I can't seem to stop listening to the different versions of this song!
This is the beautiful Skye Boat Song which I have written about before
but this time it's the wonderful French version from the first half of season two.
Bear McCreary is the wonderful musician and composer that has reworked the original version
of this song into the beautiful song for the show.
I love how he slightly changes the arrangement for different stages of the show
Like how the the second verse is song is sung in French to reflect the French setting and in the second half of the season it reverts back to the bagpipes and drums.
I love Bear McCreay's work on The Walking Dead and Black Sails and can't wait to hear more of his work on season three of Outlander.
As you might have guessed by my music choices I really like strong female voices!
I really enjoy listening to strong women singers from my first listen to Billie Holiday at the age of 14 I was hooked! By that age I already loved Sarah Brightman and Kate Bush but that was just the start of my love affair of strong women in music! I soon discovered lots of different powerful women in music, I love alot of different types of music from blues, folk and rock the female voice just stuck me.
Some of my favourites are Carly Simon, Edith Piaf, Barbra Streisand, Janis Joplin, Maria Callas, Heart, Adele, Sarah Brightman, Dolly Parton, Dusty Springfield, Diana Ross, Amy Winehouse, Tina Turner, Cher, Kate Bush, Joni Mitchell, and Stevie Nicks
It's not just the music I love from these powerhouses it's also there stories almost all of these women have struggles and hardship in there lives in one shape or another. Maybe they didn't fit in growing up, maybe there childhood was harsh, maybe there where in toxic relationships, maybe it was trying to get there big break in a male oriented industry but I am drawn to there voices and there stories.
While I was in a time in my life when I was discovering different types of music I hear the voice of Annie Lennox and I loved it! I ran out and bought her solo and Eurythmics albums. I just love her voice the way her image changes, I love how in the video for this song she has lookalikes in all her different personas from over the years.
This song make me smile I was listening to this song while I was pregnant on Oisìn and one of the first kicks I got was when listening to this song!
What ever she sings whether it's pop, ballads or dance she just gets it right.
Myself, Mam and cousin went to see this movie adaptation of the wonderful book
Me Before You this week and we enjoyed it.
I have mixed feelings of the adaption which I am working on blogging about
It's taking me a while to actually write the review and it has been waiting in my drafts to be edited which I will try get around to posting before the weekend but it will have to wait as I have hospital appointments today and tomorrow!
The thing that added to the movie was of course the soundtrack, it got across some of the emotions from the book. I really loved this song and it was been humming around in my head since the movie! While I felt the movie was lacking in emotion the soundtrack certainly wasn't and I download it to my ipod the day after we went to see the movie!
Half The World Away (The Royle Family Theme Tune)-Oasis
This song has been going through my head all weekend
due to the passing of the great comic writer and actress Caroline Ahern
This song is of course the theme tune to one of Caroline's great shows The Royle Family.
We watched this show every week growing up and I guess in a way we could related to it
As a working class family with an older daughter and younger son, we watched the telly
every evening after tea, we sung along to different ads and theme tunes on the telly.
At the time my parents would call me Denise (cause I wasn't not much of a cook) and my brother was nicked named Lerkyo or Antkneeee (due to his height he looked a little like lankly Ralf Little)
later when I met Paul my parent's gave him the nickname Dave and when we had Oisìn my Dad would sometimes call him Baby David!!
We watched the Christmas specials every year, and still like to watch the reruns at Christmas time.
After my brother died I found it hard to watch this show, but the writing and cast soon had me watching again. I have wonderful memories of my brother laughing so hard at this show, that his face would go red and tears would be ruining down his cheeks.
Not alot of shows have captured our families heart in the way The Royle Family did, maybe Only Fools and Horses was the only other.
Thank you Caroline Ahern for the laughs and memories
This is one of my favourite catchy pop tunes from Kate Bush
This song unlike many of other songs from Kate isn't too deep
it's just a sweet catchy song about loving nature, and looking at the sky
while guessing what different clouds look like!
One favourite version of this song is the remix on the Hounds of Love Delux Remastered album
The video for the song is also care free and fun and like all Kate Bush's videos I love it!!
I recently had my ipod on shuffle and this song came on
I actually forgot I had Lady Anterbellum on my ipod I hadn't listen to this band in forever!
I haven't stopped listening to them all week especially this song. I really love this pop/country band, country music isn't something I listen to alot but this band has just about the right mix of country and pop. I love that is a jointly lead by a male singer Charles Kelley and female singer Hillary Scot. Stevie Nicks another of my all time favourite artists love this band and has sung with them on original songs but also covers over her own well know songs.
My favourite songs from this band are Need You Know, Downtown, Just A Kiss, I Run To You and Love Don't Live Here
This is my most favourite of my Father In Law's songs it a beautiful haunting instrumental piece of music that was written by Finbar and Eddie Furey
It has become there most popular piece of music....something about this piece of music strikes something in everyone. From the opens sea gull cry to the way tin whistle soars it gives me goose bumps.
I have been lucky to hear it live a number of times and it is even more beautiful live.
There is also a poem called Silent Annie that sometimes is spoken before the piece
the lyrics to that are belown
A song which nearly broke my heart
A tramp lay dying in the park.
I knelt beside him to hear him speak
And the words he spoke, they were oh so weak.
He told me a story of long since past,
Of a sailing ship with its long grey mast,
Of his captain's cap with it's shining braid
And the wonderful voyages that he'd made.
"Silent Annie" was his great ship's name.
Like a token of love he spoke her name.
She sailed 'round the Horn, aye, more that once.
She could cut through the waves like a sharpened lance.
"Believe me," he said. His eyes filled with tears
Like a drunk on a corner, trying to remember his years.
He reached out his hand and I took it in mine.
"I believe you," I said, and he gave a sad smile.
"I remember the day when they towed her away.
Her sides they were sore from the sea's angered spray.
They said she's unfit for to sail out once more
(And they towed her more inward from her own sandy shore)?
And as they broke my Silent Annie. I watched with a sigh.
I remembered her beauty when I was a boy.
She was my one love, my life's only dream,
When we sailed out together as captain and queen."
It started to drizzle, and I felt my hand tight
And he squeezed even harder as he ended the fight.
And a crowd they had gathered, and they watched with dismay
As some ambulance men came, and they took him away.
So I got to my feet, and I walked through that park.
On first listen this is just another pop/dance tune which being honest I like to sing along to
while catching some sun in my back garden
On second listen it's actually quite a sad song about a pop star who has/had it all but has nothing
Sure he had fame, money, drugs and women
but he is telling the lister he doesn't trust anyone, can't get clean or have a real relationship
He is lonely and all he knows is sad songs
I really like this song, it is a good dance tune and I am sure it is being played all over Ibiza while ravers are taking that pill! I like it because of the beautiful, regretfully, sad lyrics
Sometimes I think I was born into the wrong era! I love 70's music especially women fronted bands like Jefferson Airplane, Heart and Fleetwood Mac. So when I discovered Heart back when I was a teenager I was so in love with this sister fronted band. I love there mellow rock sound of the 70's and there more pop rock sound of the 80's
This song is one of my favourite it's from there album of the same name which 40 years ago made them stars in America. While they aren't as big in Europe and haven't done the huge sell out shows across the world like Fleetwood Mac I still really enjoy there music and would love to see them live.
Like so many artists of the 1970's this band like Fleetwood Mac broke the mold and had two females fronting the band, in a industry that was male oriented this was a huge thing and would lead on in the 80's to having all women rock and pop groups.
I don't play my many CDs much anymore it's all about spotifiy and my ipod now
but that doesn't mean I don't love my back catalogue of Fleetwood Mac CDs!
I will buy the new reissue of Mirage Fleetwood Mac's 1982 album where the song Gypsy takes pride of place. I will be buying it not on itunes but on amazon for the actual CD. I am still old school like that I love taking out the booklet looking at the new pictures, reading the lyrics and searching for new facts!
While Mirage isn't my favourite Fleetwood Mac album it will be joining my CD collection of Fleetwood Mac bumper reissue albums Fleetwood Mac, Rumours and Tusk
Do you still listen or buy CDs?
With the weather being so nice lately music has been playing alot at our house and garden
While Oisìn has been playing in our back garden the music has always been on
Our little guy love music and loves to dance and sing
Of course some of the lyrics are in his own two year old language but that's funny to hear!
I really like this song as Craig David always reminds me of my late teen years
Just before I met Paul, going to college and going clubbing when I should of been studying!
I like this short little tune, it's catchy slightly old school
and reminds me of my youth
Great reason to tune it up!!
I love Outlander and all week this song has been humming through my head
This is the longer version than the intro for the show
It a Scotland folk song the lyrics have been changed over the years
and now there is two different versions of the song
Orignal Lyrics
Speed, bonnie boat, like a bird on the wing,
Onward! the sailors cry;
Carry the lad that's born to be King
Over the sea to Skye.
Loud the winds howl, loud the waves roar,
Thunderclouds rend the air;
Baffled, our foes stand by the shore,
Follow they will not dare
Later another version the one used in Outlander became popular
the lyrics are from a Robert Louis Stevenson Poem
Sing me a song of a lad that is gone,
Say, could that lad be I?
Merry of soul he sailed on a day
Over the sea to Skye.
Mull was astern, Rùm on the port,
Eigg on the starboard bow;
Glory of youth glowed in his soul;
Where is that glory now
While I like both version the Stevenson's will always be my favourite
although I do like this version of my Father In Law singing the original lyrics
After the sad and shocking news that another of my favourite artists passed away last week
I have been playing a lot of Prince's music this past week
He was a favourite of mine his music always makes me sing along and dance
I first heard this song in the Romeo and Juliet 1996 movie
Prince marks a time in my life from the age of 12 till 16 when I discovered all sorts of different music
Sarah Brightman, Kate Bush, Fleetwood Mac, Thin Lizzy, Maria Callas, Andrew Loyd Webber, Pink Floyd, Rolling Stones, Edith Piaf, Billie Holiday, Janis Joplin, Ray Charles, The Who, and
Stevie Nicks where all artists I discovered around this time. I have a very broad range in my taste in music. I love classical, blues, easy listening, rock n roll, oldies, opera, r n b and dance music
Prince never did the same song twice and I think that's why I loved him so much
His songs have been sung from Sinead O'Conner to Stevie Nicks and all in between
RIP Prince the doves are crying
Another legend added to the long list off music and screen lengends who have left us this year
The stars in the sky are shining bright this year
