Songs for Adrienne

I heard a song today that made me decide to take a musical journey for Adrienne. Think of it as a road trip for the soul..... a roadie, if you will.

I should start at the very beginning, but I didn't listen to Restless Heart. But here is a little Restless Heart just for her (I picked a song at random).



So, there is one band that has been like a thread for our friendship; stitching our lives together in a common theme. The theme of which was getting really stoned in college (COME ON, WHO DIDN'T!?). And the soundtrack to our 9 month stint in higher education in Wyoming was Sublime. Oh, the memories that we created, and then promptly dispersed into a smoky haze above the heads of 2 college girls (and one college dropout, hehe). Adrienne wrote me a whole letter about 5 years ago for my birthday detailing every memory she could find, most of which I didn't recall until I read them. I could put about 30 songs up and give a story for each one, but this one is near and dear to my heart. It was sung to me under a kitchen table, by the one and only Miss A, after a boy was mean to me and made me cry. An a cappella version broke out at the party, and we seem to sing it when one of us needs a little extra dose of love.
Sublime- Garden Grove


Next up, another throwback to the old college days. Can you believe I never experienced any Bob Marley before Adrienne popped a scratched CD into her portable CD player and we cruised her little Nissan around town? I can't believe it. One of my favorite lines, and memories, is "we'll share the shelter/of my single bed". For two girls sleeping in twin size beds the idea of sharing it with another person, especially a boy, was very appealing. Oh, we're older and wiser now, and I can tell you honestly that having a boy in my single bed was never the poetic experience Bob promised, but I still love it.

Bob Marley- Is This Love?



The song I heard this morning that prompted me to revive the long musical post was Joni Mitchell. This is yet another musician I was introduced to in a Nissan Altima. I love that Joni started out with a sweet, high soprano and later got raspier and more hoarse with age and smoking, much like myself. This song, out of a bunch I could choose from, reminds me of Adrienne the most because of the reference to silver. If you know either of us, you know that we don't do gold. And if there was a place called the Mermaid Cafe I would buy her a bottle of wine. We'd laugh and toast to nothing and smash our empty glasses down. I'll stop now.

Joni Mitchell- Carey



I couldn't post a blog about the music we shared without throwing out Janis. Oh, Janis, she really narrated a lot of the scenes in the fun times we have had. I'll never forget our trip to a cabin in the woods, the trip there, and wailing Janis in the passenger seat of my little Subaru hatchback while everyone wailed with laughter and requests to make the madness stop. I know Adrienne was brave enough once to sing this song karaoke, and I hope one day to force her into a repeat performance.

Janis Joplin- Me and Bobby McGee



Okay, so Steve Miller Band is an OLD band, which carries the theme that Adrienne and I were born about 25 years too late to enjoy the music that later became the stuff we made memories to. I used to hate the song "Swingtown" because it just seemed really dumb. I've since gotten over that, after a stern talking to from my dad, but it's not one of my favorites. Adrienne and I had to drive a turkey or a ham or some kind of frozen animal to Lame Deer once to drop off for my mom, and on the way back we listened to SMB. She mentioned how she imagined that our parents probably listened to the same song on the same stretch of road heading back to Colstrip. Now she gets to make the same drive daily, listening to Bob and Tom and her books on tape. This song is EVERYBODY'S favorite, and we had the pleasure of seeing reggae superstar Half Pint do his own dread swinging version of this song in Boulder, CO if February of 2000. Enjoy!

P.S. Steve Miller really reminds me of a very young version of my musical father-in-law in the video.

Steve Miller Band- The Joker


I've got two more videos, then I'll halt this Magical Mystery Tour and make it a two parter at a later date. The first one is by the Long Beach Dub Allstars, which is Sublime minus Bradley Nowell plus Opie and Ras1, two guys that they got to replace him for vocals. This is the concert that Adrienne, Krystal, Riaz, Scott, and Levi and I piled into a big old brown Lincoln and traveled 414 miles to go see. It was an amazingly fun concert, since they played a million Sublime classics. This was also the night of the "bunk" acid that Scott and Levi took that ended up not being bunk. So much fun, so many memories.

Well, the fascists at youtube have disabled linking the ONE SONG I could find that I wanted to put up here, so go find it for yourself and listen to it. It's called Trailer Ras.

This is the last one, I swear. I heard Jack Johnson for the first time when his first CD came out and we put it in the listening bin at Hastings. I was working inventory at the time so I popped it in one morning while we scanned all the books or cds or whatever we were scanning that day. I FELL IN LOVE WITH IT. Just a few notes into the first song I knew that this guy would make great music. I debated on putting up two songs, so I'll do them both. One is my fave from the first album, and the second is what I assume Adrienne's is, after she demanded it be played on an August night in 2007 when a lot of beer had been consumed.

Jack Johnson- F Stop Blues


Jack Johnson- Bubble Toes


I'm sure Adrienne will think of more songs I didn't even remember. I love you, my friend. I'm glad that you've known me since we were little girls in the man-camps. I hope you had fun reading this.