For my twenty-sixth Tune Tuesday, I am going to write about one of my favorite songs ever. I am going to write about a song, that is for a very special occasion today. I am going to pick Billy Joel's first hit song "Piano Man", from 1973, in the honor of his 67th Birthday today. The lyrics of this song are so much fun. The first verse goes, "It's nine o'clock on a Saturday, the regular crowd shuffles in. There's an old man sittin' next to me, making love to his tonic and Gin." Then the second verse says, "He says 'Son, can me a memory? I'm not really sure how it goes. But it's sad and and it's sweet, and I knew it complete, when I wore a younger man's clothes. Oh la-la-la-de-de-da. La-la-de-de-da-da-da." Then the chorus goes, "Sing us a song, you're the Piano Man, sing us a song tonight. We we're all in the mood for a melody, and you've got us feelin' alright." Then the third verse says, "Now John at the bar is a friend of mine, he gets me my drinks for free. And he's quick with a joke, or to light up your smoke, but there's someplace that he'd rather be." Then the fourth were goes, "He says, 'Bill, I believe this is killing me, as a smile ran away from his face. Well I'm sure that I could be a movie star, if I could get out of this place. Oh la-la-la-de-de-da. La-la-de-de-da-da-da." Then the fifth verse says, "Now Paul is a real estate novelist, who never had time for a wife. And he's talkin' with Davy, who's still in the Navy, and probably will be for life." Then the sixth verse goes, "And the waitress practicing politics, as the businessmen slowly get stoned. Yes their sharing a drink they call loneliness, but it's better than drinking alone." The chorus comes in again, and the seventh verse says, "It's a pretty good crowd, for a Saturday, and the manager gives me a smile. 'Cause he knows that it's me, they've been comin' to see, to forget about life for a while." The eighth and final verse goes, "And the piano, it sounds like a carnival, and the microphone smells like a beer. And they sit at the bar, and put bread in my jar, and say 'Man what are you doin' here?' Oh la-la-la-de-de-da. Oh la-la-de-de-da-da-da." Then the chorus repeats one last time, and then the song ends. This song is known for three things, its entertaining La-la-ing parts, it's catchy chorus, and of course, the harmonica interludes that come in the beginning before the first verse, after each verse a bit, and after the chorus. That might be one of the most famous harmonica parts ever. This song dictates what the fellow Long Islander saw, when he was playing the Piano, as a side gig, in a nightclub. The scenes he saw, naturally happening, inspired him to write a sort of "Fly on the Wall" type of song, as he mentions everyone, a drunk old man, John the bartender, Paul the real-estate novelist, Davy the seaman, the waitresses, the businessmen, the manager of the club, and the patrons of the bar as a whole. This song became Billy Joel's signature song. He plays this at every concert that he does, and everyone calls him the Piano Man. We don't just do that for our health here on the Island! This song has been used since 2012, as the sing-a-long song in the eighth inning at Citi Field for the Mets games. They only play it if they are winning by any margin, tied, or if they are losing by a run or two. I have been to three blowout games, two last year against the New York Yankees and Philadelphia Phillies, and one this year against the Miami Marlins, and they didn't play the song, which was upsetting. Anyways, I hope that you all enjoy this song, and get to love it as much as I do, and also the rest of Long Island does! Have you ever heard this song before? Did you like this song? Do you like me using Billy Joel song's, or do you want me to get new artists in the Tune Tuesdays? Peace and Love,
DGS Quotes of the Day: "Nothing fixes a thing so intensely in the memory as the wish to forget it." - Michel de Montaigne "Thousands of geniuses live and die undiscovered - either by themselves or by others." - Mark Twain "We may give without loving, but we cannot love without giving." - Bernard Meltzer For my twenty-sixth Memory Monday, I am going to write about something that was really sad when it happened. I am going to write about something I am also immensely proud of. I am going to write about the last solo I ever sung at Kellenberg. It was around this time last year, when my time at Kellenberg was winding down. I was starting to say all of my goodbyes, and some of the hardest things to say goodbye to was chorus. If you have been a long reader of this blog, you will know how much I love chorus, and how it played such a huge part in my life. In our final Spring concert, there was a great song that we were singing. It was a melody of songs by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. In the middle, there was a singing solo for the beginning of the song "Let's Hang On". I tried out for that and I got it, but I wasn't done yet. There was a song for Firebird Swing that I wanted as well. It was a scat solo, in the middle of The Flintstone's Theme Song. I got that one as well. When I was signing these two solos, I couldn't believe that my singing career at Kellenberg was over. Let's Hang On was my last chorus solo, while The Flintstones was my last ever solo in Kellenberg. It was a very emotional few moments for me, as I stepped away from the mic after my scat was finished. I couldn't believe that this magical joyride of a singing career was over. To come from not being in the chorus, to being told by other's that I would never get a solo, to getting The Boy From New York City, to then being one of the leaders, not just of the basses in the chorus, but in the entire chorus my junior and senior year. All of these thoughts, and many more were floating around in my head during that last ever song. I am so excited to be going back to Kellenberg this Friday, for the Spring Concert, for the first time since I graduated last year. I am also really excited to be going to the Firebird Swing concert next Friday, and having the privilege of going back up onto the risers, to sing our old theme song, Route 66. I will link both songs down below, both Let's Hang On, and The Flintstones, so that you can hear what I had to do. Plus, it gives me a good excuse for putting in two great songs onto this blog. Have you ever heard these songs before? Were you ever in your high school's chorus? Would you have wanted to have solo's in your chorus? Peace and Love,
DGS Quotes of the Day: "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." - Jim Elliot "Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever." - Napoleon Bonaparte "The fate of love is that it always seems too little or too much." - Amelia Barr "Insanity is hereditary; you get it from your children." - Sam Levenson Happy Cinco de Mayo Everyone! For my twenty-fourth Turnstile NYC Thursday, and to help celebrate Cinco de Mayo, I am going to write about a great place to go eat for todays Cinco de Mayo festivities. I am going to choose a place, that is not in New York City, but rather in Brooklyn, at the base of the Manhattan Bridge. I am going to write about the world famous Junior's Restaurant. (If you didn't understand that that was sarcasm, I am sorry, but it's too late for you.) Since there are no interesting Spanish places to go and visit in the city, I had to choose another option, and what is honestly better, and than some nice Junior's. Junior's is an old school diner, that is right across the street from Atlantic Terminal, and is right down the block from the base of the Manhattan Bridge. It has a real Brooklyn feel too it. When you walk in, the walls are decorated in pictures of older Brooklyn, newspaper articles from this restaurants over 60 year history, like the Brooklyn Dodgers still being here, and for course it is known all over the world, for its three main things, its excellent egg cream milkshakes, its great diner courses, and its killer Cheesecake. First is the milkshakes. They are so smooth, and they taste so good. Now you can be weird and get those different and crazy flavors, but I am a plane jane guy, who just goes after Chocolate shakes, and in all of my years, I have never had a better Chocolate Shake, ever. They are insane, and I hope that you get to try one one day. Second is the food. They have everything, and when I say everything, I mean everything. They have cheeseburgers, ribs, steaks, seafood, breakfast items, and so much more, all day long, and it is all good stuff to eat. Then third, and most importantly, and probably most famously is their unbelievable Cheesecake. I always get the original, (don't judge), and I always enjoy it. I think that it is impossible to not enjoy the cheesecake from Junior's, not going to lie here. Anyways, I hope that you check this place out, on your next trip to the city / Brooklyn. It is a great eatery, and I am sure that you will enjoy your food from here! Have you ever eaten at Junior's before? Would you want to? If you have, what did you get there? Peace and Love,
DGS Quotes of the Day: "Action is the foundational key to all success." - Pablo Picasso "It takes a great man to be a good listener." - President Calvin Coolidge "However rare true love may be, it is less so than true friendship." - Francois de La Rochefoucauld For my twenty-third Wisdom Wednesday, I am going to re-address something that I have touched upon in other Wisdom Wednesdays in the past. I am going to hit on something that is getting ridiculous on the college scene. I am going to talk about professors and students in college, acting like four year olds over differing political views.
(This is going to be in a written rant like style, so it might be longer than my previous posts.) Listen, everyone is entitled to their own political beliefs and views, and that we give people respect and dignity when they differ from ours, yeah, doesn't that sound fair and right?... WRONG!! That is not how college works my friends! Not at all! I am going to tell you how college works, and I am not holding back any punches anymore. It is ridiculous what I am seeing the media, and with my own two eyes, and I cannot stand to sit silent anymore. This blog is big, and I hope that this all gets shared to the ends of the Earth, I really do... First off, you have these students, that are 18, 19, 20, 21, even 22 years old, that think they know the world, and how it all works. Sorry you're wrong on that. They act like "saviors of the world", with their backwards knowledge. They come into college trying to "rebel against the man" and rebel against their parents and authority. They are very impressionable people, and they are told by many professors, to "question authority". REALLY!! QUESTION AUTHORITY! The funniest part, is that all of these professors write books, novels, and papers, that literally one person reads, themselves, and they look for the answers as to why no one respects their parents, and police officers, and people above them in the way of life anymore... but they need not look any further than in their own classrooms, where they are teaching these people to do that! My second point, is that I cannot stand when these people try to act all tough and mighty with their 'newfound' knowledge, and try to pressure you into following their ideology. Like please relax,... just months ago, you needed to raise your hand to go to the bathroom in high school, so please, take a seat. Listen, what I am about to say next, might offend some people, but preface: I know a lot of excellent, very nice Democrats, but, seriously, student and professor Democrats on a college campus are the literal cancer of learning. These are the worst types of students, and outside people have it all wrong. People always say that its white men, or black men that cause problems on campuses, start protests and riots, and are the counterculture people, but that is so dead wrong. Do you want to know who it is... It's mostly, about 95% white women, and sometimes, also very rarely black women too. They are these feminist, mean, angry, people that get in your face, for no good reason. Like seriously, can we be real for a second, people of all races, colors, religions, whatever, we all want women to have equal pay, and representation, and all the good things in life, but I absolutely cannot stand these types of people. You all know the people I am talking about. I am talking about the short pink, purple, blue, or green haired, five piercings on both ears and one the eyebrow and on the upper and lower lips, four tattoos on the arms or the back, dressed like a man, people. They are some of the meanest people you will ever meet in your life, and yes, some of them are also lesbian, or queer, or whatever, but again, I also know many very nice LGBT people, so, sorry, I'm not going to put those very nice people that I know, with these jackasses at college. That is not fair to them. Listen, I am a very nice guy to be around, I like to kid around, joke, and laugh, but I am also a Donald Trump supporter (so happy today!), and that is like forbidden on the college campus scene. I cannot tell you how many times, I have been wearing my Trump shirt, or hat, or buttons, and are carrying about my business, walking to class, or reviewing notes, or checking my phone, whatever and have had such dirty looks given to me, and those women come up, and try to start shit with me. There is one good thing though, and that is that I have been watching and studying both sides of this political season for over a year now, so I know everything about every candidate. You can't fool me on politics, especially with this election cycle. But anyways, they come up to you, and they curse you out, they spit at you, they call you all the names, racist, xenophobe, homophobe, sexist, you name it, I've been called it, in the past few months at college. This has all happened to me, everything that I have written. Everything except physical violence, but as we move closer to November, that might scaredy change. That is literally the tactics of a four year old. Trying to bully you into believing something else, that you don't agree with, and that is purely just so wrong. This needs to STOP at college, NOW! It is getting to the point, with this stupid radical, suppressive, Democratic agenda, that in the classrooms, a place of learning, and where respect should be overflowing, you cannot express your political beliefs, if they don't fit with the professor, and a few of the students in that class, so much to the point where you will lose points on tests, and finals, and maybe even fail a class, because you don't want to sacrifice who you are, to people you don't even know, and people who don't give a damn about you. My friends at college, as well as me, have been faced with receiving failing grades from professors, and name calling from fellow students because of what and who we believe in. Have we really gotten to this point in our country, when the conversation of discourse, and the freedom of speech and party expression, has become so overly squashed out, by insecure people of a differing viewpoint. I am afraid that we have gotten there guys, and it is only getting worse now. Don't believe me,... just look at what has happened in the well documented news media over the past few weeks! First with Virginia Tech, canceling the visit of an esteemed Black-Republican writer for the Wall Street Journal, because they were afraid of 'riots'. Come On! Or look at Harvard University, HARVARD!, where a Catholic-Republican young man was ridiculed by his female professors and students, because he believes that life begins at conception, and was Pro-Life. Really! Or in the most famous case so far, female students at Brown University, bringing up charges against two people, a white man and a black man for writing "Trump 2016" on the board, with them calling that "Hate-Speech" Are you kidding me! The Swastika on your protest signs against Trump are way more hateful, than his campaign hashtag! People later, all across the country, took to their college campus sidewalks, walls, and even statues, with chalk, in protest of this ridiculous behavior, writing things like "Make America Great Again", "Build the Wall", and the thing that started it all, "Trump 2016" We need to seriously wake up from this nightmare situation, and all act like big men and women, and grow up, because if we don't, no matter what party you belong to, we will not like what we have become, in what is supposed to be the greatest place to learn in the world, a college campus in America, where differing ideas, are supposed to flow, naturally, and lead to a more complete understanding of the human condition, here in this county. So that is enough of me getting on my soapbox for today! I hope you all enjoyed it, and please, please share this, and let me know if you want me to go more in depth on any of this 'speech'! Did you like this post? Do you agree with me, or not? If you do agree, or don't agree, why? Peace and Love, DGS Quotes of the Day: "I'd rather attempt to do something great and fail, than to accept to do nothing and succeed." - Robert H. Schuller "Anyone who does not believe in miracles, is not a realist." - David Ben-Gurion "You never lose by loving, but you always lose by holding back." - Barbara de Angelis "I am quite fond of pigs. Dogs look up to us, Cats look down on us, Pigs treat us as equals." - Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill For my twenty-fifth Tune Tuesday, I am going to choose a song that commemorates a huge moment in the history of the United States. I am going to choose another song from Billy Joel. I am going to choose "Goodnight Saigon", to commemorate the 41st Anniversary of the sad Fall of Saigon, which ended the Vietnam War, on April 30th, 1975. The lyrics of the song tell the story of soldiers of the Vietnam War, but before the lyrics come in, the backing music is so cool. It starts off with crickets, which symbolizes the jungle of Vietnam, and then the maracas shake for a while, until you hear the rotors of a helicopter, and then the song begins. The first verse goes, "We met as soul mates, on Parris Island. We left as inmates, from an asylum. And we were sharp, as sharp as knifes, and we were so gung-ho to lay down our lives." The second verse goes, "We came in spastic, like tameless horses. We left in plastic, as numbered corpses. And we learned fast, to travel light, our arms were heavy but our bellies were tight." The third verse goes, "We had no homefront, we had no soft soap. They sent us Playboy, they gave us Bob Hope. We dug in deep, and shot on sight, and prayed to Jesus Christ with all of our might." The fourth verse goes, "We had no camera's to shoot the landscape. We passed the hash pipe, and played our Doors tapes. And it was dark! So dark at night! And we held onto each other, like brother to brother, we promised our mothers we'd write!" Then the chorus goes, "And we would all go down together! We'd say we'd all go down together! Yes we would all go down together!" Then the fifth verse goes, "Remember Charlie, remember Baker. They left their childhood on every acre. And who was wrong! And who was right! It didn't matter in the thick of the fight!" Then the bridge goes, "We, held the day, in the palm, of our hand. They ruled the night, and the night, seems to last, as, long, as..." Then the sixth verse comes in immediately with, "Six weeks, on Parris Island. We held the coastline, they held the highland. And they were sharp! As sharp as knifes! They heard the hum of the motors, they counted the rotors, and waited for us, to arrive!" Then the chorus comes in again, and then the song ends, in reverse of how it started, with the helicopter leaving, then the maracas ending, and then just the sound of crickets. This song is such a masterpiece, because it talks about both sides of the war, from the American side and the Viet Cong side too a bit. It also talks about the soldiers lives, and how their outlooks changed throughout the war. I hope that you all enjoy this song, and remember the brave lives lost not just in Vietnam, but in all of our wars. Have you ever heard this song before? What do you think of it? Do you think it is a good song, or a bad song? Peace and Love,
DGS Quotes of the Day: "If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear to man as it is, infinite." - William Blake "The years teach much, which the days never know." - Ralph Waldo Emerson "Love is the energy of life." - Robert Browning Peace and Love, DGS Quotes of the Day: "There is nothing impossible to him who will try." - Alexander the Great "Leap, and the net will appear." - John Burroughs "I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people." - Vincent Van Gogh |
About The AuthorHi! I'm Dylan, I'm 19, and I live on Long Island. I hope I can spread some laughter, advice, and love to people through this blog! Archives
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