#30DaySongChallenge

30 Day Song Challenge, Day 5: A Song That Reminds You of Someone

Before I reveal my pick for a “song that reminds me of someone,” let me say a little bit about the someone in advance. My “someone” is not just one of the best best friends in the whole wild world, not just any grossly-underappreciated poet and philosopher, not just any garden variety wunderkind, not just any…

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30 Day Song Challenge, Day 4: A Song That Makes You Sad

As I’ve said many times before on this blog, the four essential ingredients of a great song (in my estimation) are three chords and a sad story.  I think I’ve always had a particular affection for sad songs, one that has only grown over the years, and my guess is that if I made a…

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30 Day Song Challenge, Day 3: A Song That Makes You Happy

For today’s pick, I’m returning home to Soulsville, to draw from one of our deepest cultural and musical wells: Stax. The Stax “sound” is the sound that I most closely identify with Memphis, my home, and even the saddest of songs from the Stax vault has always possessed the power to cheer me up. Those…

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#30DaySongChallenge 2016

Each summer, I participate in the #30DaySongChallenge. As regular readers of this blog already know, what that entails is my posting a song in response to a daily prompt for each of the 30 days of June, accompanied with some (long or short) post that accounts for why I chose that song for that day’s…

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30 Day Song Challenge, Day 2: Your Least Favorite Song

First, see yesterday’s post for my caveat about picking “favorite” and “least favorite” songs. The category “least favorite song” is a weird one, since it presumes there is something at least minimally favorable about the pick. It needs to be a song that is not so awful that you actively avoid hearing it, but still…

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30 Day Song Challenge, Day 1: Your Favorite Song

As I’ve done for the last several years, I’ll be posting once a day throughout the month of June for the #30DaySongChallenge. (Here is the link to the “anchor” page for this year’s iteration of the Challenge where you can keep up with my daily picks.) There is a prompt for each day, and today’s prompt…

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30 Day Song Challenge, Day 30: A Song You Discovered This Month (During The Challenge)

They say all good things must come to an end, and since today is the last day of June, it’s time to put the finishing touch on this year’s 30 Day Song Challenge. If you’re interested in going back to check out my previous picks, I’ve collected them all at this link. I had a…

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30 Day Song Challenge, Day 29: A Song You Want Played At Your Funeral

IT’S A TWO-FER TODAY in the 30 Day Song Challenge!! I couldn’t pick just one so I’m giving you both of my picks for today. That may be kind of a sad commentary on the things I think too much about, since today calls for me to pick a song that I want played at my…

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30 Day Song Challenge, Day 28: A Song From Your Childhood

Only a few days left in this year’s 30 Day Song Challenge and as much as I’ve enjoyed participating again this summer, it just got considerably more difficult to do so as I am now swamped with other blog-matters (specifically, my post regarding the recent SCOTUS “marriage equality” decision).  Thankfully, today’s prompt is a simple…

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30 Day Song Challenge, Day 13: A Song That Is A Guilty Pleasure

As a rule, I don’t like the category “guilty pleasure” when it’s applied to music.  You like the songs you like.  No harm, no foul Most of the time, when asked to report their “guilty” music pleasures, people tend to pick from artists like ABBA or Neil Diamond or Boyz II Men— all of whom I love, by the way– but what…

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