I remember when there was this cable television station that was called Mtv. And it played these things called "music videos" that were set up by folks called VJs, pictured below.
Those fabled times were the 80s.
Two musicians who had their careers established because of their videos were Cyndi Lauper, famous for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" and "True Colors" and Lionel Ritchie, who I remember most for "All Night Long."
I don't care for the work of either musician much at all. Well, maybe there is a shiny piece of my heart that enjoys the goofiness that is "She-Bop," but I'll not detail that here.
While I'm not a fan of Lauper or Ritchie, I am a fan of both Caroline Herring and Centro-matic. And they both do fine covers of the work of Lauper and Ritchie and make them their own.
First up is Herring's rendition of "True Colors." She has a powerful voice.
"All Night Long" by Ritchie is an up-tempo pop song that's happy.
Will Johnson and his mates in Centro-matic will have none of that. No sir.
As you can experience below, it becomes an opus of sorrow in their hands.
After checking out both of these folks' websites, apparently they both have new albums out this summer:
- Caroline Herring's The Little House Songs, which looks available now
- Centro-matic's Candidate Waltz, out June 21
And Centro-matic offers a free 24-song sampler for your perusal. The download is prefaced by this prose: "People often ask what Centro-matic or South San Gabriel album to start with. There's no easy answer to this, so we are giving away a couple of songs from each album spanning the 15 years the band has been making music together. Please share this with your friends."
For your weekend plans, I offer these lyrics:
Well, my friends, the time has come
[To] raise the roof and have some fun,
Throw away the work to be done.
Let the music play on... (Play on, play on, play on...).
Everbody sing. Everybody dance.
Lose yourself in wild romance.
We're going to party, karamu, fiesta forever.
Come on and sing along.
We're going to party, karamu, fiesta forever.
Come on and sing along.
