R.I.P. Amy Winehouse

When I got that fateful text this morning from my friend James — he’s the Grim Reaper of dead celebrities and is, usually, the first to tell me when someone famous has died — I knew it must be someone kinda big by the way Christine reacted when she saw it. But, wow, how totally sad to hear that it was the very talented Miss Amy Winehouse.

We don’t have any of her full-length albums, but, I remember like it was yesterday the first time I heard Amy Winehouse’s now-iconic single “Rehab” on the radio. I was driving somewhere by myself and got so excited by the crazy-retro sound (not to mention the fact that they were playing this strangely hypnotic song on Top 40 radio!) that I called Christine at home and told her to turn on the radio RIGHT AWAY!

I know it sounds crazy now that the song has become so popular, but, wow, the first time I heard it, that shit was crazy. The music, her voice, that look, wow, where the hell did this chick come from? Insanity!

I know she had all kinds of substance abuse issues and was probably a bit genuinely bonkers to boot, but, love her or hate her, Winehouse was the real deal, baby. And that’s what makes the news of her death so damn tragic. I mean, just think of what she mighta done, musically, down the road…so sad.

I’ve been reading a lot of online tributes and XMRadio is playing all kinds of musical and call-in tributes on The Spectrum (XM28) but the coolest article I’ve found yet is this one by Chris Wilman at Reuters. Great, insightful stuff from someone who actually interviewed her. Check it out.

R.I.P. Amy Winehouse, you will be missed…

Rockabye Baby…take me away!

Last week, Greta’s gigantic lower molars came in with a vengeance and lemme tell ya, it was not pretty. Non-stop crying, bleeding gums, no eating, no sleeping, urgh…it was hellish. And that was just us! You can imagine how bad the week was for poor little Greta!

Seriously though, whether you’re the one growing the new teeth or not, teething totally f-ing sucks. There was, however, one bright spot last week and that was the fact that we scored some swinging new Rockabye Baby music to help all of us through those long, sleepless nights. Hooray!

Of course, we already had a pretty rocking collection of Rockabye’s lullaby jams on hand — Coldplay, Radiohead, Smashing Pumpkins and The Beatles Vol. I — but, trust me, even The Beatles get old after the thousandth late-night listen.

Thankfully for us, Rockabye has s-loads of other bands on tap. So, first we checked out Björk, which, as you can see, has the coolest cover of the bunch. The lullaby versions of her songs were good, but since her music is kinda trippy and lullaby-ish already, it didn’t really sound that different.

Metallica, on the other hand, was capital-A awesome! Rocking Greta to sleep to a lullaby version of “Enter Sandman” made me wanna bang my head like a madman. Um…you know, a very sleepy madman. Anyway, it rocked.

Green Day was also excellent, but a few of the songs were so rocking that Greta started dancing in my arms. Not the best trait in sleepy-time music…but we will definitely listen to this one in the car on road trips. Awesome stuff, guys!

Surprisingly, our favorite of the latest bunch of Rockabye Baby CD’s was No Doubt. Crazy, huh? I mean, we have a few of the band’s regular CD’s and some of Gwen’s solo stuff, but have never been hard core fans…until now!

Seriously, the lullaby versions of No Doubt’s songs are absolutely gorgeous. I defy you not to shed a tear while listening to that lilting lullaby version of “Simple kind of life”. And when you think about what she’s singing about in the real song and how your new life with this amazing baby is anything but simple…wow, it kills me every time.

And best of all, the No Doubt Rockabye Baby is just great music. Period. Seriously, this album is so good that even people without babies would dig it. So, if you only have the cash for one Rockabye Baby CD this summer, No Doubt’s is the one I’d buy. Actually, I’d still probably get the Beatles one too…Rockabye’s soaring version of “Across The Universe” makes me cry my ass off. Beautiful!!

We’re currently on a waiting list (!) at the library for a couple more Rockabye Baby CD’s (Rolling Stones, anyone?) so, we’ll let you know what we think of those when they come in. But for now, thank you Rockabye Baby, for saving our butts last week…you guys rock!

Scarlett Johansson + Pete Yorn = Best Music Video Ever!

Longtime readers know of my deep and abiding love for Scarlett Johansson, but what even I didn’t know until this morning is that aside from looking lovely and acting her ass off in some amazing movies, Scarjo can actually sing! I mean, I knew she had an album a while back, but, no offense, so did Paris Hilton.

And while I can’t vouch for the quality of the entire album Scarjo released this week with indie slatwart Pete Yorn — it’s called “Break Up” — I can say for sure that the song and video for their first single “Relator” is freaking awesome!

Christine and I often Tivo cool music videos for each other to find when they wake up and you can imagine my surprise when the little rocking, retro-fueled video (linked below) bleep bleeped onto my screen this morning. Sheer. Pop. Awesomeness. Thank you, sweetie!

Seriously, I loved the song so much that I watched the video at least ten times today…even Greta was tapping her feet! And even though the song comes a little too late to be our official 2009 summer jam — that honor goes to the equally jamming “1, 2, 3, 4” by the Plain White T’s — something tells me “Relator” will be getting a lot of play on our iPods this fall.

To see the video for yourself, click here. And in the meantime, rock on Scaryorn, we don’t just love your song and music video…we totally wanna be you guys! Um, you know…minus the whole breaking up part…

Rockabye Baby CD’s rock!

Christine and I had read about Rockabye Baby CD’s — which are basically lullaby versions of popular rock songs — a while back but it wasn’t until our friend Ginger got us the Coldplay album that we actually heard one in its entirety. And though the concept sounds a bit odd, I gotta tell ya, the music is really amazing…

Since we loved the Coldplay album so much, we quickly ordered two more of the Rockabye Baby CD’s on Amazon.

I picked the Rockabye Baby Radiohead album (which rocks!) and Christine chose Rockabye Baby The Smashing Pumpkins which positively soars. Seriously, the lullaby version of “Tonight, Tonight” left all three of us breathless. Actually, I don’t know if Greta was breathless from the music or from breastfeeding, but either way, she totally digs the tunes.

Radiohead seems to be here favorite right now — I did not coerce her, I swear! — but she loves all three of her Rockabye Baby CD’s so much that it’s practically all we play for her on the iPod.

And aside from sounding truly awesome, and hopefully introducing her to some rocking good jams before she discovers the unspeakable horrors of Miley Cyrus and the JoBros, the music puts her to sleep like nobody’s business…so, yay!

To sample some of the super cool Rockabye Baby music for yourself, visit their crazy-cute site here. And if you’re looking for a cool baby shower gift, look no further…because these CD’s kick some serious ass!