Thing of the Week: Lucky Leif and the Longships, The Girl with the Paul McCartney Tattoo, The Best TGIF Dog

LJ'S THING OF THE WEEK: Lucky Leif and the Longships by Robert Calvert 

Lucky Leif and the Longships by Robert Calvert (who is the singer from Hawkwind) is a concept album produced by Brian Eno about what America might have been like if it were colonized by Vikings. A BRIAN ENO-PRODUCED CONCEPT ALBUM ABOUT VIKINGS FROM THE LEAD SINGER OF HAWKWIND?!?!?! Are you kidding me?!? That shit has my name written all over it. It's the exact sort of thing I would love- and I do! 

Lucky Leif sounds like Something/Anything? by Todd Rundgren mixed with Sides 5 & 6 of Sandinista! by the Clash mixed with that very tidy waterfall of shimmering light that only Brian Eno knows how to make guitars sound like. Last night I was stoned and cleaning my room and listened to Here Come The Warm Jets followed by Let It Be and got really into imagining what Let It Be would have sounded like if Brian Eno produced it. Probably awesome! Anyway, that's an aside. (But definitely one worth thinking about.)

My favorite song on Lucky Leif is called "Magical Potion." It sounds like "Blank Frank" by Brian Eno on Percoset on a beach, and also on Quaaludes. Mr. Calvert's pronunciation of the word "California" is very thrilling to me. My second-favorite song on Lucky Leif is called "The Lay of the Surfers," and guess what??? It's a Beach Boys pastiche!!! There are few things in this world I love more than a good Beach Boys pastiche; I seriously don't relate to any/all musicians who ever made a record that doesn't have a Beach Boys pastiche on it. Like, get it together, fun-haters. "The Lay of the Surfers" might be my second-fav Beach Boys pastiche EVER, after "Back in the USSR" (obvs). It says the words "watery grave"! "We're gonna rock it to our watery grave," to be exact. Cool sentence. Then there's this really embarrassing "Barbara Ann"/"barbarian" pun part that makes me want to kill myself/is so awesome. 

The last track is called "Cricket Lovely Reggae", a title that would bring ample charm and intrigue to any mix CD tracklist, in my opinion. It's about becoming a cricket star, and it's a reggae song. "A cricket star is something to be," sings Robert Calvert, and it's definitely the weirdest "Working Class Hero" reference to ever have existed.

LIZ'S THING OF THE WEEK: The Paul McCartney Tattoo On The Right Arm Of The Rad Girl I Met At Native Foods On Tuesday

Tuesday was my last day of my UCLA class with my amazing teacher and afterward I went to Native Foods for a Sesame Kale Macro Bowl, which looks like this. I was wearing my Paul McCartney shirt and the girl waiting on me told me how she loved my shirt and loves Paul McCartney and how she's met Paul McCartney twice, and one of those times he signed her arm and then she got a tattoo of his autograph. So we cutely bugged out a while about our mutual Paul love and I asked if I could take a picture of her tattoo and she said sure and I Instagram'd it and everyone loved it so much. And then the girl found me on Instagram! And commented on my pic and it was adorable. Then I went to her Etsy page and now I want this necklace and also this Ringo pic. And this morning I listened to the bonus tracks on the 2012 remaster of Ram and stared happily at that picture of Paul at right above and named it "A Paul for Fall," and everything was fun and sparkling and perfect and good. Paul McCartney is my thing every week, but especially this one.

  

JEN'S THING OF THE WEEK: THE BEST TGIF DOG EVER

Joan got a job! A good & cool one, even! We were out having some celebratory prosecco-on-tap when this overwhelmingly adorable dog was spotted. Joan has a new Dog of the Day blog so she introduced herself to Maisey  (the dog). Then she took the best TGIF dog photo ever. It’s perfect - I can’t get over it. TGIF Maisey.