Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Papa Was a Rodeo

Heather gave a mix-CD to Jon for his birthday that included the song, "Papa Was a Rodeo" performed by Kelly Hogan & The Pine Valley Cosmonauts. As Heather is a genius at the art of the Mix Tape (partially because she's worked in stores that sell CDs for so long), we've been listening to it a lot ever since Jon's party (he's still not thirty yet). Aleks really likes this particular tune (though my favorite is Sly Stone doing "Searchin'") and I noticed him singing it now and again. The chorus goes:
Papa was a rodeo - Mama was a rock'n'roll band
I could play guitar and rope a steer before I learned to stand
Home was anywhere with diesel gas - Love was a trucker's hand
Never stuck around long enough for a one night stand
Before you kiss me you should know
Papa was a rodeo
He did ask me awhile back what a one night stand was, but I was getting ready to go rather frantically and somehow shook having to answer at that exact moment. He hasn't brought it up again (yet).

Here's Aleks singing it while he crafts...

2 comments:

Lynnie said...

We love "Papa was a Rodeo" by the Magnetic Fields, I'll have to check out the Cosmonauts!

Anonymous said...

Lately I've been playing this song I really like over and over, it's "We Both Go Down Together" by Colin Meloy (of the Decemberists, are you the one who was asking for music? I might have already mentioned it here before, if not and you're curious let me know and I'll send you the link) and well, it's really catchy, and I have musical children... So we're at the dining room table doing kiddy crafts, and the playlist gets around to this song and the girls start belting out the lyrics which are basically about a Romeo and Juliet-style romance and suicide, with one particularly uncomfortable line about a deflowering. Surreal to hear that coming out of the mouth of a four-year-old, but also sort of perversely hilarious in such an innocent context. Luckily they haven't yet begun wondering about the actual meaning of whatever we're listening to...