Here Come the Sun.

Every once in a while, I pop in my Weavers Best-of CD, because most of those songs make me smile and sing along. "Tzena Tzena" is great for that, even though I don't know the Hebrew words.

Other cheer up songs for me: Bruce Springsteen's version of Viva Las Vegas, Joan Jett's Bad Reputation (and a lot of her other songs), and Dancing in Heaven (Orbital be-bop)

Early Beatles does it for me--maybe it's because I have to sing along. I also perk right up for TMBG or The Monkees. (Yeah, I'm a pop whore, so what) When blue, Crowded House makes me not cheery but comforted--another group which does that for me is Green Day. After I had a bad time at my evaluation today, I slammed "Jesus of Suburbia" on and it was just the thing. When I want to cool out, I play bossa nova (like Jobim or Gilberto) or Bjork.

Secret Crush Society's Tasha Brown (uploaded to a buffistarawk account near you)

(Couldn't help the vanity posting! just got the cd tonight!!!! It's been a lOOOOOOOOOng time coming)

Some Friday Fun:

I have a different kind of challenge for you this month.

Because I will be on vacation for 10 days in the middle of October, and want to do a Halloween mix for the end of the month, I will be posting a “year in review” playlist for the first part of the month.

So, without looking back in this thread, can you identify the 12 themes in this playlist (see next post), and put each song in its proper category? Bonus points for giving the actual name of the mix I used at work.

Some clues:
1) Every theme contributed either 5 or 6 songs to the list.
2) Some songs could fit multiple themes, but do not count twice for the purposes of clue number 1.
3) Up to 3 of the songs could switch or rotate places and this puzzle would still work, but only those three.
3) Knowing my exact age would help you to guess one of the categories.
4) The mix name of one of the hardest themes to guess is one of the songs on this list.
5) The most subtle mix name comes from a song by an artist on this list, but that song is not included here.

“Africa” by Toto
“Ain't No Sunshine” by Me First & The Gimme Gimmes
“Black Horse and the Cherry Tree” by KT Tunstall
“Coin-Operated Boy” by The Dresden Dolls
“Crazy” by Andy Bell
“Crazy” by Gnarls Barkley
“Crazy” by Violent Femmes
“Cruel Summer” by Bananarama
“Crush with Eyeliner” by R.E.M.
“Dandelion Wine” by Ron Sexsmith
“Dashboard” by Modest Mouse
“Destroyer” by The Kinks
“Down to Nowhere” by Thea Gilmore
“Downtown Train” by Everything but the Girl
“867-5309 (Jenny)” by Tommy Tutone
“Everybody Knows (Except You)” by The Divine Comedy
“Excitable Boy” by Warren Zevon
“505” by Arctic Monkeys
"The Flowers She Sent and the Flowers She Said She Sent" by Magnetic Fields
“Forget the Flowers” by Wilco
“4 Minutes” by Madonna
“Friday Night” by Lily Allen
“Friday on My Mind” by The Easybeats
“Girls on Film” by Duran Duran
“Guilty” by UB40
“I Eat Cannibals” by Toto Coelo
“I Want Candy” by Bow Wow Wow
“It's Raining Men” by The Weather Girls
"Lazy Sunday" by Chris Parnell and Andy Samberg
“Let’s Kill Saturday Night” by Robbie Fulks
“Little Red Corvette” by Kustard Kings
“Monday Monday Monday” by Tegan and Sara
“Money, Money, Money” by ABBA
“The Moneymaker” by Rilo Kiley
“The More You Ignore Me, the Closer I Get” by Morrissey
“No Rain” by Blind Melon
“Only Happy When It Rains” by Garbage
“Petals” by Hole
“Pink Cadillac” by Bruce Springsteen
“Pretty in Pink” by The Dresden Dolls
“Psycho Killer” by Talking Heads
“Rain Street” by The Pogues
“Rich Girl” by Gwen Stefani & Eve
“The Richest Kids” by This Is Ivy League
“Ring of Fire” by Social Distortion
“Rock el Casbah” by Rachid Taha
“Ruth, Roses, and Revolvers” by The Real Tuesday Weld
“The Saturday Boy” by Bill Bragg
“She Blinded Me with Science” by Thomas Dolby
“Shock the Monkey” by Peter Gabriel
“Sky Blue Sky” by Wilco
“Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Paul Anka
“So. Central Rain” by R.E.M.
“Summer Son” by Texas
“Summer Wages” by Nanci Griffith
“Summer Wine” by Nancy Sinatra & Lee Hazlewood
“Summertime” by Me First & The Gimme Gimmes
“Survival Car” by Fountains of Wayne
“Tall Green Grass” by Cory Branan
“Thirteen” by Big Star
“The Truck Got Stuck” by Corb Lund
“25 or 6 to 4” by Chicago
“Welcome to the Black Parade” by My Chemical Romance
“Whip It” by Devo
“Wicked and Weird” by Buck 65
“White Wedding” by Billy Idol

My MCR mood-lifting picks are "I'm Not Okay" and, oddly, "You Know What They Do to Guys Like Us in Prison."

Prison isn't that odd... Gerard seems to enjoy it as well. Kinky boy.

I was just thinking in the car earlier, while it was playing, that "I'm Not Okay" is totally one of my moodlifters!