Since I had so much fun doing this last week and I have way more favorite albums that could've possibly fit into one single TT entry, I'll let them spill over into this week's post. I didn't get a lot of visitors last week since I posted my list so late, but stop over and check out last week's favorites if you get a chance.
I've certainly noticed doing this that I have quite the large range of favorites here. The only thing you won't find is twangy country crap!
Thirteen More of My Favorite Albums
The Wall by Pink Floyd. Remember the controversey this movie and the song "Another Brick in the Wall" caused when it came out in the '70s? My mother didn't want me to have this album. I finally got myself a 45 single at Woolworth's with some babysitting money or something, but I didn't see the movie until late high school or early college. I think I saw it on MTV or something. Remember how they used to play music related movies? Anyway, I played the heck out of this album while I was in college.
Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd. It's not the top selling album of all time for no reason (or is it...must go check that fact). Hey Denverites — Remember how they used to do laser shows to this at midnight at the planetarium? Good times. "Dark Side of the Moon" is just such a great song for chilling out, but "Money" is my absolute most favorite PF song ever.
Mania a greatest hits compillation of the Ramones. I wasn't really a big Ramones fan early on. I used to think of them as these weird little punk rock dudes on MTV. When MTV played thier Rock 'n' Roll High School movie, however, I was hooked. I even had a bit of a crush on Joey. Anyway, my favorite songs of theirs are "Rock 'n' Roll High School" and "I Want to Be Sedated."
Mascara & Monsters: The Best of Alice Cooper I absolutely adore Alice Cooper. I even got to see a live show of his once. One of the best concerts I've even seen. My most favorite song of his is "How You Gonna See Me Now," but you can't help but singing along to the anthem, "School's Out." I love that Staples commercial he did with that song. Hilarious!
Christmas by Mannheim Steamroller. OK, a little out of season here, but definitely my most favorite holiday album. I've always loved Mannheim Steamroller's work and their sound is so beautiful and original. It is the one thing that can get me into the holiday mood. When you first hear "Deck the Halls," you know the holiday season is upon you!
The Dreams of Children by new age group Shadowfax. I saw this group up at a concert at Red Rocks when they opened for my most favorite jazz group ever, Spyro Gyra. I don't think they're together anymore, though. This song is called "Another Country."
Grease Musical soundtrack. I love the musical Grease. John Travolta and Olivia Newton John certainly did it proud when they did the movie version. I remember this stuff being played all over the radio and I thought that was totally cool. My most favorite song from this musical is when Rizzo sings "There are Worse Things I Could Do." Stockard Channing did an excellent job with that role.
5150 by Van Halen. It was the first VH album post David Lee Roth, but it was pretty good. My college roommate at the time and I were both huge Van Halen fans. I saw them in concert a couple of times while Sammy Hagar was lead. I sure wished I could've seen the original line up, though. "Love Walks In" is definitely my most favorite track on this album, though "Hot Summer Nights" was a close second..
Dr. Demento 20th Anniversary Collection: The Greatest Novelty Records Of All Time How many of you used to stay up late to the weekends to to listen to the Dr. Demento show? I did. It's where I first heard Weird Al's "Another One Rides the Bus." There are the most awesome litty ditties on this collection. They always bring a smile to my face. My most favorite on here is "Star Trekkin'" and "Existential Blues."
Back in Black AC/DC was the first hard rock band I ever listened to. My favorite on this album is "You Shook Me All Night Long," but the cover track is pretty darned awesome, too. When I met Marcus and found out he was a big AC/DC fan, I knew we were meant to be!
The Matrix Reloaded This soundtrack is cool in that one of the two discs featured the rock songs and the other disc featured the orchestral score written by Don Davis. My favorite tracks are P.O.D.'s "Sleeping Awake" and Fluke's "Zion."
Empire by Queensrÿche. It's rare that a group puts out an album with several good songs on it. This was one. In addition to the title track, there was "Jet City Woman," "Another Rainy Night," "Anybody Listening" and my favorite "Silent Lucidity."
The Ozzman Cometh is a greatest hits compillation of Ozzy Osbourne. In addition to the great Ozzy solo music, there is also a little bit of Black Sabbath basement tapes on here. "Crazy Train" kind of became my own little anthem while I was in college. Life was definitely crazy back then.
The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!
With Marcus' AppleTV purchase, the blog post earlier this week about the upcoming Police CD release and various conversations the last couple of weeks with coworkers about favorite music, I decided to start compiling a list of my favorites. It's funny how various events in life dictate why you like a particular group or album. A lot of these will be greatest hits type compilations because I happen to own a bunch of those. So, without further ado:
Thirteen of My Favorite Albums (in no particular order)
Xanadu Soundtrack featuring the music of the Electric Light Orchestra and Olivia Newton John. This is my favorite album and movie of all time. I don't know why this movie stuck with me so, but I love it and ELO is one of my favorite bands of all time, as well. It also featured one of my favorite classic performers, Gene Kelly. He happened to be a clarinetist in this movie and so was I back in the day. I was also big into roller skating, which was another theme of the movie. My favorite tunes on this are the OLN/Tubes collaboration called "Dancin'" , the hauntingly sad ELO track "Don't Walk Away" and the optimisitc "I'm Alive."
Saturday Night Fever featuring music by the Bee Gees and various other disco artists. I know everybody bashed disco and burned albums, etc., but I'm not afraid to say that I love disco. I still do. The very first time I danced with a guy he was wearing a silk shirt, white pants and we were under a disco ball. This was a really sad movie, though. I was pretty young when I first saw it, so I didn't really see the sad, pathetic nature of Tony's (the main character's) life until I saw it many years later. In addition to the Brothers Gibb, my favorite tracks are the classical/disco mixes of "A Fifth of Beethoven" and "Night on Disco Mountain."
Hooray for Boobies by The Bloodhound Gang. Marcus liked these guys long before I did. I just didn't get them. When this album came out, however, I changed my tune about them. You all know the song "The Bad Touch" (You and me baby ain't noting but mammals...) and I tried to pick another couple of favorites to list, but they're all good! I like the little humorous filler tracks, too.
Classic Queen & Queen Greatest Hits I grouped these two together since I almost always listen to them both in their entirety as a double CD set. I love almost every song that Queen put out. Freddie Mercury et al were definitely one of the finest musical acts ever. I think his passing was the first loss of a musician that really struck me hard. I was too young when Elvis and John Lennon died to truly appreciate what their loss meant. "Who Wants to Live Forever" and "Bohemian Rhapsody" are two of my most favorite cuts. That was so cool how Rhapsody got a resurgence in popularity after the Wayne's World movies came out.
1984 by Van Halen. This is the very first cassette tape I purchased with my high school graduation money to play in my first car stereo that I also received for graduation. The album has extra significance since 1984 was also the year I graduated from high school. In addition to the fact that I loved VH's music and had a major crush on Ed, it was another of those groups from my coming of age, so to speak. Sadly, it was the last album with David Lee Roth, but at least we got to enjoy his solo career. Favorite tunes are "Hot for Teacher" and "Panama."
Antics in the Forbidden Zone by Adam and the Ants as well as some Adam Ant solo work. I first heard of Adam and the Ants via their videos on MTV. I absolutely loved the "Antmusic." In fact, I used to go to school sometimes with a white makeup stripe across my face and those little braids like he had. Ha! It seems so lame now! Anyway, I also love "Strip" and the chart topper "Goody Two Shoes."
ChangesBowie by David Bowie. Once again I can thank MTV for turning me on to David Bowie. Since this is a greatest hits one, it's really hard to pick favorites. "Space Oddity" has always been one of my favorites as well "Fame." This was one of the few acts I saw in college that wasn't hard rock or heavy metal. The Glass Spider tour hit the old Mile High Stadium in 1987 according to Wikipedia. That sounds about right. A friend got tickets at the last minute (hours before showtime) and I almost didn't go. I'm glad I did, though.
Purple Rain Soundtrack by Prince and the Revolution. The soundtrack to a semi-autobiograhical movie by the same name and another cassette that I bought with my high school graduation money. I don't get Prince as a person, but I do love his music. I was really mad one night when a college roommate had some rather shady friends over and the next morning discover many of my cassettes were gone, including this one. I went out immediately and purchased myself a vinyl copy and made myself a new tape. I believe this was also one of the very first CDs I acquired. I'm not going to pick a favorite because I really like every track on this one.
Cinemagic by composer/pianist Dave Grusin. Dave Grusin writes music for movies, thus the album title. A college roommate turned me on to this disc. He was the first person I ever knew that owned a CD player and had quite the collection filled with the most wonderful composers. I think he wanted to get into film directing. As an aside, he was also the first guy I ever met that owned an Apple computer. Anyway, my most favorite song on here is the "Heaven Can Wait" theme. I loved that movie and I love the sound of a soprano saxophone.
Cabaret featuring Liza Minelli. I don't know why I'm into all of these films about tortured artists. I absolutely love Liza's voice. I was too young to understand this movie the first time I saw it. I was enthralled with Joel Gray's emcee character, though. I taught "Cabaret" to a group I had at band camp one summer (we had to put on musical numbers as a group activity), but there weren't too many kids in the late '80s that could really appreciate it. In addition to the title track, my other most favorite tune is "Money, Money."
Metallica by obviously Metallica. Dubbed "The Black Album," both due to the monochrome color scheme of the cover and the view by many fans that the band "sold out" to mainstream music. I personally liked all of the tracks on this one. True, not as hard as "Master of Puppets," but artists can't be expected to produce the same stuff over and over. I really love "Enter Sandman," "Don't Tread on Me" and "Sad But True."
Countdown to Extinction by Megadeth with frontman (former Metallica member) Dave Mustaine. I loved several songs on this CD. It's one of the ones I used to listen to when I first started working pizza. There are many nights that listening to the songs on here was the only thing that kept me going. My most favorite were "Symphony of Destruction" and "Sweating Bullets."
Use Your Illustion I & II by Guns 'N' Roses. Even though these are two separate albums, I count them as a 2-Disc set. These contain some of my most favorite GnR songs ever. I absolutely love the song "November Rain." It's so sad and heart wrenching. The video was totally amazing for it, too.
The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!
So, it's my 24th time doing a Thursday Thirteen. I have the ticking seconds from the television show 24 playing in my head as I type this!
Anyway, life has been crazy busy, but in a good way. The last time I did a TT was a whole month ago, so without further delay, I present to you:
Thirteen Things That Have Kept Me So Busy I Haven't Had Time to Do Thursday Thirteen
Colorado Rockies Baseball Game — At work, I was offered a free pair of tickets to the ball game on April 16th against the San Francisco Giants. I'd never been to a ball game, so I figured, "Why not?" I took my dad and we had seats in the front row of the third deck right behind home plate. It was supposed to rain that evening, but it sprinkled a little before the game and waited to start raining until we were almost back to the car. It was just a little chilly, though. It's a little windy up there! Coors Field is a pretty cool venue. It cracked me up how everybody booed Barry Bonds whenever he came to bat. I totally forgot to take a camera and would've taken more pics with my camera phone, but silly me forgot to charge it beforehand. All I managed to get were a few pics before the game started. The Rockies lost. *sigh* Oh, well.
Software Upgrade — The software our company uses to run it's whole operation needed to be upgraded. Over the course of several weekends, Marcus had different tasks that needed to be done to make it happen. He got my supervisor to authorize some overtime for me to help him out. Unfortunately, every PC in the building had a different configuration of different modules of this main program, so he couldn't just do a network-wide upgrade push. On April 15th, we went in and did a few sample installs and I wrote the installation instructions and PC inventory sheet for the team of us that would be working the next weekend. He figured while we were at each machine, we could get serial numbers and things in addition to documenting which modules were installed on each. No previous IT person had gathered any such data. On Friday, April 20th, they took the whole system offline and we all installed the upgrade on machines into the wee hours of the morning. I worked my full shift that day, so I was at work from 7am until 1:30 am. We ran into some trouble with some ancient machines, so we had to go back the next day to finish up, run some tests and put the system live. Last Friday, the server was replaced. It all seems to be working great! I got 16 hours of OT. Not too shabby.
Apple Store Opening — You know Marcus and I won't miss an Apple Store opening. April 21st was the one for the Park Meadows location. Yes, after getting to bed at 3am and being at work 18+ hours the previous day, we were in line to check out the new store and get our t-shirt. I splurged since I was getting all this OT and bought a nifty hard case for my iPod.
Insurance Meeting — On April 18th, I had to attend a meeting to get my benefits. As of May 1st, for the first time in my life, I have company-paid health benefits.
ROM — ROM is going to be my best friend. It's the exercise machine that our owner provides for his employees to use. It stand for "Range of Motion" but has also been called "Ridiculously Overpriced Machine." The thing supposedly costs almost $15,000! They claim you can get a complete workout in 4 minutes a day. You alternate between upper and lower body every day. I felt like I was going to die the first day I used it.
Organizational Challenge — The challenge over at I'm an Organizing Junkie! took up a lot of my time. Between the fiasco of trying to find a reasonably priced file cabinet, to finishing the countertop, to actually purging, cleaning and organizing, it was a lot of work, but well worth it. (Yes, it is still clean!)
Steve's Snapping Dogs — On April 28th, Marcus, Mike and I tried a place new to us. I had heard ads for them on the Martini on the Rockies station and the owner was a cohost on The Gabby Gourmet show that afternoon. Steve's Snapping Dogs sits on the corner of Monroe and Colfax in Denver. It was good, but expensive. Probably won't be a frequent visitor of that establishment.
Idaho Springs — I was lamenting how Marcus and I never take road trips on our days off like we used to when we first started going out. I was also lamenting on a separate occasion about the BeauJo's restaurants all being too far away since the one by Buckingham Square closed down. On Sunday, April 29th, Marcus said we were killing two birds by taking a road trip to the original BeauJo's. It's a nice little place. I got the stuffed mushrooms (as always). I wish I knew how to make those...they are so freakin' good! Marcus' pie got lost somehow and they had to remake it, so he got it for free. That was cool of them. I was bummed because I couldn't find a decent shot glass for my collection, though. It was nice to get out of the city and spend some quality time together.
Looking for a Part-Time Job — I'm trying to find some more income. I really want to move. I really miss having a dog and I want a garden.
Working on Graphics — I've finally got some inspiration for a new blog design. I've been working on some graphics for myself, as well as Marcus. I don't want to lose my mad Illustrator skills, y'know?
Taking Online Classes — I'm about half-way through the current courses I have been assigned at work. I'm trying to learn as much as possible. First, I just love learning stuff. Second, I'm hoping with more responsibility, I can make more money.
Played a Wii — Mike and Nina got themselves a Wii for their wedding anniversary. We went over to their place a couple of weekends ago to play. Once I got over feeling stupid for having to actually move to play, I really enjoyed it. Bowling was really cool.
Lunch With Friends — Saturday I met up with a couple of friends from Design school and had lunch at Applebee's. It was so good to see them! It's amazing that we all took pretty much the same classes and we're all in different fields. One is a graphic designer, one is a web coder and I'm in prepress. That's kind of cool.
The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!
LaDonna is the #687 most common female first name. 0.016% of females in the US are named LaDonna. Around 19,600 US females are named LaDonna! source: namestatistics.com (no longer online)
LOCATION: Black Hills, SD DOB: September 11 SEX: Female
The Wall by Pink Floyd. Remember the controversey this movie and the song "Another Brick in the Wall" caused when it came out in the '70s? My mother didn't want me to have this album. I finally got myself a 45 single at Woolworth's with some babysitting money or something, but I didn't see the movie until late high school or early college. I think I saw it on MTV or something. Remember how they used to play music related movies? Anyway, I played the heck out of this album while I was in college.
Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd. It's not the top selling album of all time for no reason (or is it...must go check that fact). Hey Denverites — Remember how they used to do laser shows to this at midnight at the planetarium? Good times. "Dark Side of the Moon" is just such a great song for chilling out, but "Money" is my absolute most favorite PF song ever.
Mania a greatest hits compillation of the Ramones. I wasn't really a big Ramones fan early on. I used to think of them as these weird little punk rock dudes on MTV. When MTV played thier Rock 'n' Roll High School movie, however, I was hooked. I even had a bit of a crush on Joey. Anyway, my favorite songs of theirs are "Rock 'n' Roll High School" and "I Want to Be Sedated."
Mascara & Monsters: The Best of Alice Cooper I absolutely adore Alice Cooper. I even got to see a live show of his once. One of the best concerts I've even seen. My most favorite song of his is "How You Gonna See Me Now," but you can't help but singing along to the anthem, "School's Out." I love that Staples commercial he did with that song. Hilarious!
Christmas by Mannheim Steamroller. OK, a little out of season here, but definitely my most favorite holiday album. I've always loved Mannheim Steamroller's work and their sound is so beautiful and original. It is the one thing that can get me into the holiday mood. When you first hear "Deck the Halls," you know the holiday season is upon you!
The Dreams of Children by new age group Shadowfax. I saw this group up at a concert at Red Rocks when they opened for my most favorite jazz group ever, Spyro Gyra. I don't think they're together anymore, though. This song is called "Another Country."
Grease Musical soundtrack. I love the musical Grease. John Travolta and Olivia Newton John certainly did it proud when they did the movie version. I remember this stuff being played all over the radio and I thought that was totally cool. My most favorite song from this musical is when Rizzo sings "There are Worse Things I Could Do." Stockard Channing did an excellent job with that role.
5150 by Van Halen. It was the first VH album post David Lee Roth, but it was pretty good. My college roommate at the time and I were both huge Van Halen fans. I saw them in concert a couple of times while Sammy Hagar was lead. I sure wished I could've seen the original line up, though. "Love Walks In" is definitely my most favorite track on this album, though "Hot Summer Nights" was a close second..
Dr. Demento 20th Anniversary Collection: The Greatest Novelty Records Of All Time How many of you used to stay up late to the weekends to to listen to the Dr. Demento show? I did. It's where I first heard Weird Al's "Another One Rides the Bus." There are the most awesome litty ditties on this collection. They always bring a smile to my face. My most favorite on here is "Star Trekkin'" and "Existential Blues."
Back in Black AC/DC was the first hard rock band I ever listened to. My favorite on this album is "You Shook Me All Night Long," but the cover track is pretty darned awesome, too. When I met Marcus and found out he was a big AC/DC fan, I knew we were meant to be!
The Matrix Reloaded This soundtrack is cool in that one of the two discs featured the rock songs and the other disc featured the orchestral score written by Don Davis. My favorite tracks are P.O.D.'s "Sleeping Awake" and Fluke's "Zion."
Empire by Queensrÿche. It's rare that a group puts out an album with several good songs on it. This was one. In addition to the title track, there was "Jet City Woman," "Another Rainy Night," "Anybody Listening" and my favorite "Silent Lucidity." 
The Ozzman Cometh is a greatest hits compillation of Ozzy Osbourne. In addition to the great Ozzy solo music, there is also a little bit of Black Sabbath basement tapes on here. "Crazy Train" kind of became my own little anthem while I was in college. Life was definitely crazy back then.
Xanadu Soundtrack featuring the music of the Electric Light Orchestra and Olivia Newton John. This is my favorite album and movie of all time. I don't know why this movie stuck with me so, but I love it and ELO is one of my favorite bands of all time, as well. It also featured one of my favorite classic performers, Gene Kelly. He happened to be a clarinetist in this movie and so was I back in the day. I was also big into roller skating, which was another theme of the movie. My favorite tunes on this are the OLN/Tubes collaboration called "Dancin'" , the hauntingly sad ELO track "Don't Walk Away" and the optimisitc "I'm Alive."
Saturday Night Fever featuring music by the Bee Gees and various other disco artists. I know everybody bashed disco and burned albums, etc., but I'm not afraid to say that I love disco. I still do. The very first time I danced with a guy he was wearing a silk shirt, white pants and we were under a disco ball. This was a really sad movie, though. I was pretty young when I first saw it, so I didn't really see the sad, pathetic nature of Tony's (the main character's) life until I saw it many years later. In addition to the Brothers Gibb, my favorite tracks are the classical/disco mixes of "A Fifth of Beethoven" and "Night on Disco Mountain."
Antics in the Forbidden Zone by Adam and the Ants as well as some Adam Ant solo work. I first heard of Adam and the Ants via their videos on MTV. I absolutely loved the "Antmusic." In fact, I used to go to school sometimes with a white makeup stripe across my face and those little braids like he had. Ha! It seems so lame now! Anyway, I also love "Strip" and the chart topper "Goody Two Shoes."
ChangesBowie by David Bowie. Once again I can thank MTV for turning me on to David Bowie. Since this is a greatest hits one, it's really hard to pick favorites. "Space Oddity" has always been one of my favorites as well "Fame." This was one of the few acts I saw in college that wasn't hard rock or heavy metal. The Glass Spider tour hit the old Mile High Stadium in 1987 according to Wikipedia. That sounds about right. A friend got tickets at the last minute (hours before showtime) and I almost didn't go. I'm glad I did, though.
Purple Rain Soundtrack by Prince and the Revolution. The soundtrack to a semi-autobiograhical movie by the same name and another cassette that I bought with my high school graduation money. I don't get Prince as a person, but I do love his music. I was really mad one night when a college roommate had some rather shady friends over and the next morning discover many of my cassettes were gone, including this one. I went out immediately and purchased myself a vinyl copy and made myself a new tape. I believe this was also one of the very first CDs I acquired. I'm not going to pick a favorite because I really like every track on this one.
Cinemagic by composer/pianist Dave Grusin. Dave Grusin writes music for movies, thus the album title. A college roommate turned me on to this disc. He was the first person I ever knew that owned a CD player and had quite the collection filled with the most wonderful composers. I think he wanted to get into film directing. As an aside, he was also the first guy I ever met that owned an Apple computer. Anyway, my most favorite song on here is the "Heaven Can Wait" theme. I loved that movie and I love the sound of a soprano saxophone. 
Cabaret featuring Liza Minelli. I don't know why I'm into all of these films about tortured artists. I absolutely love Liza's voice. I was too young to understand this movie the first time I saw it. I was enthralled with Joel Gray's emcee character, though. I taught "Cabaret" to a group I had at band camp one summer (we had to put on musical numbers as a group activity), but there weren't too many kids in the late '80s that could really appreciate it. In addition to the title track, my other most favorite tune is "Money, Money."
Metallica by obviously Metallica. Dubbed "The Black Album," both due to the monochrome color scheme of the cover and the view by many fans that the band "sold out" to mainstream music. I personally liked all of the tracks on this one. True, not as hard as "Master of Puppets," but artists can't be expected to produce the same stuff over and over. I really love "Enter Sandman," "Don't Tread on Me" and "Sad But True." 
Countdown to Extinction by Megadeth with frontman (former Metallica member) Dave Mustaine. I loved several songs on this CD. It's one of the ones I used to listen to when I first started working pizza. There are many nights that listening to the songs on here was the only thing that kept me going. My most favorite were "Symphony of Destruction" and "Sweating Bullets."
Use Your Illustion I & II by Guns 'N' Roses. Even though these are two separate albums, I count them as a 2-Disc set. These contain some of my most favorite GnR songs ever. I absolutely love the song "November Rain." It's so sad and heart wrenching. The video was totally amazing for it, too.
Name: LaDonna
