BIG LOVE (AND WHAT IT LEADS TO)

[First, I'd like to once again thank my friend JIM for riding to the rescue re: my long-lacking blog banner. I owe you, sir. Big time.]

My parents have been in town for the holidays, so I've been spending quite a bit of time lately holed up in my bedroom listening to music (suddenly, I'm a teenager again). One of my re-discoveries was LINDSEY BUCKINGHAM's rather rippin' live version of "Big Love," as performed during the much ballyhooed FLEETWOOD MAC reunion of some 9 or ten years ago. His performance still jumps out of the headphones at me, and I wish to hell I could play guitar like that (or play guitar AT ALL, for that matter).

"Big Love" got me thinking about the HBO show BIG LOVE, whose title sequence unspools to the strains of THE BEACH BOYS' "God Only Knows." I seem to be one of the only human beings on the planet who thinks that PET SOUNDS is overrated, but certainly this song (along with "Wouldn't It Be Nice" and, to a lesser extent, "Sloop John B") are deserving of "timeless" status.

From there, my free-associating jones took a leap to film. I'd just re-watched THE BOURNE IDENTITY on TV not long before, so I was reminded of the pretty cool tune that accompanies that movie's pretty cool Mini Cooper car chase. "Ready Steady Go," indeed.

Apropos of nothing, I then got to thinking about one of my brother STEVE's "old" favorites -- TRUE ROMANCE. At the time, I was quite fond of the scene in the club in which CHRISTIAN SLATER does the duel-thing with a dreadlocked GARY OLDMAN. The insistent music that plays underneath it is key to its sense of impending, TARANTINO-etched mayhem. (Also unforgettable in that film, for better or worse, is the over-the-top, titanic battle between PATRICIA ARQUETTE and a pre-Tony Soprano JAMES GANDOLFINI.)

Somehow, that led me to MIDNIGHT EXPRESS [written by the Tarantino of his day (sort of), OLIVER STONE]. I remember being entranced by the simple and repetitive synthesizer aria that highlights the desperate, dirty-Turkish-streets foot-chase between "Hey, It's Only Hashish" BRAD DAVIS and "Hey, I Only Want To Help You Help Yourself, Billy" BO HOPKINS.

GIORGIO MORODER composed that particular piece of music, so it seems at least somewhat apropos that I then started thinking about BLONDIE's "Call Me" -- which Moroder produced and co-wrote, and which appears in the movie AMERICAN GIGOLO. I have heard that RICHARD GERE goes full-frontal in that particular picture, but I'm still holding out for his infamous Gerbil-goes-a'gamboling escapade to show up on You Tube.

[And don't forget to come back tomorrow for the ever-popular BEST OF DECEMBER mix.]

[MP3] Lindsey Buckingham/"Big Love" [live]

[MP3] Fleetwood Mac/"Big Love"

[MP3] The Beach Boys/"God Only Knows"

[MP3] Paul Oakenfold/"Ready Steady Go"

[MP3] Nymphomania/"I Want Your Body"

[MP3] Giorgio Moroder/"Chase" [from MIDNIGHT EXPRESS]

[MP3] Blondie/"Call Me"