No deep meaning behind this one…it’s just raining tonight. There is something very satisfying about big downpours of rain—it’s very cathartic. Plus, I love the excuse it gives me to hang around inside and watch a movie, take a bath, etc.

Not much deep meaning in this song, either—it’s Madonna, after all. When I was a kid, I took dance for about seven years, and I remember we used to warm up to this song, stretching out on the floor. This seems like the kind of memory I might have made up, but I feel like I remember doing those stretches one evening when it actually was raining out.

I have an entire playlist devoted to songs about rain, and this isn’t the best song on it, but somehow it’s always the one I want to listen to first when it’s raining out.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SFVeBUPo94]

Runner-up: “The Beauty of the Rain” by Dar Williams

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRoOqKf7uds]

Labor Day Weekend, the unofficial end of summer, is coming up— so sad, although I do love autumn as well. It’s a great time of year, though, for this beautiful song, which I acquired from my friend Jenny. I don’t know any other songs by Ron Pope, but after hearing this lovely song, “Fireflies,” I want to check out more of them. It’s a song about two summer lovers having to say goodbye at the end of summer, and the lyrics are just gorgeous, especially the chorus:

Like autumn turns leaves,

The winter will breathe

Cold on our necks,

Snow in our paths.

Wherever she goes,

All that I know about us

Is that beautiful things never last.

That’s why fireflies flash.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xm-DhO0BbzY]

A couple of years ago at work, we did a CD exchange where we made mix CDs for people in our group and ended up with five new CDs of our own. One coworker in my group included the Indigo Girls’ cover of Elton John’s “Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters,” and there was one line in particular that stood out to me: “I thank the Lord for the people I have found.” I’ve loved Elton John since I was a kid, and I have over forty of his songs on my iPod, but I didn’t have this one. So I listened to his version, discovered that it was even better (and that it was in the movie Almost Famous, which I saw a long time ago and had forgotten about), and promptly bought it.

The speaker in this song lives in New York City, where I’ve never lived, but the idea in the song, of being overwhelmed and disappointed with where you are in life but still finding hope and inspiration from the people in your life, really resonated with me. I’ve felt that way a lot of times throughout my twenties—that even when things were crazy and upsetting, there were always people to hang onto—“I thank the Lord there’s people out there like you.” And I have been feeling very grateful lately for the people I have found. So this Song of the Moment is for all of you.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tRgYfQ48A0]

Here’s a preview of a post that’s going to be coming later this year- can’t make it until I have more to post. This year, I have been experimenting by going to churches of different denominations- kind of a smaller scale version of what Suzanne Strempek Shea did for her book Sundays In America. One church I went to, a Vineyard church, had a contemporary Christian band playing during the service, and before the sermon, the pastor had the band play a song by the Decemberists that played into his sermon. It’s a really lovely song, and appropriate for this time of year.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KusWM9AKfZg]

I’ve decided to start a new feature on SSTS called “Song of the Moment.” I’ve written before about how I listen to music and how songs are more important to me than albums or artists. The point of this is to provide some commentary on how and why I’m listening to a certain song at the moment, for reasons serious or silly.

This first one is the latter. The song is “First of May” by Jonathan Coulton, which my friend Jenny introduced me to. A couple of years ago in my chorus, we split into groups to sing madrigals, and my group sang “Now Is the Month of Maying,” which is basically a sixteenth-century pop song. At first it just seems like a song about the spring, but as Wikipedia reveals, there are some double entendres going on.

“First of May” is almost like an update of that song, only with fewer double entendres and more, uh, unexpected profanity. Have a listen, but lyrics are NSFW. Be warned: like Cee Lo Green’s “Fuck You,” this is a song that has an unfortunate tendency to get stuck in your head at times when singing it out loud would be inappropriate.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCbD8nsxcd8]