Presidential Groove: Weekend Update

Headline story:

The biggest music-related Presidential campaign story thus far has been the Obama/will.i.am video.

So, no surprise there is a John McCain parody video.

Even two.

Hillary Clinton has her own video response.

Other big stories this week:

Barack Obama wins a grammy for Best Spoken word album.

Tom Scholz from the band Boston asks Mike Huckabee to quit playing "More Than A Feeling".

Campaign theme articles:

An interersting and amusing article about campaign songs, and how the lyrics of the songs don't match the intent.

Clinton has regaled her backers with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' "American Girl", doubtless to evoke the image of a patriotic, down-home candidate.
But the lyrics tell an altogether different story of seeing a dream slip away: "God, it's so painful/ Something that's so close / And still so far out of reach."

Another article on theme songs used in this campaign.

(Clinton) offered nine songs to vote on, but many overzealous readers supplied their own suggestions, including Elton John's The Bitch is Back, Foreigner's Cold As Ice and The Rolling Stones' Sympathy for the Devil.

Assorted articles from this week:

Pitchfork ran an article on John McCain's daughter and her music bloggery.

Songwirter/satirist Tom Lehrer endorses Obama:

I asked Lehrer if there was anything he'd like to add, in this chat, about the current president. After a bit of pause he said, "Just tell the people that I am voting for Obama."

Wonkette reports that Paula Abdul endorses a female for President.

Wonkette also featured this picture of Barry Manilow fans for Hillary:

Have a good week.

Weekend Update

Top Ten Recent Stories

• Merle Haggard was on the Bill Maher show and said that he was disappointed that after he wrote "Let's Put a Woman in the White House" that Hillary went to Nashville to get other songwriters to write songs about her. Merle also joked about Hillary going on Willie Nelson's bus.
• Stevie Wonder campaigned for Obama in California
• The remaining members of the Grateful Dead were reuniting to campaign for Obama.
• A video put together by will.i.am of the BlackEyed Peas, and featuring Herbie Hancock, Common, John Legend, and Nicole from the Pussycat Dolls was a huge hit. The video which combined Obama's speech with music and sung vocals got 1.9 million views.
• Kim Gordon from Sonic Youth supports Obama
• The Beatles support Obama. Well, if Elvis supported Duncan Hunter...
• Speaking of the Beatles
• Arlo Guthrie is supporting Ron Paul
• John Mellencamp tells John McCain to quit using his songs. You'd think that making campaign appearences with John Edwards would have given some clue where Mellencamp's allegiances lie.

and lastly, the biggest music-related story of the last two weeks..

• In case, you didn't see it on every major news outlet, Obama Girl didn't vote for Obama. In fact, she didn't even vote at all.

Presidential Groove: Mike Huckabee

Who?: Former Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-AR)

Musician supporters: Ted Nugent

On the Record:

Mike Huckabee plays in the band Capitol Offense, which has opened for Grand Funk Railroad, Percy Sledge, REO Speedwagon, .38 Special, and Willie Nelson.

Wikipedia adds this: Capitol Offense is a cover band that plays a mix of classic rock, Motown, country and blues. The band intentionally shuns the trendier hit-makers, preferring older tunes that have stood the test of time. "We don't try to play trendy stuff," Huckabee has said of his band's musical tastes, "nothing without a long shelf life." Early on, all of the band members played only Gibson guitars, and did so "proudly", according to a note Huckabee sent to the company in 1999. However, as of July 2007, Huckabee actually sported a black and white Fender bass during his campaign stop record store performance

Mike Huckabee says his latest music purchase was Evanesence.

Huckabee says of the Rolling Stones: "..the Rolling Stones have had the lasting power because even after all these years - Keith Richards has probably been dead for several years and doesn’t know it - they continue to make the greatest music and put on the most amazing shows.” and from the same article we are told During his tenure as the state’s leader, he gave the Stones’ guitarist a full pardon from a reckless driving offense that had occurred years before.

Mike Huckabee inspired this awful theme song.

Will Mike answer my question "What music are you currently listening to?": Of all the candidates, Mike gets the highest praises for his musical background, so I was hoping for an answer from the Huckabee camp.

However, we got an "Out of Office Reply" addressed to Dear Friend, and started "Thank you so much for taking the time to write Governor Huckabee. Your email is very important and we are interested in, and value your opinions, suggestions and concerns.We will make every effort to respond to specific policy questions not addressed on our website in a timely manner." and ended "if you would like to make a contribution, click on the Contribution tab – every little bit helps. Thanks so much for writing."

However, we never did get a real answer.

So, that's it- all the major candidates done- Thanks for tuning in