Apparently if you are an Olympian, you're more prone to getting caught for drunk driving. Historically the last few years have only dealt with ice skaters; Tonya Harding got herself a DUI and served time for it. ( I bet they didn't let her hear the plumbing in the slammer ) Miss Oksana Baiul got a DUI, claiming she was "carried away with song on radio". Da. Iz truth. Good songs always make ME crash my Mercedes into a tree.
Skater Alexei Yagudin's DUI started it for the boys. But now, we see in the news recently, one more boy. He was THE small-town star of Olympic swimming. Winning six gold and two bronze medals, 19 year old Michael Phelps got his DUI in Maryland, where the legal drinking age is 21. Cheers, kiddo. Where is my Wheaties box with his cover? I'm sure it's price is rising on eBay right now.
So in celebration of drunks everywhere, I've decided to pull together a list of my favorite music while I'm drinking. Now I know what you're thinking, Peter Mavrik, devotee to the divas, will throw out a list of all this dance-diva type stuff. No, my collection of music is more than just sounds for the dance floor. In fact, with a drink in hand, I'm usually more nostalgic than anything. Let's break it down by drinks, shall we?
With a bottle of red, I love jazz and blues. Billie Holiday on the Decca Recordings Box Set is brilliant. "'Taint Nobody's Business If I Do" is one of those tracks that hits home when you're sipping the last glass from the bottle. There's also Etta James, a little more upbeat than Miss Holiday, but "I'd Rather Go Blind" can make a grown man cry. Koko Taylor's remake of that track is one of the best, and along with her signature song "Whang Dang Doodle", it makes the nectar of the gods a bit sweeter. Anything by saxophone player Boney James is also par for the course.
A cold beer makes me whip out pop-rock of Stone Temple Pilots. I can tour through both Core and Purple, singing the night away. "Interstate Love Song" ( Purple ) and "Plush" ( Core ) are the hits I'm addicted to. If I can find Alanis Morrisette's Jagged Little Pill album in my apartment ( it hides from me ) , I'm hollerin' at the top of my lungs with cathartic release. Ahhh, the 90's.
Vodka Gimlets have been a mainstay in my drinking career since the beginning. Lately, with a gimlet, I've been craving Disco classics like "Love Injection" by Trussel, Loleatta Holloway's "Hit and Run", or even that terrible guilty-pleasure track "Baby I'm Burnin'" by none other than Dolly Parton.
And finally, the simplicity of a martini demands the complex grooves of Deep Tech-house. "Under The Sea" by Digby Jones is definitely a martini sipping track. But Zero 7's "In The Waiting Line", made famous by the Sex and The City kids, is breathtaking and perfect.
