All available in the seafood department at Mecca.

In the US, today is Labor Day.  But I don’t get the day off, so neither does our in-house DJ Scratchy.  That means it’s time to roll out another nifty tune for the working class stiffs out there pulled straight from the melodious muzak that fills my nights with such ecstacy and agony.  Welcome to the Labor Day edition of Mecca Muzak Monday!

Many of the prior songs I have featured on MMM have come from lesser known acts that tend to avoid the mainstream pop spotlight.  But that won’t be the case today, since the featured band is Train, and unless you’ve been living in the Batcave for the past 15 years, chances are you’ve heard of them before…

They don’t give awards like that to nobodies… Milli Vanilli notwithstanding.

Train has put a steady stream of hits on the charts ever since the late 90’s when they broke into the spotlight with “Meet Virginia.”  “Drops of Jupiter” is a song that literally takes me back in time to the turn of the millennium… enough to actually give me chills when it first comes on.  Unfortunately, a lot of what Train released post-Jupiter is a steaming load of crap.  “Hey Soul Sister” is the song that plays on loop in Hell’s waiting room.  “Drive By” is a song that doesn’t live up to its name since it won’t ever leave town.  “50 Ways To Say Goodbye” is another recurring Mecca Muzak song that just doesn’t do anything for me.  I wouldn’t go as far as to say Train sucks, but they would certainly vie for the “honor” of being to the 00’s what Hootie & the Blowfish were to the 90’s…

A Darius Rucker/Pat Monahan duet might be the death of rock and roll music.

But not everything Train has done in the last few years is a wreck (See what I did there?).  It was about this time last year that the Fall 2013 Mecca CD debuted, and on the 8th hour of that disc was a totally corny song that managed to quickly become my absolute favorite thing Train ever did.  From their 2012 album “California 37”, here is the awesome “Mermaid”…

The lyrics to this song are pretty much classic Train, only with much better music backing it and a lot more fun to listen to.  Monahan loves to insert specific pop culture references into Train’s songs, and “Mermaid” is no exception with mentions of Ecco sandals and Johnny Depp…

Who knew there were remote islands in the Puget Sound?

Train performed this song at halftime of the 2013 NFL Pro Bowl in Honolulu, and the official video for “Mermaid” was shot during their trip to the Aloha State, and includes footage from the concert and the pregame.

I would blur out the gaudy Hawaiian shirts too.

Two legs or a tailfin, laboring or not, have a great Monday!