Made from real, guillotined unicorns!
You look like your morning could use a bit more than a vat of coffee and a nasty breakfast burrito. Luckily, you tuned into The Nest, where every Monday we feature another up and at ’em tune that will help you face the world for another seven days! And we’re doing it countdown style right now, halfway through our Top 30 Songs We Just Feel Like Playing countdown! These are the songs that are too cool for even DJ Scratchy and her Dusty Vinyl Archive. Now sit back and relax, and enjoy a musical experience that could have only come from the 1990’s…
#15. “The Distance” – Cake
A little over fifteen years ago, someone on ye olde message board I frequent who I used to trade a lot of back and forth banter with, dedicated a song called “Nugget” to me by this group I had never heard of called Cake. I hated the song, and over the years made sure to bring up Cake every time I wanted to tease her about her questionable musical tastes. For many years, and solely on the basis of one song I thought was stupid, the band Cake was a joke that epitomized all I didn’t like about 90’s music…
Oh, who’d have guessed you’d drag me out again, squirrel. I’ll laugh from up here when Merby slaps your ass…
Then in 2012, I grew tired of my current radio station when it dropped its “no repeat” format at the same time a new all 90’s station was coming on the air. For the year or so it existed, it became my new regular… and much to my surprise I found a whole bevy of new songs I had never heard of before which had grown on me. I was gobsmacked to find out that two of them were by that very band I used to so blindly ridicule… the one and only Cake. While I love “Short Skirt/Long Jacket” (As well as “Never There,” which I picked up from the Mecca CD in 2013), my favorite, and one I adore enough to put in this countdown, is Cake’s 1996 breakout hit “The Distance”…
Cake’s signature style is all over this song… the blending of such varying formats of music like hip hop and mariachi, the monotoned singing of John McCrea, as well as the trumpet of Vince DiFiore that appeared in almost all of their songs. When I think of what the mid 90’s sounded like, “The Distance” is the collage that best represents that era to me.
Your exotic musical instrument to be introduced to this week: The melodica.
The video is pretty awesome as well, featuring an extra from the set of Wall Street who apparently has enough of day trading and decides to just go all Forrest Gump and start running… where he meet all kinds of interesting furries who are cheering him on.
I’ll leave you with one more tidbit about this song. One of the most common hidden meanings people try to inject into our favorite pop tunes is that they are really about masturbation. Most artists deny this, and usually they’re justified in doing so. Listen to “The Distance” again and pretend that it really is about wanking. It works entirely too well….
Mr. Skunk doesn’t care. He’s just happy to get into a music video…
Like Cake, The Nest is going the distance in this countdown! Be sure to come back next Monday for Song #14…
Evil Squirrel's Nest 
love the video it is fabulous disturbing, cool! I had a melodica… I could play ONE song and I tortured all people for weeks with this shit, till my grampy bought it from me for 10 bucks and threw it in the trash can.
LOL! Back when grade schools in America had real music programs, I was able to buy a recorder as part of my class… and I’m sure my parents quickly regretted that purchase! It sounded more like a dying animal than sweet music…
I love the breakfast treat!
Everything tastes better with unicorns…
Uh huh. Thinking I’ll not be adding this to any of my playlists. Nice beat, but… dare I say it… kind of dumb lyrics.
Cake is a bit of an acquired taste, I’ll admit (The band, not the food). Speaking of the lyrics… one thing I realized while listening to this song again is that I actually understood just about every word recited in this song. As opposed to most songs where I can kinda make out most of the words, but the rest sounds like gibberish. Stupid lyrics or not, at least Cake’s singer enunciates clearly and should be a role model to other singers…
Good point about the enunciation. I like that, too. Please make that so…
Unusual video to say the least……….so much happening – interesting to see a band in SUITS….and all that corporate atmosphere is wild. Not AT ALL familiar with “Cake” other than the kind I eat (no pun intended of course).
Pam
A lot of 90’s bands liked to dress up in suits… I think it was supposed to be an ironic statement. There’s a video by the band The Butthole Surfers (Yes, they are a real 90’s band!) where they are in their best formal attire as well. And there’s a famous picture of the members of Nirvana wearing three-pieces…
Whoa…I’d forgotten this tune. Hip hop meet cool. 🎂
Who needs Coolio to be cool?
They have that cool, quirky sound. Also, those unicorn cakes–wish we could get them up here!
I’m surprised you don’t have unicorn cakes! It’s unicorn everything around here….
I need to get myself some unicorn slippers like my niece😊
I feel like I missed the boat on that! I had a rainbow unicorn character in my comic strip I drew from 2012-17, and used to occasionally have one of the characters wearing unicorn slippers in his likeness. This was before the unicorn craze hit! I did at least make a few bucks selling unicorn merch in my Cafepress shop before all the big shot companies caught on!
It had a catchy kind of beat and the video was entertaining. But I really hope I never hear it again!
LOL! I’ll assume that’s not a ringing endorsement for Cake!
Correct! My grumpy old lady ears are very intolerant of even the tiniest hint of rap or hip hop. Lol!
I tried to remember is I know ANY 90s music and I realized I don’t. That was the decade we got married, moved three times. I was working full time and Garry was working ALL the time and I listened to audiobooks (on tape) in the car. I don’t think I really began to notice music again until around 2010 when we were all suddenly retired.
You probably didn’t miss much, although there was kind of a big band/swing revival in the late 90’s. “Jump, Jive and Wail” and “Zoot Suit Riot” are both favorites of mine from 20 years ago, and they have a bit of a 40’s sound to them…
I thought I should mention that tomorrow is “Appreciate A Squirrel” Day. It’s a real day. #SquirrelAppreciationDay. It’s tomorrow. I have a post going up. Thought you should know if you don’t already know.
I love this song. I love Cake. Damn they are brilliant. Thank you. From the girl in the short skirt and long jacket.
I knew you would like this, even if it wasn’t your favorite slice of Cake. This song is a masterpiece…
I saw the best skate routine EVER to this song. Love it. Brilliant. Thanks for sharing it.
I don’t usually go for this type of “rappy talking” song, but this one could easily grow on me!
That’s better than most of the comments I got on this song. I’m quite happy that you didn’t outright hate it!