Well, someone’s happy about the weather…
Is another Monday trying to rain on your parade? Then let The Nest sweep those clouds away with the power of muzak! This is the day we reach into the eye of the hurricane and pull another vinyl hailstone out of that polar vortex of lost music we like to call the Dusty Vinyl Archive! DJ Scratchy’s your weather pony, and she’ll have it raining stallions. While the Sponkies get out the ruler and hope for another snow day. This song will even make Rainy smile behind her empty gauge…
Why settle for listening to just one maniac when you can hear a chorus of ten thousand of them? The New York band 10,000 Maniacs hung around the fringe of pop rock in the late 80’s and early 90’s, and is probably best remembered for their cover of the Bruce Springsteen song “Because the Night,” which was also their biggest pop hit. I know them as that band with that horribly wretched singing voice that needs to be silenced with 10,000 pillows…
About two notches more tolerable than Yoko Ono…. which is still criminally unlistenable.
Natalie Merchant is one of those female singers whose voice just generally grates on all six of my precious ear bones. If her and Jennifer Nettles from Sugarland ever did a duet, I’d just stab my eardrums on the spot and accept a life of comfortable deafness rather than listen to the two of them wail. Much of my hatred of Merchant’s voice comes from her much more successful solo fling she had in the mid 90’s with a bunch of songs that are as awful as her singing is. But in 1987, when she was still a Maniac singing about the weather, she was not only tolerable, but I absolutely love this song!
“Like the Weather” was only a #68 hit, and was more of an underground/alternative/college thing at the time… but they made a video for it, which got it on MTV, and gave me a chance to appreciate how nice this song is with Natalie’s voice toned down a few notches and supplemented by a groovy guitar and some bongo drums…
Dude, I thought my friend was gonna let me use his BONG. Not these…
No matter what the weather is like in your neck of the woods, I hope you like it as much as Natalie and her maniacs do. Come back next Monday and I’ll thaw out another lost hit for you…
Evil Squirrel's Nest 
Well now that truly is quite “listenable”……not at ALL familiar with her other music and I think based on your assessment of her voice in MOST of her efforts I take it I’m not missing much but this one really is fun – the bongos are perfect accompaniment too. Kind of took me away from the snow and cold to a place much more tropical and sunny. At least until I looked out the window.
Pam
Maybe if I play this song enough, it will melt all the snow outside so I can get out of my driveway…. which I can’t tonight, much to Mecca’s dismay! A cold dull gray rainy day would be a welcome change right now from six inches of snow and minus whatever degrees!
I don’t know it but that’s no bad muzak… honestly not… added to playlist , thanks!!! btw: I’ve heard about chicks in bed but real chickens?
Some people seem to prefer bedding with feathers, but want to be kind to animals!
Not bad, but the video is very strange. I always liked hearing her voice and especially on the song Because the Night – a favorite of mine. 🙂
Their version’s the only one I really know. It’s funny how many songs Bruce Springsteen wrote that I know only because other people sang them…. like Blinded By the Light and Pink Cadillac too!
Poor snowman – all we have here is rain, rain, rain and more rain.
The snowman’s an older photo from a couple years ago. He’d be standing proud right now with the freezer we’ve been in for the past week and a half…
Rainy would be pleased to visit Utah (every other day) right now. Nuthin’ but rain.
Where’s the freakin’ SNOW???
I gotchur snow right here, and you can come take all you want!
Clearly Natalie’s singing is on par with her dancing (if you can call it that). Although this is probably one of her best attempts at singing. Happy Monday.
Apparently she only dances half-heartedly when she doesn’t like the weather…
It was like a Stevie Nicks kind of dancing, without the gypsy dress. 😳
LOL, you’re right!
Always loved Stevie’s voice but that clod hopping/twirling in a dress that looked like a lacy Kleenex was just so distracting. Blech.
That song reaches the heady heights of “OK”! I quite like the video, but I can imagine in certain circumstances, if unfettered, that voice could make your brains dribble out your ears.
She did some dreadful songs in the 90’s that are only mad worse by her singing. I think she was trying to be a less-edgy alternative to the chick rockers of the 90’s, but it just didn’t work…
I always liked the 10,000 Maniacs. Sorry NM offends you. Oh well, we all can’t and some don’t…
Natalie is certainly not my cup of tea (at least, outside of this song), but she must fill the cups of a lot of others since she is a well known singer, and I am a not so well known music critic….
I really thought that climate change was going to end snow in New England which, though I deeply regret climate change, I don’t miss the snow. But it has been snowing relentlessly all month. Two to three snows each week so far. At least they know how to clear the roads around here!