Mark Knopfler has a dinosaur named after him.

I Did Not Know That.

I guess when it comes down to it, I didn’t like much of any pop/rock when I was in high school. When I lived in Indiana, I listened to country music (largely because no one else did), then when I m*ved to Kansas where everyone listened to country, I took up oldies. (Yes, my rebellious teenage years always took strange turns like that.)

(Speaking of strange turns, your comment filter says “m*ved to” is questionable. Oookay.)

I’m not a fan of REO Speedwagon. While Journey can be a Great hard rock band when they want to be (but with Mediocre lyrics), REO never rose above the processed cheese level, probably because they were fronted by a crooner rather than a singer. They only did one decent song in their entire career, and that was sung by the bass player.

ISTR Journey played Wichita not too very long ago, but I could be wrong. I seem to remember Carl saying “It wouldn’t be the same without Steve Perry” and me saying “Last I heard of, the new guy sounded just like him.” Might have been Kansas City or somewhere just sort-of nearby, though. In any event, we didn’t go. Obviously.

REO Speedwagon played the West Bank Stage, within hearing distance of our house (as you probably saw on my LJ: http://gamehawk.livejournal.com/23685.html). It was kind of spiffy, other than I’m thinking free outdoor concerts might be a step below state fairs. (Which isn’t altogether, er, fair… the River Festival has upped their button prices so they can bring in nicer acts like that. And the Kansas State Fair generally brings in some pretty big acts too, albeit mostly country. At least, they’re usually big. I don’t recognize any of them this year, because I don’t listen to country music. I see they’ve got Skynyrd and Steve Miller Band, though.)

I’m thinking the last concert we went to was the Prairie Rose Wranglers, wherein I learned that there *is* a difference between country and western music, and now a whole Blues Brothers joke is spoiled for me. (And now I have “I’m My Own Grandpa” in my head, darnit. And that’s one of the differences. Country music is often cheesy. Western music is, instead, often corny.)

Consider “We Built This City.”

*Now* doesn’t “Walk of Life” seem perfectly good?

Of course, I sort of like WBTC too, occasionally. They say you always keep a soft spot for the pop music of your late teens, so what can I say? Sometimes it’s okay to just like the music regardless of (and sometimes in spite of) the lyrics (hey, most of my favorite stuff doesn’t have lyrics, so there). As long as it’s only sometimes, I think.

I don’t think we have any Mark Knopfler solo stuff, though we have some of David’s. Nothing recent, though. Which, now I think about it, pretty much sums up our music collection lately…

It’s perfectly good cheese.

Awful cheese was when somebody *else* recorded “The Bug.”