La la la

I know that People Who Know Things say that you shouldn't listen to music via earphones more than an hour a day. This is advice I ignore entirely. I have my earphones on, listening to music every day, all day, while at work. I LOVE music and listen to it all the time. Part of the reason I started was when I had a cubicle mate, it was a simple matter of courtesy. Not only to I listen to music all the time, I frequently listen to songs over and over. And over and over and over. This scratches the same part of my brain that loves to re-read stories many time, too. I just love re-immersing myself in something, whether a story, or a story in a song, set to beautiful music.

The three songs on constant repeat this past week:

The Newry Highwayman (Traditional). I have both the versions by Solas and by Leahy's Luck (you can download the Leahy's Luck .mp3 for free here, or the Boiled in Lead version, if you prefer it.) The words are here. Why I like it: I'm an absolutely sucker for English folk ballads and love listening to them. Great tune, absorbing story, tragic ending. One of the stories I was obsessed with as a kid was Robin Hood--the cheerful rebel who robbed from the rich but left the poor alone. There are echoes of that story here. And it's hard to think badly of the Newry Highwayman for being a thief when he loves his wife so dearly.

The Bravest Man I Ever Knew - Ministry of Magic Great song. Mark's climb on the tenor line raises the hairs on the back of my neck. Again, a tragic story that gets under my skin. I mean, it's about Severus Snape, come on! The lyrics bring tears to my eyes. It's all about choosing the heart of flesh over the heart of stone:

I have given you a name
One that shows you can always change
No matter the way or mistake you've made
And sometimes consequences define your life with hardship
Will goodness be the banner you raise?
Because with his last breath
Severus said
Take it, take it

And it has a great danceable beat. Here's a video of Ministry of Magic doing this in an acoustic set at Portus. Before they do the song, Mark talks a little bit about the challenge of hitting that high note.

Sexyback - Justin Timberlake I first became aware of this song when I ran across this video created by chaeche about Snape using it. (Yeah, it was the first time I'd heard of it. Yeah, I told you I was old. Shut up.) The video is quite cleverly edited, with each quirk of an eyebrow corresponding to emphatic beats in the music, creating a masterpiece of innuendo. Now, the Snarry ship does absolutely nothing whatsoever to float my boat, but (*blushes*) I DO find Alan Rickman to be really hot. Seeing the way this video is edited makes him even hotter. I do like a song that power-taps directly into the libido (mine has been, um, up quite a bit lately), and this song, combined with the video, accomplished it powerfully for me.

Tell me about three songs you've been listening to on constant repeat lately, and why you like them. (And let me know if you like the Sexyback video, too.)