Celebrate Life
celebrate the joys and pains of existence with tommi tikka
featuring artists like
Elvis Presley, The Impersonators, Robb Murphy, HOAX, Elton John, Neil Diamond, DD Allen, The Modern World
The great Oscar Wilde once remarked:
To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that’s all.
This famous quote pretty much sums up what Music To Celebrate Life is about: living. More precisely, it celebrates the life lived, all of it – not just the good bits. Hence, the music featured here is about the joys and pains of existence. The songs selected for this playlist will have strong vocals and compelling melodic structures. However, given the nature and the theme of this playlist, special emphasis is placed on the lyrical content.
Sailing – Rod Stewart
17 June 2019
Dear Dad,
You passed away yesterday, on June 16 and left a void that cannot be filled in the hearts of the people you loved. Anyone who knew you will know exactly how incredibly huge this void is for my mom, brother and me. You were everything to us. I know anything I ever did was done to make you proud of me, proud of the fact that I was your son…
Meet Me in Stockholm – Sir Douglas Quintet
12 June 2019
A friend from Detroit wanted to experience Finland and traveled here to visit my ex-wife and I in 1993. We showed her around Helsinki, hitting all the hot sights, mandatory restaurants and clubs. We even took a ferry to Stockholm, Sweden, so she could discover another stunningly beautiful Scandinavian capital…
If I Can Dream – Elvis Presley
5 June 2019
I’m never going to sing another song I don’t believe in. I’m never going to make another picture I don’t believe in.
– Elvis Presley after hearing ”If I Can Dream” for the first time.
Speaking of first times, I remember the first time I saw Elvis on TV. This was in the early 1980s. I must have been no more than ten. It was the day before Christmas and there was a rerun of the King’s ’68 Comeback Special on NBC…
Let Your Love Flow – Bellamy Brothers
28 May 2019
Okay, so I have a question for you: Do you enjoy the first signs of spring, when the nature wakes up, flowers and trees blossom and people around you start showing symptoms of spring fever?
I for one love it…
And The Cradle Will Rock – Van Halen
16 May 2019
When Van Halen came on the scene, they blew people’s minds. It was the type of music that hadn’t been heard before. I remember my parent’s feeling a bit iffy about the band. My dad especially was concerned when I had the MTV on and was watching the long-haired lead singer jumping around in tights…
Melancholia – The Who
8 May 2019
The world is filled with webpages that’ll teach you how to be happy. Presumably that’s what people want, constant happiness. Lo and behold if you have a negative or deep thought. This has become a crime almost, especially in social media. Our lives must be incredibly cool and blissful all the time…
Lone Bulb – Crooked Cat Adams
24 April 2019
I have a confession to make. Kate Chopin is one of my favorite authors. I remember the first time I read her most critically-acclaimed novel The Awakening. I’m not a feminist and obviously, not a woman but I nevertheless found the novel touching. For those of you haven’t read it, it’s a story about rebelling against the expectations that society places on us…
Hurt – Johnny Cash
17 April 2019
I remember being in my twenties and not really understanding why people get burned out. It was hard to grasp. I was young, happily married at the time, had no kids and in retrospect, not that many responsibilities. I led the kind of life that would make a great holiday resort for someone needing to recover from a rocky patch. Of course, when you are knee-deep in the Garden of Eden, you rarely realize that this is the case…
Can’t Kick The Habit – Spin Doctors
2 April 2019
If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.
– Henry Ford
And yet that’s what most of us do. It’s actually rather crazy. We just keep going. I for one seem to have a master’s degree in that. It doesn’t matter if what I’m doing or who I am with isn’t good for me, I’ll see it through to the bitter end. I call it quits, all torn and broken, only after all other alternatives have been exhausted…
You Can’t Always Get What You Want – The Rolling Stones
26 March 2019
I’m writing this on a plane, flying back home from California. As my fifteen-year old son would put it, it’s a long-ass flight, close to eleven hours, and I’m only three hours into it. That’s the bad news. The good news is that I have plenty of time to write my upcoming post for Celebrate Life. And yeah, you guessed it right, this one is inspired by my trip, during which I drove about 2000 miles – a hell of a long way, at least by my standards…
Blue Raven – Gene Clark
19 February 2019
Any fool can be happy. It takes a man with real heart to make beauty out of the stuff that makes us weep.
― Clive Barker (English writer, film director, and visual artist)…
You Are The One – The Impersonators
12 February 2019
So, it’s Valentine’s Day again, which means it’s time to reflect on the songs I’ve written in the past. A year ago, I wrote a post on a Carmen Gray track called “Fall In Love.” This year, I’ll take a look at a more recent song, “You Are The One” by my current group The Impersonators. Like “Fall In Love,” this track brings back a lot of memories, fantastic memories in fact…