MY-TUNES

I've got good news and bad news.

The good news is that my eldest son has FINALLY stopped requesting "One Was Johnny" off of Carole King’s classic album Really Rosie.

The bad news is he now insists on U2.

Y’all probably think I’m nuts. Who wouldn’t prefer new, grown up U2 to old Carole King for kiddies? Sure, it sounds great in theory – after all, it is my cd. Trouble is he wants to hear one song, and one song only. And he wants it loud. Window-shattering loud. The dulcet tones of Ms King were ok by him at any volume (ie. soft). But for Bono’s boom, nothing less than full blast will do. We’ve tried to subtly lower the volume of the stereo. But this raises the volume, and ire, of the boy in the back. And if you think a blaring rock band is loud, that doesn’t hold a candle to a shrieking 2 ½ year old. I’ve got one of those. A screamer. Some have biters, or hitters, or criers. I’ve got a screamer. Our doctor told me that one day he’d learn how to use his “inside voice” but my husband doesn’t get that concept, so why should our two year old?

But back to the music. We thought it was amazing that our genius could correct Bono’s bastardized Spanish as he sang along to “uno, dos, tres, quatorze”. The yeah-yeah-yeah’s at the end? Adorable. At first. But I bought a couple of new cd’s and wanted to hear ‘em in the car (they get lost in my ipod. More on that another time.). I tried slipping in some new discs. No luck. The cry for U2 beat my desire to hear John Legend.

I recently read an article in New York Magazine. All the coolio parents were so thrilled that their little hipsters only listened to their (the parents’) tunes. But come on – didn’t their kids want to hear the same one song over and over and over again? I mean puh-lease, after a while, don’t The Beatles become as irritating as Raffi?

Last week, I slipped the latest Madonna cd in after track one of U2. Guess what? My boy loved her. So now when we get into the car he requests Old Madonna. Doubt she’d like that moniker, but we think it’s hilarious. Sadly for us, having listened to Old Madonna over and over again, we realize how much we miss U2.