Favorite song is the topic of our dog photography 52 week project this week and my mind went in a 100 different directions when I thought about this topic. My initial thought was, how do I pick one favorite song? I love music. I have tons of favorite songs. I listen to music all the time. Do I try to pick my favorite song that's being played on the radio right now? That'd be hard... but I could try.

Can I just say, this is impossible for me. I wrote this blog and within 5 minutes of finishing it I thought of artists and bands I didn't even mention. I love (like LOVE) Billy Joel. Some of you know I love the piano hence my love of Billy Joel. I also love Maroon 5. Sunday Morning and Secret are my two favorites songs of theirs both from their first album Songs About Jane. (And yes I've googled Jane to find out who she is!) Perhaps my favorite band of all time is The Eagles. I totally forgot to mention them. Like I said, this was hard (but fun!) for me. Here is my original post:

The radio in my car is usually on KIIS FM out of Los Angeles so I listen to a lot of pop music. I occasionally listen to country. My favorite pop song changes frequently. Right now I'd have to say it is Lights Down Low by MAX, gnash. I love the chorus. On the country side, I really like You Make It Easy by Jason Aldean. Will any of these songs be my favorite songs 5 years from now, probably not. No offense to any of these artists and certainly not to Jason Aldean - I love his music. :)

I went on a road trip this past weekend. I was visiting friends in Dataw SC which is along the southern coast of South Carolina and it's a 4 hour drive from my house. I had two photography sessions scheduled and once I got there, I managed to find a horse to photograph on the beach too.  I was in heaven so in this blog are photos that I took while I was in SC. 

On the drive down, I was thinking about what to write about for this blog topic when I discovered a new radio station that played the music I listened to in college.  It's an 80s & 90s alternative rock station on Sirius XM called 1st Wave and many of the songs they play took me back to my college days. It was a great station to listen to on my trip.

I heard songs I've not heard in 25-30 years. (Yes I am THAT old.) I heard some of my favorite bands from back in those days like REM and The Cure. Here are a few of my favorites from those years if anyone wants to have a listen:

The Cure "Friday I'm in Love"   REM "The Finest Worksong"  The Smithereens "A Girl Like You"

They played other songs like Simple Minds "Don't You Forget About Me" and the Talking Heads "Burning Down the House." I heard some Duran Duran. I saw them in concert for the first time my sophomore year of college. I heard some more tunes that I'd not thought about in years like Adam and the Ants, The Violent Femmes, A Flock of Seagulls, The Smithereens, and Depeche Mode. Needless to say, it was a fun ride for me.

Here's a link to a list of my most popular "new wave" songs of the 80s. I'm putting this here for my benefit really. I want to go back and look at this list. It brings back some great memories.

Do songs take you back to a certain place and time? They do for me. Perhaps that's why I like music so much and why I've fallen in love with photography since it captures moments in time.

But if I had to pick my absolute favorite song, it would have to be one that actually came out in 1973. I wasn't even 10 years old.  My Love by Paul McCartney and Wings. (You have to watch this video just to see Paul McCartney's hair... hehe.) I'm not sure when it became my favorite... certainly when I was older. I do remember my sister who is 5 years older than me had this album Red Rose Speedway. Another song I love that is totally different from My Love but has such great memories for me is Back in the High Life Again by Steve Winwood. James Taylor sings backup on it and I learned to love James Taylor while I was in college in Chapel Hill. He grew up there before leaving for England where he hung out with the likes of The Beatles. He wrote the song Carolina on my Mind while he was in England and was homesick for Chapel Hill.

This has been a fun chance to reminisce about some of my favorite songs. Here are a few others that I always stop and listen to if I hear them and I'm sure I'll think of others long after this has been posted: Bruce Springsteen Tunnel of Love, George Michael Praying For Time (and many others of his), The Rolling Stones You Can't Always Get What You Want, and of course Michael Jackson is on the list too but I can't just pick one of his. There are soooo many. 

This really is a dog photography blog but when the topic is called favorite song, I digress. And it was fun. I'm really curious to see what everyone else does with this one. Anyone younger than me (i.e. most everyone reading this) is probably bored to tears. So here you go, next up in the blog circle is St. Cloud, St. Paul, Minneapolis and central MN located About A Dog Photography. Happy Reading!