Poker Face
“Is that… Lady Gaga?” I asked. Meg and I were walking around an independent baby store, A2Z Babies and Beyond off Broadway.
“What?” Meg asked.
“It is Lady Gaga.” I tilted my ear towards the overhead speaker. “Paparazzi?” I ventured. We passed by a shelf full of stuffed caterpillars.
“I think it’s Poker Face,” Meg replied.
“Ah, that’s it!” I said. It was Lady Gaga’s Poker Face. In xylophone. “Well, that’s weird.”
We passed into the crib aisle. The cribs all sported fabric bumpers and blankets—which are SIDS risks, Meg pointed out.
About the time the xylophone Poker Face cover ended and xylophone Bad Romance started, I wanted to leave. Something about an all-xylophone Lady Gaga album creeped me out.
In the car, I exploded. “Why! Why would they make a xylophone Lady Gaga album?”
“Sometimes parents want kid-friendly music,” Meg said non-committedly.
“But why? What’s wrong with Lady Gaga?”
Meg gave me a look. “It’s not exactly kid-friendly.”
“Well, my kid is going to listen to real music,” I grumbled.
“Like classical music?”
“What’s wrong with music this side of 300 years old?” I asked, slightly overestimating how old Mozart was.
Meg lapsed into silence and I imagined playing trance music to my baby. Meg had a point—you can’t just play anything around kids, can you? Parents who play Lady Gaga around their kids are probably the type who tote around Chihuahuas in purses and let their five-year-old girls wear lipstick and pierce their ears. On the other hand, I’m drawing a red line at xylophone Lady Gaga.
you can’t play just anything, but it doesn’t stop you playing music this side of 300 years ago! my babies are getting classical, drum n bass and hip hop (minus the swearing hehe)
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I think a xylophone Lady Gaga album sounds hilarious and awesome! I love it when people make instrumental versions of popular songs, like the Vitamin String Quartet or Vitamin Piano Series, or choirs that do a capellas of pop music. re: Yes, it is a pretty low bar when you think about it. Isn’t that so sad?? That something so easy is still failed ALL the time?
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I played a lot of soft music for my little guys, which helped them sleep. Stuff like the Beatles and Chris Issak soothed the to sleep a lot. Just go with the flow and you’ll find something that will help him/her fade quickly. Later,
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Lady Gaga xylophone music is perverse (but amusing for its incongruity.) Shop music is sometimes so. I remember being in a supermarket where there were signs posted assuring customers that, for their safety, employees were drug tested, where they were playing Paul Simon’s Late in the Evening about how he was playing guitar “underage in some funky bar” and he “stepped outside to smoke myself a J” and came back in and “blew that crowd away.” I rather enjoy things like that. I don’t know what kind of music is “best” for kids. Classical is said to be calming, especially for cows. But yes, I’d say “real” music on principle, not overly loud, catchy lyrics. Davo
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My late grandmother detested “modern music” (“It’ll give you brain damage!”) and would only listen to an instrumental muzak radio station. Every time she started humming along to one of the songs, I’d chime in with the band and song title: “Grandma, you know you’re rocking to Led Zepplin’s Whole Lotta Love, right?” Oh man, I just realized why I was left out of her will.
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RYN: Hats with little ears?!? I’ve been waiting for an excuse to make one! If I make one and mail it to you, will s/he actually wear it? I have a firm theory that children who wear goofy hats at a young age grow up with a positive view of the world, because people are always smiling at them.
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It’s ok. You can get AC/DC lullaby music.
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