Music Monday: Maroon 5 & Smurfs

I heard this in town where I was having breakfast today and started toe-tapping just a few bars into it. Catchy as all get out, which is why I like it so much… as well as its Smurf version. The latest Smurf CD, loaded with their versions of recent hits, cost the best 10 euros I spent during our Christmas trip to Athens. I got it for my son and ended up enjoying it more myself – but I’ve been a Smurf fan for a quarter of a century now, and that won’t change any time soon, even though the latest dubbing of the series has got nothing on the classic, all-star 80s cast.

Music Monday: Tunes for sick days

Young master and I are both ill; he with an eye infection and I with a cold I couldn’t shake. We went to the doctor, got our antibiotics, and spent the rest of the day cocooned at home.

This is what I enjoyed listening to, again, since it doesn’t interfere with my understanding, no matter how the fever spikes:

This is what the young one sings along to, but only if he doesn’t know I’m watching:

Music Monday: Green Balloon Club with Bill Oddie

I’m currently on my way to a two-week family gathering for the holidays, so the festive spirit is running high. I couldn’t possibly choose anything but my favourite children’s Christmas song for the occasion.

Wordless Wednesday: CBeebies with Artem Chigvintsev – Strictly Cinderella

Music Monday: ZingZillas

My son has had a love/meh relationship with the ZingZillas ever since the beginning of the show. He’s outgrown the plot bits (and, in this respect, the ‘ZingJam’ format of the current season suits him better than the old style), but, no matter how he protests ‘I don’t like ZingZillas any more!’, he’s always hooked when the Big Zing rolls by.

We have the CD with all the songs from the first season, to my own guilty pleasure, but this bit is from the second one, so commercially unavailable as yet. That doesn’t stop it being a cool song (with a Zeppelin-esque bridge) featuring an even cooler instrument.

Music Monday: Horrible Histories

I bought myself the DVDs of the first two seasons last week and had a whale of a time watching them. The show is even better than the books! Perhaps it’s the writing/acting team… or it’s my definite preference for pastiche sketches over witty (yet still kid-oriented) lines and comics. Which is not to mean I’m not getting the boxed set of all 20 books for Christmas! (Ostensibly for my three-year-old, who loves the show, but I’ll be reading until he gets to that stage himself.)

Proof of awesomeness coming up:

Music Monday: Children in Need

I love Children in Need. It can be a bit of a to-do (when I have to send my toddler to preschool wearing something spotty, and there’s nothing suitable to be had for love or money), and the sob stories become more and more distressing each year, as my involvement in motherhood deepens (how do you let children, in your own affluent Western country, sink to such misery?), but the show and its aftermath always restore my faith in humankind. This year, the event has raised £26 million, £8 million more than last year, at a time when recession is still biting. I will not despair.

I’m supposed to be too old for boy bands, but One Direction are just too cute and too much fun. (Video’s a bit out of sync, but I’m not nitpicking.)

I don’t care for Gok Wan’s stylistic prowess (I’m still a Trinny & Susannah girl), but he certainly seems to know his stuff when it comes to musical theatre. This performance got even my classically trained husband’s seal of approval, and that’s something.