Kansas City News Blog

Aruba, Jamaica oooh I wanna take you/To Bermuda, Bahama come on pretty mama/Key largo, Montego, baby why dont we go: A Jamaican gunman took a planeload of passengers hostage at Sangster International Airport in Montego Bay, just the mention of which set off a Beach Boys "Kokomo" neural bomb in my head. It's not even the whole song, just the fucking chorus repeating over and over again, which makes me want to take whole airplanes of people hostage. The one good thing you can say about "Kokomo" is that it knocked Phil Collins' "Groovy Kind of Love" out of the Billboard number one slot in 1988, but on the other hand, all of you people and your parents made the Beach Boys' "Kokomo" and Phil Collins' "Groovy Kind of Love" number one hits. Do you actually let other people look at your CD collection? That question presupposes that you have a tiny measure of self-awareness and therefore regard "Kokomo" as a "guilty pleasure" which you would not tell your best buds about. For all I know, you actually think the Cocktail soundtrack is really, really cool.

Finally, with reference to the apparent attempted hijacking of a passenger plane in Montego Bay, I'll just point out that Brian Wilson didn't even sing on that goddamn record, which means that the song was kind of like those episodes of Airwolf filmed after the departure of Jan Michael Vincent and Ernest Borgnine, but all y'all went out and bought it anyway. And before you get up my ass about it, yes, I know Brian Wilson sang "Kokomo" in an episode of Full House, because you watched it and treasure your beloved VHS copy of it, and clearly won't shut up about it.

Life sure is depressing! Striking an actual blow for poor people, Kansas City and St. Louis are asking the Missouri legislature to bail out their respective transit systems which poor people such as part-time editorial assistants use to commute between their multiple jobs despite the fact that the Kansas City bus service is extremely unreliable if your schedule doesn't have a lot of flex. So, great. Now I've got Tracy Chapman's depressing "Fast Car" playing in my head, the title of which makes it sound like it might be an awesome Sammy Hagar anthem or something, FAST CAR WHOOOOO!!! Seriously, here's what the title of "Fast Car" looks like if you've never actually heard the song:



But then you listen to the actual lyrics and realize that not only will you not be going to Montego Bay anytime soon, you will have to pick up an extra shift at Walgreens on the Saturday because you've missed the electric bill one too many months in a row and they're going to shut you off, and your boyfriend keeps taking out payday loans without telling you about it and plus maybe you've also missed a period on top of all that. Depressing! There's a reason the Tappert brothers haven't ever used "Fast Car" as bumper music on the irritating NPR broadcast during which they laugh at their own hilarity in thick Boston accents.