by Alexander O’Neal and Cherrelle: Talk about a song that will get you up in the morning! This came on my Pandora channel this morning and I was JAMMIN in the shower. Yall would have thought I was performing at the Apollo!  This was not on my mom’s initial playlist, but this needs to be the first of many songs that will be added via Download List #2.

by The Emotions: I had this song in my head for *days* and it was driving me insane. Not because the song was stuck in my head, but because I didn’t know what the song was at the time. The only part I could remember was “hmmmmmmmm hmmm hmmm hmmmm to the world”. I also knew that wasn’t the melody of the whole song. I requested help from my friends, my mom, and my step dad. Try explaining your musical thoughts to people when you know you can’t hum! I received the same response from all of them: laughter! I knew I would figure it out one way or the other. I used all kinds of technology to help me find the song – one I will blog about next – none of which helped.

I knew I was either going to listen to oldies until I heard the song again or I was going to magically figure it out.  And I did just that…I researched every old school female artist I could think of. Eventually, something told me to analyze the harmonies and the sound of the song and think about what other songs sounded like this one. I somehow got to The Emotions and watched other Related Videos on YouTube until I found a match. I became an expert at scanning songs and starting them a minute into the track. When I first heard this one, I thought “Could THIS be the song? This may be the song!” You have no idea how happy I was when I took it back to the beginning and heard that “hmmmmmmmm hmmm hmmm hmmmm to the world”. I have listened to this track at least 30 times since then – enough to where I know all the lyrics and I will never again have to question what the song is.