Breaking the Ice.3

Les Patineurs, or The Skaters’ Waltz, is a standard for winter backdrop music. Still few lyrics have been pinned to this French ditty. Here is one of the best, The Golden Orchestra and Singers performing “The First Skater’s Waltz.” Kidstuff, but terribly amusing–with real ’60s orchestration.

Skating goes with dating, for some. Gloria Estefan is “Thankful” for you at that time of year: Skating with my crew in the park (cause school is out, yay!). Gospel-ish pop sung by thinkers Gloria Estefan, Emily Estefan, Sasha Estefan-Coppola.

Burnt trees, unread letters to Santa, a shaken snowglobe with skaters suffering vertigo… Bnny Rbbt declares “There’s No Christmas in Hell“–hell being your absence from his love. But this filtered alt is a gorgeous cry for help. Play it again!

Breaking the Ice.2

Cha$e D’Amico raps “Ice Skating” almost as an apology. Claims to like it, but i call fish out of ice water.

Jethro Tull makes “Skating Away on the Thin Ice of a New Day” a metaphor for endtimes. Like he does. Prog pop.

Patti Page sings “I Wanna Go Skating with Willie” with all the sassy panache of a thirsty teen. That flying and gliding stuff is a gateway sport to canoodling, I bet you.

Breaking the Ice.1

The word for ice skates seems to have derived from leg or shank, since that’s where the bone came from which was strapped to the bottom of a foot covering thousands of year before now. Scandanavians have nothing else to do in a frozen world but invent getting-around-a-frozen-world stuff.

Still a big fan of John McCutcheon’s electric guitar new-age-ish country rocker “Fly.” A good skate feels that way.

More elegantly, certainly more New Age, “Ice Skating at Night” by The Ocean Blue floats over us on a rink of repetition. A figure eight is after all infinity’s side.

Rekindle revisits the ’90s for a synth-y pop ear worm: “Ice Skating Girl.” Whoa!

Sled It Snow.28

American rocking it hard, Noxtrain remembers the old days (with you), which somehow involved ice and tobogganing. “Twenty-Six Seventy” is a journey of maudlin proportions. Good stuff.

Carl Dixon a cappellas to ‘Chopsticks’ about how “Snowflakes are Dancing.” Then it gets jazzy! There are horses, buttoning up coats, snuggling… and then: Some like toboggan or seed cataloguing–not a rhyme i expected!

Hawksley Workman hits the novelty marching rhythm acutely for the alt-pop “First Snow of the Year.” First panic, then consideration, then all-day tobogganing! Magical (and not just ‘cuzza the whistling solo).

Sled It Snow.27

Megan and Shane update an old Bing toon-a-noodle-hoo into bluegrass rockabilly fun: “White World of Winter.” Falling in love hard, you might split your noggin on a toboggan.

Canadian bro and sis team Love Note to Dexter impress with their certain uncertainty in “We are the Wreath.” This ode to Xmas includes toboggans, and a rainbow of colorful doodads, and a Nativity. Weird and wild folk.

Love Note to Dexter again with “Anthem for the Big Christmas Brawl.” More wild poeticizing: And toboggans they rise From the grave of that guy Who invented sleds in the first place puts this folk drug trip into first place.

Sled It Snow.26

Baby Jey alt-pops their “Toboggan” to a swing and sway party for one. Or two. Whoever can fit on the slippery thing.

Toboggan Trip” is conversational word jive from Bobo and The Unusuals. Don’t flip, baby. It’s hip. Wa-a-ay hip.

I’d be suspicious of “We are Toboggan” by Toboggan, too. But i’d like you to try out this garage rock and hold on tight. That’s something.

Big Ol’ Toboggan” by Terry Tufts (w/Tobias Meis) is the epic buildup for the kid shenanigan. Folk anthem. Stand up! I mean, watch out! Those kids’er crazy!!

Sled It Snow.24

Now a luge is a sporty device for racing. The Swiss came up with this craziness around 1900. So they got to name it. Unfortunate.

Egghead’s “Breakaway Luge” is a punk party of speed and danger. Zoom. To you.

Jimmy Fallon’s derivative homage “Doubles Luge” is over before you know it.

That’s all i got on luging. Let’s switch across to toboggans again. The Strawbs get psychedelic (a smidge) with “The River,” a shamanistic turn on suffering Winter’s harsh cold. Those kids grab their toboggans, but the river wouldn’t move. You see that.

Sled It Snow.23

Toboggan is just another word for sled, though it may have referred to First Nationers’ hauling sledges, like Santa’s.

Tim Rosenau returns grabbing his toboggan in the rocking “It Snowed.” Shreddin’.

A Group of Eyebrows Take the World Lead in Toboggan Sleds” is experimental garage nonsense from ColdmaN5. Listening to it doesn’t help understand it. Take the ride to the random sound effects.

JJ Rivers playfully sings about his love’s broken neck in the novelty EDM “Tobogganing.” But it’s a mispronunciation problem.

Sled It Snow.22

The Bobsled Song” is an annoying cheer of pride and frictionless motion from Mrs. Sizemore. School assembly genre.

Mrs. Sizemore brings in the kid choir to up the ante with “Toboggan Tango.” Better kid stuff. Worse cultural appropriation.

2 the Sun measures the childhood “Seasons, 2002” in grief and joy. R+B mixes with some rapping to bury the dog, cherry blossoms… and sledding! Wistful.

Finale strong, Mrs. Sizemore hits the rock’n’roll button on the keyboard machine with “Catch My Drift,” a snowboardin’ tune of pop song design.