Iced Tea Forever

Mandy has moved on from cheap and inane fiction like “Are You My Mother?” and “Green Eggs and Ham” to classic Americana literature like “An American Journey” by the Oak Ridge Boys.

It’s a great book, just ask Mandy!

Awhile ago I posted about my buddy Daryl Petersheim’s song The Empty Tomb Says it All.

Now it’s the Kingdom Heirs latest single, available for free download at Crossroads Music.

Or listen to it here:

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This is what I found when I walked into the kitchen the other day.

Thursday night I finished watching The Sing-Off on Hulu.   Being the a cappella freak I am, I need to offer some brief comments.

Maybe I should have titled this “America gives the Voices of Lee the shaft.”  I like the Voices of Lee, they should have won.  Although I may be biased because the great 4 Voices quartet were former Voices of Lee members.    Speaking of which, I saw them win the International Barbershop Championship in Portland in ‘02.  Awesome quartet.

Anyway, Voices of Lee was pretty smokin’ in the Sing-Off.  And the two judges that had issues with their “Man in the Mirror” performance were full of it.  Way to go Ben Folds for disagreeing with them.

Eventual winners Nota did gradually grow on me, they actually are pretty good.   I came to kind of like them.  Their lead singer is a big boy, so we have that in common.   The SoCals?  Yawn.   Noteworthy was interesting, I thought.  I was surprised they were eliminated when they were, I thought they would last a little longer than that.   The ‘Bubs?  Nyeeah.  Not my style.

I agree with this dude:

One problem with the show, frankly, is that even though the groups are all a cappella, they’re so varied—small group vs. large group, barbershop, etc.—that any comparison is a bit apples-and-oranges.

And with the show geared towards the contemporary-vocal percussion-large ensemble sound (not my favorite type of a cappella for sure), you knew Maxx Factor was going to be sent packing at some point.   I thought they did pretty good overall though, I liked them.

The judges:  the two boys were fine, but the chick in the middle.  Was it just me, or did she say the same thing every time?  ”I felt the groove, You sang from your hearts and we felt that, Thank you for being here, I appreciate it,” and so on in touchy-feely generalities.

I knew nothing about Ben Folds going in to the show (isn’t he a piano player?!), but came away pretty impressed with him.  His critiques were knowledgeable and pertinent, he was pretty good.  Especially when he stood up for Voices of Lee.

All in all, good show.

For the tenth year in a row, no less.

On the seventh of this month, my buddy Lynn and his wife took me and my wife to hear the Oak Ridge Boys at a great little theater in Warsaw, Indiana.  It was fantastic!

The Wagon Wheel Theatre is a small, round venue.  Really cool.

Duane Allen

Joe Bonsall

William Lee Golden

and Richard Sterban

Great concert!  These dudes have been going for decades, and they’re remarkably consistent vocally.

Here’s a few clips I took and strung together:

Facebook Photo Album

Tonight Mandy overheard her aunt say “I need to go change.”

She asked her in all seriousness, “Are you wet?”

Remember just recently I talked about getting an Oak Ridge Boys record on eBay? It took me quite awhile to find it too.

Yesterday I went to a next door neighbor’s garage sale and found that exact same record.   It took me forever to find one searching the world with eBay, and here there was one next door to me!

So now I have two of them.

If only they acted like this all the time!