Setting the Mood With Mood Setters

Many a fortnights ago, a high school classmate of mine, let’s call him Dike Menegri (this name scramble didn’t work out so well – sorry Dike, nothing personal), was telling me about his ‘mood setters playlist’. To elaborate, he had made a playlist which consisted of songs he felt would put his potential fornicatresses (yes that is a real word and you’re welcome) in the mood to, well, fornicate with him. Or maybe not necessarily fornicate with HIM per se, but just in the general mood to fornicate. I think what I’m getting at is that these songs, if played at the right time and setting, would supposedly make a girl moist in her cooter. This concept totally blew my mind because until that day I’d always thought the only thing that could do that for a girl was this picture.

Jokes aside, when I heard this I thought it was a pretty absurd idea and laughed about it for the next four years. It seemed as ridiculous as making a trail of rose pedals leading to a bedroom decorated with scented candles in order to get laid. I found out later on that even this wasn’t uncommon, but our friend who pulled it off will remain anonymous because some say he is solely responsible for making sure the economy is running smoothly. Here's a random picture:

Fast forward some odd years. Anyone that has lived with me or knows me well enough knows that I have a strange collection of music. I’m by no means musically inclined or knowledgeable about music in any way, and my library is far short of extensive. But as I was thinking about Dike Menegri and his mood setters today it donned on me that I could actually come up with a pretty decent list of mood setters myself. So here’s my 2011 Mood Setters Playlist That I Would Never Make Under Normal Circumstances But I Am Here For Your Listening (possibly fornicating) Pleasures:

1. The Seed 2.0 by The Roots. The only reason this makes the list is because it’s about knocking girls up and girls love it. It’s just amusing for me to think that girls listen to it while thinking about how badly they would like to get impregnated.

2. Pussy Galore by The Roots. We are now in more comfortable mood setter territory. Pussy Galore has everything a mood setter should have, a female back up vocalist with an attractive voice and a story about a medical student that pays her tuition by being a stripper. It also doubles as a metaphor for the unfairly high college tuition hikes every year in America, but not really.

3. You Are My Angel by Horace Andy. Every time Horace Andy is played, an angel gets its wings, Dick Cheney has a heart attack, and someone from Indiana dies in a horrific car accident. Good things happen. The man’s voice is mind-bogglingly smooth. I will go short of guaranteeing you v-jay play with this song because I only listen to it exclusively when I sob to myself in public stalls.

4. Self Hate Bad Dub by Atmosphere. There’s something about the sample used in the instrumental of this song that makes it an aphrodisiac. One time this song came on in my car while I was driving and my friend spontaneously started giving me an old-fashioned. Which was cool because it would have been weird if I got a blow-job from a guy.

5. I’ve Been Thinking by Handsome Boy Modeling School. Cat Powers and I actually wrote this song together one summer night on the banks of the Seine River in Montparnasse, so there’s some history there. Feelings aside, the song glides beautifully for the better part of five minutes. It also goes well with a rainy day and of course, scolding hot tea, but save your monocles.

6. Maggot Brain by Parliament. Not much to say about this jingle, just ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh . . .

7. Dreamworld by Robin Thicke. Robin Thicke is a successful black R&B artist trapped inside the body of a white trust-fund baby. His lyrics drip from your respective music player onto your fingertips and settle in the remote crevices of your lover’s sex apparatus.

That short list should be enough to preside over your filthy sin sessions for the next eight years. Here are some other songs that I like but didn’t make the cut for one reason or the other. The Honorable Mentions:

1. Woman Tonight by Felt
2. Shahdaroba by Roy Orbison
3. Sea of Love by Tom Waits
4. Obnoxious by Immortal Technique
5. Pat Tobin by Jack Likes Zazz
6. Zoo Zoo by Bisquit
7. Somebody to Love by Jim Carrey

I'd like to take this space to thank Liam Setzkelly, my copy editor, for his contributions to this entry. Without him this one would not have been possible, so if you enjoyed it make sure you tell him you appreciate his hard work.

My Thoughts on the USA Credit Downgrading

My blog is a lot like a slinky – very captivating at first, but becomes very dull and repetitive once the initial novelty of it wears off. To jazz things up, I tried bringing in a guest writer and even changed up the entire theme of the site. After I had a breakthrough spiritual epiphany this last weekend, I came to realize that cheap gimmicks like these won’t improve the quality of my writings, and consequently, of my readers’ interest in my work. Namely, I was hanging out with a group of friends and trying to think of a particularly embarrassing insult to say to one of the guys. The conversation was bouncing all around so I had time to think this one over. Should I call him a pea brain? Naa, that’s played out. A joke about suicide? Possibly. Then it hit me. I don’t need to say anything about this pea-brain, because I’m already better than him. The only thing he is worthy of is my silent pity. Hence the revitalization I will be pursuing regarding the future of this blog. I’ll no longer have to degrade others in order to elevate my own status. I’m already so high above everyone in an unreachable stratosphere of artistic wordsmith mastery that disrespecting others will no longer be necessary.

Just kidding. I’m bitter as ever, and to think for a second that I could continue to live and breathe as Bekir Yilabilir without intermittently poking fun at people on a website I specifically designed for that purpose is like thinking that the USA still has a AAA credit rating just because Obama said so – it’s slightly unrealistic. First up at bat, Liam Setzkelly.

I used to wear a monocle and watch BBC News as I sipped on scolding hot tea. There was a segment called No Comment in which they would show a clip with no added commentary – the understanding being that the clip was so ridiculous/unique/upsetting that no commentary could do it justice. I wanted to practice a similar approach regarding this striking photo of Liam, but decided against it because I wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight if I don’t write at least two demeaning things about it.

1) If I were put in charge of the publication of the MAAA Magazine (Mothers Against Alcohol Abuse), I would use this picture on the front cover. I’m confident that any adolescent to lay eyes on this atrocity would swear off alcohol indefinitely. Liam successfully took everything cool about binge drinking and turned into this . . . this thing which could suck the tits out of any party. He looks gray, defeated, and most importantly, unattractively pale.

2) Are those leopard print swimming trunks? Giraffe print? I’m not even trying to be an ass here I’m just really curious. Let me know what the fuck those are when you read this.

I’m going to end this one abruptly before this turns into a fashion critique. On the real though, that’s all I got.

NOTE: That’s not really a picture of me wearing a monocle. I drew the monocle in using Microsoft Paint, for those of you who were left baffled at first.