My husband and I met working with kids. Our earliest talks were about music. Now we’re enjoying music with our own kids. While Dave and I share our old favorites with them, we’re also interested in what they’re listening to now. While recently putting together a Spotify list of songs that our whole family can enjoy, I thought it would be fun to share some of them with you. Here’s our criteria:
1. The tune: carried by vocals and instrumentals, needs to be excellent and have something interesting or surprising.
2. The voice: unique tone and used in ways that are interesting or surprising.
3. The lyrics: storytelling, real, vulnerable, touching, positive, clean.
4. The beat: usually upbeat or a variety of beat, with good use of pauses.
Hat tip to my son, Ian, who helped me with this post. So what do we like about Avicii’s Wake Me Up? We like the catchy tune, positive story-telling lyrics, unique voice (Aloe Blacc) singing in surprising way. We like the old-school acoustic guitar start, with a building upbeat, then the addition of techno pop.
What songs are you listening to with your family?
Love is the prize ~~~~~~~~ Angie Mc
Family Love Does More 
You should check out songza as well, it creates playlists for you, I find it’s a good way to get exposure to new music!
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Thanks for the lead to songza, Caitlin! It is very well organized and streamlined and …so many Christmas lists for me to play 🙂
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Love that song! We do the same thing with our kids, and are always exchanging songs!
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~~~ waving to you, Diana! Do you share music online, if so, which venues? Which songs to you currently like? Ian and I have songs lined up for weekly posts for months 🙂 Thanks for stopping by and blessed Advent to you & yours, especially dear (((Lily)))
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You know….I am not quite as savvy as ya’ll….my kids all have spotify, and I just sort of tag along for the ride. We all love Coldplay, not every single song, but quite a few…..I am a BIG David Gray fan….I am all over the place from Beethoven and Bach to Sting and Mumford and Sons…..and all of my fun music of the past which I only hum along to in the grocery store late at night. BUT…you have inspired me to look into Spotify for my own big girl self.
And…..a Lily update…the girl just lost her FIRST TOOTH!!! That sort of rattled me more than her turning six and starting first grade, the tooth was so tangible, it just screamed, “Yep, I’m growing up, Mama!!”;)
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Once you’re on Spotify, let me know and we can follow each other. The fastest way to do that is to send a link a direct link from the account to follow – searching for accounts on the site is rough.
Yay for Lily!
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I think you’re really on to something here, Angie. Music has such strong emotional connotations for all of us that it’s a great way to connect as a family. That can be challenging when you have a wide age range(as we do with kids from 9-16 years old) but we manage with anthem-like songs such as Philip Phillips’ and F.U.N.. The Wii Just Dance! stuff is great for family bonding, too. Watching Mom and Dad try to keep up on those fast dance songs has everyone laughing and singing along.
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Perfect, Faith! Now you have me thinking about anthem-like songs that cross generations, like Tom Petty’s “Won’t Back Down” and how we all love them, including my parents 🙂 We, too, like to clear the dining room from time to time to dance. I specialize in “80s white girl” lol! A most Happy New Year to you & your family ❤
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