The Medley: my musical misery

I've been singing in the shower the past few mornings. It's been a medley of songs, but really more like a medley of first lines of songs. It's gone something like this:

"I don't want to be an American idiot. We've come a long way, changing day to day, but tell me, where do the children play? Shake it, shake it baby. Where's your head at?"

Can anyone tell me which songs these are, and who sang them? More importantly, I wish I could answer why these songs in particular are in my head.

We have iTunes and an iPod now, which is amazing but I'm still fond of my discman. It may have to do with my comeplete clumsiness, and the fear of destroying that sexy, silver, compact piece of technology that cost more than my car payment does. But music is important to me, and I'll grow comfortable with it. I bought my first and current car solely on the fact that it has a 4 CD changer. I listen to CDs at work but it really has to be muzak because of the people and children I work with.

My latest lament is about women, and music. I really only have early Liz Phair, and Ani DiFranco. L likes Avril Lavigne and Alanis Morisette, mainly I think because they are Canadian, but they don't do much for me. I know I sound like a snob, but I just don't feel very connected to women musicians. It makes me feel like a faulted feminist.

Next week I am going to see Wilco. This will hopefully match my Jayhawks concert of last February. At that point I had not been to a live concert in 5 years, and it was wonderful. Especially so since original band member Marc Olson reunited with Gary Louris for the Cambridge show. It wasn't techinically the "Jayhawks," but pretty much the backbone of the group. It was at an old movie theater I used to go to. Coincidentally it was also one of the last times I had a Krispy Kreme donut, since they pretty much pulled out of MA.