Robin Thicke (ft. Black Thought) -- "Blurred Lines" (2013)

Good girlfriends, I've had a few

But the best girlfriend I ever had is you 

Let's start this post off with an inspirational quote from Edward Gibbon, author of the groundbreaking historical work, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire:

Unprovided with original learning, unformed in the habits of thinking, unskilled in the arts of composition, I resolved to write a book. 

Substitute "blog" for "book," and . . . welcome to 2 or 3 lines!

Robin Thicke recently performed "Blurred Lines" with Jimmy Fallon and his house band, the Roots, on Fallon's late-night show on NBC.  The  thing that makes that performance so charming is that the Roots and Fallon accompanied Thicke on toy instruments like those you might find in an elementary-school classroom:

Fallon is a total douche.  For one thing, he broke the heart of a young female lawyer at my law firm.  But much more importantly, he's a Red Sox fan, or at least he played a Red Sox fan in a movie, which is close enough for government work.  

However, he has a great house band in the Roots and he has a lot of cool musical guests.

Tariq Luqmaan Trotter -- who goes by the nom de hip-hop "Black Thought" -- is the lead MC and co-founder (with drummer Ahmir Thompson, a/k/a/ "Questlove") of the Roots.  The lines quoted above come from Black Thought's freestyle rap during Thicke's performance on Fallon's show.

Black Thought and Questlove

I'm using Black Thought's lines rather than lines form the rap verse of the original recording of "Blurred Lines," which was contributed by our old favorite, T.I.

T.I. usually doesn't pull any punches, and he certainly doesn't on his "Blurred Lines" verse, which starts off like this:

One thing I ask you

Let me be the one you back that ass into

Things go straight downhill from there, I'm afraid, so I used Black Thought's lines instead -- if they are clean enough for NBC's lawyers, they're clean enough for 2 or 3 lines.

Robin Thicke gets twerked

Here are the first four lines of Black Thought's freestyle rap for "Blurred Lines":

Good girlfriends, I had a few

But the best girlfriend I ever had is you

I thank God for my blessings, it began with you

So I put a ring on it and I married you

As you regular readers know, 2 or 3 lines has the utmost affection and respect for girlfriends.  Click here if you doubt me.  But girlfriends and wives are two very different things, and just because you can handle one of those roles well doesn't mean you can handle the other.

Former president Bill Clinton has this to say about girlfriends and wives:

I'm not saying that Black Thought will be sorry for putting a ring on it.  I'm just saying that the words below are just as true now as they were when English author John Heywood wrote them in 1546:

And though they seeme wives for you never so fit,
Yet let not harmfull haste so far out run your wit:
But that ye harke to heare all the whole summe
That may please or displease you in time to cumme.
Thus by these lessons ye may learne good cheape
In wedding and all things to looke ere ye leaped  

(They obviously didn't have spell checkers back in 1546.)

Here's the official music video for "Blurred Lines," which has attracted 237 million viewers on Youtube:

Here's a video of Thicke's performance of an excerpt from "Blurred Lines" at the Video Music Awards.  He got a little help from Miley Cyrus.  (The video begins with Miley performing "We Can't Stop" solo, and then segues into a "Blurred Lines" duet with Thicke about three minutes in.)

Get More: 2013 VMA, Artists.MTV, Music, Miley Cyrus

Click below to buy the song from Amazon:

Matthew Sweet – "Girlfriend" (1991)

Honey, believe me

I'd sure love to call you my girlfriend

In Sense and Sensibility, Jane Austen spoke of "that sanguine expectation of happiness which is happiness itself."  

Jane would have agreed that Friday is the best day of the week.  Why?  Because the anticipation of a pleasurable weekend away from the office is nearly always more enjoyable than the weekend itself.

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How many of you remembered that today marks the four-year anniversary of 2 or 3 lines?  Can you believe it?  (I can't.)

Who'd a-thunk it back on November 1, 2009 (when 2 or 3 lines debuted with a post about The Last's "She Don't Know Why I'm Here") that four years later we'd be looking at 598 posts and (as of 12:01 am today) 408,135 page views.

As the old saying goes, "Tall oaks from little acorns grow."  Or in the case of 2 or 3 lines,  "Big piles of bullish*t from little blogposts grow."

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I write about popular music – at least that's what I write about when I'm not writing about myself.  (Which is rarely).

I think that if you had to reduce the essence of pop music to a single word, that word would be "girlfriend."  

Why do I say that?

I want a lifetime subscription

Although there have been many talented female pop musicians, the vast majority of what I consider to be the best pop songs of my lifetime were written and performed by men.  And what are men interested in above all else?  Women, of course.

And what is the best thing in the world for a woman to be?  

A wife?  HA!  (I'm not being anti-wife here, but remember what I said at the beginning of this post: anticipation is usually more pleasurable than realization.)  

A girlfriend?  Bingo! – as Strother Martin's character in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid said when he successfully spit tobacco juice without fouling his beard in the process.

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A girlfriend is the greatest thing a guy can have.  When you have a girlfriend, either you are young or you feel young – which is almost as good.

(Not really – who am I kidding?  But humor me, please.)

Please note – I said "girlfriend," not "overly attached girlfriend."  An "overly attached girlfriend" – see examples below – is mos' definitely not the greatest thing a guy can have.

Avoid the overly attached girlfriend!

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A girlfriend is all about the future.  A girlfriend has a high upside and very little downside.  A girlfriend is anticipated happiness – the "sanguine expectation of happiness," in jane Austen's words.  

She's like a delicious meal after the first couple of bites – you know it's delicious, and you have so much of the meal left to enjoy that you're not worrying about how depressing it will be when you take that last bite!  

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Please note: I said "girlfriend" – I did not say "girl friend."  A "girl friend" is a very different thing than a "girlfriend."  

Although, of course, a "girl friend" may always turn into a "girlfriend" at some point in the future.  And we were speaking earlier about the anticipation of future pleasure – correct?

Yes, we are.  But in most cases, a "girl friend" turning into a "girlfriend" is a fantasy that will never be realized.  

Matthew Sweet didn't title this song (or the 1991 album of the same name that it appeared on) "Girl Friend," after all – he titled it "Girlfriend."  That's why guys write catchy little pop songs, after all – so they can get girlfriends.  (Surely you don't think my friends and I started the Rogues when we were in 8th grade out of our love for music?)

Matthew Sweet has a "girl friend" who would make an absolutely spectacular "girlfriend": Susanna Hoffs.    

Susanna Hoffs was a member of the great all-girl group from the 1980s, the Bangles.  She is cute with a capital "C" – and let's throw in capital "U," "T," and "E" as well.

And while we're at it, we might as well italicize those letters and put them in bold font and add "super" and some exclamation points:  Susanna Hoffs is SUPER CUTE!!! (And she's a ROCK STAR, for cryin' out loud!  How cool is THAT?)

Click here to see her singing "Hazy Shade of Winter" in a little black dress at SXSW in 2011.

OMG, she is cute, CUTER, CUTEST!  Am I right, or am I right?  

Unfortunately for Matthew, Susanna is married – and married to the guy who directed the Austin Powers movies as well as Meet the Parents, Meet the Fockers, 50 First Dates, and Borat.  

I know, those are all pretty lame movies – but they made a boatload of money, and that goes a long way with some people.  (As my grandmother used to say, "It's just as easy to love a rich girl as a poor girl.")

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Hoffs and Sweet teamed up to record the three Under the Covers albums, which feature covers of great songs from the sixties, seventies, and eighties, respectively.  (I am always on the lookout for opportunities to use "respectively" in this fashion.)  

Sweet is a very talented musician, and Hoffs probably couldn't have found a better collaborator.  But he's got about as much shot as making her his girlfriend as I do.

Click here to listen to "Girlfriend."  Happy birthday to 2 or 3 lines!

Click here if you'd like to buy "Girlfriend" from Amazon.