50 Cent (ft. Trey Songz) – "Smoke" (2014)

You got this club on fire

And outside I bet

All they smell is smoke

Upper Franconia, which is part of the German state of Bavaria, has more breweries per capita than any other place in the world.  

(The population of Upper Franconia is just over a million people, but there are 200 breweries in the region.  The population of my home county – Montgomery County, Maryland – is almost exactly the same, but we have only a half-dozen breweries BECAUSE OUR GOVERNMENT IS STUPID!)

Upper Franconia

One of the principal cities of Upper Franconia is Bamberg, which is home to some 75,000 souls and nine breweries that are best known for their Rauchbiers – or “smoked beers.”

Several centuries ago, brewers routinely prepared malted barley for brewing by drying it over open fires, which gave a smoky flavor to their beers.  

Beginning in the 18th century, brewers started drying their malts in kilns – not over flames.  But the breweries in Bamberg never stopped burning beechwood logs to dry their malt.

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The most famous smoked beer in the world is brewed at the Schlenkerla brewery tavern in Bamberg.

The Schlenkerla tavern

A couple of years ago, I had a Schlenkerla smoked doppelbock at Of Love & Regret, a tavern/restaurant affiliated with Stillwater Artisanal Ales, which makes some of the most provocative beers in the United States.

Of Love & Regret usually has over a dozen Stillwater beers on tap, but also serves a number of other beers.  The night I happened by, one of its guest beers was the Schlenkerla doppelbock.  

There are no words that do justice to the strangeness of that Schlenkerla smoked beer.  I usually tell people that it tasted like liquid bacon.  

You may like bacon as much as the next guy but not be eager to try a bacon-like beer.  Trust me, the Schlenkerla was delicious.  Also odd – very, very odd.

One craft beer website has this to say about smoked beer:

Smoke-flavored beer can be very polarizing.  Some find the idea of a smoked beer completely unpalatable.  Others find it to be one of the most intriguing, complex and delicious combinations of flavors out there.

I fall in the latter group.  So when I found out that Of Love & Regret’s upstairs gift shop had a few bottles of Schlenkerla for sale at $7 a pop, I grabbed three.  (I gave one away, drank another last year, and am saving the third one for a special occasion.)

Schlenkerla's smoked doppelbock

I hadn’t seen the beer for sale since then until last week, when I stopped by the Döner Bistro in Frederick, Maryland, after taking a hike on the Carroll Creek trail there.

The Döner Bistro’s menu lists both German dishes (schnitzel and several wursts) and Turkish favorites like döners and falafel.  (The combination is not as odd as you might think – there are several million ethnic Turks in Germany.)

The restaurant’s beer list includes one token Turkish beer and a couple of dozen German beers, including the Schlenkerla doppelbock.  When I saw it was available, I couldn’t resist ordering one.

The Schlenkerla was just as odd and delicious as I remembered.  It’s too overpowering to be your everyday go-to beer, but it’s just what the doctor ordered if you’re looking for a special treat.

A few American breweries have dipped their toes into the smoked-beer waters, but it’s doubtful your local bar has a smoked beer on tap.

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You probably expected today’s featured song to be Deep Purple’s “Smoke on the Water” – the 1972 hit inspired by a fire that broke out during a Frank Zappa concert at the lakeside casino in Montreux, Switzerland.  (Deep Purple wrote and recorded the song just days after the fire.)

But 2 or 3 lines is nothing if not unpredictable.

I’ve gone a little heavy on classic rock and a little light on hip-hop the last few months.  So you’re getting “Smoke,” a 2014 hit for 50 Cent (which features Trey Songz), instead of the Deep Purple classic. 

“Smoke” wasn’t a big hit in the U.S., but did make it to #1 on Deutsche Black Charts, the most important black music chart in Germany.

I’m guessing the song was especially popular in Bamberg.

Here’s “Smoke”:

Click below to buy the song from Amazon:

Trey Songz (feat. Nicki Minaj) -- "Bottoms Up" (2010)

Can I get that 'Tron?

Can I get that Remy?

Can I get that Coke?

Can I get that Henny?
Trey?  I was like, Yo Trey!

Do you think you can buy me a bottle of rosé?

It's only a few more days until 2 or 3 lines kicks off what has become an eagerly-awaited February tradition: "29 Posts in 29 Days."  (Most years, it's 28 days, of course-- but this is a leap year.)  

Right now, you're probably feeling a bit like Tony and Maria did in West Side Story -- the minutes seem like hours . . . the hours go so slowly . . . and still the calendar says January! 

Our last few January posts are going to feature several of the best rap songs from 2010 -- I meant to write about all of them last year, but time has a way of getting away from me sometimes.

The first 2 or 3 lines post after "29 Posts in 29 Days" will feature the absolutely, positively best hip-hop track from 2011 -- let's see if any of you can correctly guess what it's going to be.

Trey Songz

"Bottoms Up" was a monster hit by Trey Songz.  It's a pretty generic hip-hop song about a good-looking guy with lots of money (his sobriquet for himself is "Mr. Steal Yo' Girl") who has gone to a club in search of young lovelies.  

Like a Boy Scout, Trey's motto is "Be prepared" -- he's prepared with sufficient cash to get those babes drunk out of their minds.  

Bottoms up, bottoms up

Pocket full of green

Girl, you know I love the way 

You shake it in them jeans

Yes, Trey loves the way the hotties in the club shake it in them jeans, but he likes it even more when they are shaking it sans them jeans.

What elevates "Bottoms Up" into the top echelon of recent rap songs is the presence of Nicki Minaj, who is making a habit out of absolutely stealing the show whenever she contributes a verse to another star's song.  That is exactly what she does here.

The chorus of "Bottoms Up" begins with these lines:

Bottoms up, bottoms up

Hey, what's in your cup?

Got a couple of bottles

But a couple ain't enough

Nicki Minaj in
"Bottoms Up"

That turns out to be the understatement of the century when Mr. Steal Yo' Girl runs into a platinum-blonde Nicki at the club.  They are a match made in . . . well, certainly not heaven.  (Maybe the other place?)  He's shallow and self-centered and really, really drunk, and so is she.

In the first lines of the verse she contributes to "Bottoms Up" (which are quoted at the beginning of this post), Nicki asks for a rather pricey alcohol smörgåsbord: Patrón tequila ($52.95 a bottle and up), Rémy Martin cognac ($31.99 for the VSOP), Hennessy cognac ($49.95 for the VSOP), and last but certainly not least, Dom Pérignon Rosé champagne ($300 and up, depending on the vintage).

Nicki's a very busy women, so she doesn't waste a lot of time when she goes to a club -- she gets right down to business when a potential suitor approaches her:

I don't say "Hi"

I say "Keys to the Benz?"    

Nicki's verse ends with some very odd lines about the late Anna Nicole Smith:

Yellin' all around the world

Do you hear me?

Do you like my body?

Anna Nicki

Rest in peace to Anna Nicole Smith

Yes, my dear, you're so explosive

Say hi to Mary, Mary and Joseph

Now bottoms up

And double my doses!

The "Do you like my body?" line is a reference to the late Anna Nicole Smith's appearance on the "American Music Awards" television broadcast in 2004, when she threw up her hands and asked the audience, "Like my body?"  Her slurred speech and bizarre behavior led to speculation that she was under the influence of some kind of drugs -- perhaps prescription painkillers.

Here's Anna Nicole's appearance.  I'm guessing someone doubled her doses earlier that evening:

Here's the official music video for "Bottoms Up."  (Almost 54 million views!)  Nikki's verse begins at 2:43 of the video, and I don't blame you a bit if you skip ahead to that point in the video -- that woman is a force of nature, boys and girls.

Here's a link you can use to order "Bottoms Up" from Amazon: