Bands that include their band name in lyrics

A long, long time ago I noticed a certain band cleverly included the name of their band in one of their songs. The lowercase version, meaning they weren’t singing their band name, they were using the actual words of their band name in a sentence. Here are the lyrics from Needtobreathe…

But I can’t figure out, yeah, I can’t figure out

Just how much air I will need to breathe

when your tide rushes over me.

NeedtoBreathe “Something Beautiful”

After this, I wondered how many other bands do something similar so I started a list. Note that I’ve decided not to use any rap songs because the list would be way, way too long. It’s more common to insert your name into a rap song, evidently. So here are bands that have included their band name in a song.

Needtobreathe “Something Beautiful”

Train “Save Me, San Francisco”

Lyric: “I drove into a Seattle rain, fell in love then missed the train that could’ve took me right back home to you.”

Natural Selection “Do Anything”

Lyric: “See what I’m sayin’, I ain’t playin’, stop delayin’ girl and make me your natural selection.”

Wang Chung “Everybody Have Fun Tonight”

Lyric: “Everybody have fun tonight. Everybody wang chung tonight.”

Rich Mullins “I Will Sing”

Lyric: “In spirit poor, in mercy rich, they hunger for your righteousness.”

Escape Club “Wild Wild West”

Lyric: “Shorties thought this could keep them rockin’ ’til the broad daylight, and here comes the Escape Club to rock it all night…”

Fugees “No Woman, No Cry”

Lyric: “Everything is gonna be alright. Everything is gonna be alright. Fugees come to the dance tonight. And everything is gonna be alright.”

Jimmy Ray “Are You Jimmy Ray”

Lyric: “Are you Jimmy Ray? Who wants to know? Who wants to know?”

Can you think of any other bands that sing their names in a song? If so, comment below and thanks for stopping by!

-Out of the Wilderness

My life in pictures… the last few weeks

  • I saw this UPS driver run a stop sign so I stopped to ask his name after snapping a pic of his truck. Yep, I’m that guy.
  • Waiting in line at a drive through… I liked how the rain looked on my windshield. And I was trying hard to not be impatient.
  • Went to have a freckle on my back checked out. Good news, no skin cancer!
  • Waiting for the doc at Nashville Skin shop.
  • View from the doc’s torture room.
  • Where I sat with my skin cancer, except it wasn’t skin cancer.
  • Neighbor’s cat found a new home.
  • Ms. Kitty in the lawn mower bag.
  • Cool floor in a Nashville condominium.
  • Mind games with this floor.
  • Guess whoooooo I saw at a local estate sale?
  • At an estate sale… I’m 97% sure this was fake.
  • Snoopy + root beer = airplane
  • Custom couch.
  • Any idea what this is? Let me know!
  • I’ve never seen a tea set / mug like this.
  • I always feel like somebody’s watching me.

-Out of the Wilderness

What’s up in the video “Lovin’ On You” by Luke Combs

There’s no question Luke Combs is one of the top names in country music. He’s also responsible for some of the best videos! I mean, just take a look at When It Rains It Pours and now check out this video, his latest:

As I do, I have dissected this video to come up with a few fun things you may not already know. Let’s start with the date in the home video at the beginning.

The date is July 22, 1998. This is a very significant date because Luke’s wife, Nicole, was born on July 22, 1992. Luke was born on March 2, 1990.

The video was shot at Brentwood Skate Center, 402 Wilson Pike Cir, Brentwood, TN 37027.

In the home video footage, Luke’s mom is driving a 1996 Buick Roadmaster station wagon. Notice the nifty sun roof 🙂

Young Luke is wearing Columbia’s PFG line of shirts, which debuted in 1996.

The cute video was directed by Tyler Adams, an alumnus of Appalachian State, also where Luke Combs attended college. App State is well represented throughout the video. Tyler Adams was also Director of Photography on a documentary called “I Hate Christian Laettner,” which I highly recommend!

Counterpart to band member Rob Williford, Young Rob is wearing a Brooks & Dunn tour shirt from 1998, you can find one like it on eBay here.

Also, yes Mona Lisa IS looking at you. Also… Luke is too.

Now to some inconsistencies in the video.

The timecode on the VHS recorder starts at 0:00 and the voice behind the camera says, “We got one more coming in here,” referring to Luke arriving at the skate center. Certainly the camera guy recorded the other kids arriving at the party. So he should have a few minutes of footage BEFORE the last kid, Luke, arrived. Therefore a timecode of 0:00 when Luke arrives doesn’t really fit.

The style and bright neon colors in the “kid scenes” are more consistent with 1988, rather than 1998. It could be that the theme was “early 90s” since they’re celebrating the young girl’s birthday, and she was born in 1992.

When it’s time to cut the cake, the video is horizontally flipped and I can’t figure out why.

The arcade game Luke and his friends are playing is called “Duck Blind Hunter” and the image is of a red cardinal. Since when can you hunt cardinals?

Luke also shreds a plastic guitar “Guitar Hero” style! The only thing is, there wasn’t a “guitar hero” style game in the 90s. GH wasn’t released until 2005.

We see the young girl wearing the coveted pink skates before Luke buys them for her.

At the end of the video, adult Luke (in 2020) uses 1 ticket, worth $0.01 in 1998, to buy a whoopie cushion. Accounting for inflation, the 1 cent ticket is valued at 2 cents. The most inexpensive whoopie cushion I could find on eBay is around $1.99.

If the young girl is supposed to be Luke’s wife Nicole (born in 1992), she would be 6 years old in 1998. The actress looks older than 6.

Wrap Up…

This was a really cute video and right on par with Luke’s style and image. Good work on the video for a song worthy of being played at many a’wedding across the country! Check out Luke and the gang on their socials below…

Luke Combs Twitter

Luke Combs Instagram

Tyler Adams Twitter

-Out of the Wilderness

I was not the victim of a bad breakup

After a breakup, don’t you think it’s always the other person’s fault? They did you wrong. You’re the victim. They hurt you. This is very true with me and one breakup I’ve been through. I would hear songs like this…

…and think, “Yeah! She should get what she deserves!” I would think to myself that I did pretty much everything right. None of this was my fault. Sometimes I even feel anger, which is sort of where this song comes in. I think it was written in anger, even if it is catchy. I’ll concede that sometimes we ARE the victims of bad breakups so if this is reality for you, that you were treated badly, then please accept my sympathy. But in this single case of a breakup I experienced, deep down I know I was not the victim. She was. All the blame I heaped on her actually belonged to me. I was a decent boyfriend, to give myself some credit. But how and why it ended had little to do with her. So it’s a reality check (and a deserved slap in the face) when I listen to “Gives You Hell” (the song above) knowing this is the song she should be dedicating to me.

There are a handful of songs that this sort of role “reversal” stops me in my tracks. The one that actually inspired this post is by U2. They’re one of my favorite bands and recently I heard a song I had never heard before. It’s called “So Cruel.”

When I heard it for the first time, I fell into the same way of thinking where it was me singing it to her, with me being the bearer of the weight of the breakup victim. I guess it’s part of human nature to deflect blame. But again, I’m just an arrogant fool if I believe this song is anything but her message to me. I was so cruel.

It hurts me to know this about myself. There are things I would change if I could go back. I’d do things differently, without a doubt. But nonetheless, here I am fully accepting the fault of a bad breakup. It’s impossible to change the past, I know that. So I guess all I can do with this burden of hurting someone I cared about a lot is to not make the same mistake again.

-Out of the Wilderness

How does God love us?

I was about to title this post “How much does God love us?” but then I thought to myself about the exact sentence that spurred today’s writing. I’ll go ahead and give it to you so if you want to stop reading after this, at least you read the most important part of this whole thing. The word “justify” in regards to Christianity…

It does not even mean that he [God] makes the sinner a good man. It means that God treats the sinner as if he had not been a sinner at all.

That’s it. That’s how God loves us. Of course there is more to unwrap from it, including how MUCH God loves us (enough to send his son to take our place in death), but as I was reading today this is the line that jumped out at me so, so, so much. I’ve posted in the past about a book I found at a local thrift store (shout out to Thriftsmart!) and you wouldn’t believe what happened the other day that totally relates to that book. It’s a story for another post but long story short, this excerpt is from The Daily Study Bible Series – The Letter to the Romans. It’s by William Barclay who delivers the thought as he is commenting on Romans 1: 16-17.

I can’t say enough about this series of books. Well, that’s actually more literal than anything, as I’ve only had two books from it (Hebrews, and now Romans). But at this point I’d say these two books have shed SO MUCH light on the background of the writings in the Bible and I don’t know if I’m just hungry for it, or what, but it’s like the perfect spiritual steak when you’re perfectly hungry.

Do you have any experiences with this study series? If so, which books and what did they mean to you? Comment below, can’t wait to hear from you!

-Out of the Wilderness