From ‘Baby Beluga’ to ‘Call Me Maybe’

The summer of 2012 was an interesting one music-wise for my four-year-old daughter Serena.

It started in mid-June. While working at Burlington’s Sound of Music Festival I caught the performance of the now internationally famous singer Carly Rae Jepsen. Just me and 70,000 others, mostly moms and their daughters. I later showed Serena my short and obstructed iPhone video of Carly Rae singing her monster hit Call Me Maybe and she recognized the catchy tune as her KinderJazz dance class warm-up song. We then checked out a few of the hundred Call Me Maybe parody videos on YouTube. Coincidentally, a while back I downloaded Carly Rae’s Call Me Maybe music video when it was a free download on iTunes since I remembered her from Canadian Idol.

By mid-August, I think I’ve heard Call Me Maybe 40 million times.

For several nights this summer I had “Hey I just meet you and this is crazy but here’s my number so call me maybe!” running through my head robbing me of much-needed sleep.

And there were other music monsters lurking.

I’ll admit I like the songs of LMFAO (no, I won’t spell that out for you in this particular forum!) particularly their hits Party Rock Anthem and I’m Sexy and I Know It. The former is more appropriate for my daughter; the latter well the title is already a red flag as is the video. But I blame Sesame Street. Serena first heard the latter at her school’s end-of-year party as the parody song I’m Elmo & I Know It (As did yours!).  I guess we have to recall our own early days of rock lyrics being somewhat raunchy but we really couldn’t hear them over the lead singer’s mangled drawl (I’m looking at you Mick Jagger).

Serena likes LMFAO’s robot-headed dancer Shufflebot and the LMFAO dance crew is fantastic. In the Party Rock Anthem video, there’s a dancer who lands on his back and gets up again and I always scream, “How does he do that?” I don’t think there’s video trickery involved or a paramedic.

Then two diverse British music phenomenons happened in August.

We were on our summer vacation in Prince Edward Island listening to music on her Uncle Kent’s iPod music deck when she heard Petula Clark’s Downtown song. For some reason Serena wanted to hear that particular song over and over again. I don’t even think she can conceptualize what a downtown is yet. I bought Downtown on iTunes and Petula Clark found a new fan on YouTube.

Then the Spice Girls made an amazing reunion appearance during the closing ceremonies of the Summer Olympics and they too gained another pint-sized fan. Serena said her favourite is Baby Spice mainly because she was wearing a pink dress that night. Was it prescient on my part to have purchased their Wannabe song during an iTunes 69 cents special (I guess I spend a lot of time and/or dough on iTunes…) and Serena discovered that track on the iPad and we enjoyed that wacky old chestnut continuously for a few more days. Personally I don’t have a problem with Petula Clark or the Spice Girls except Posh who trust me, can’t sing.

So in one hot summer, our four year old went from Baby Beluga to Call Me Maybe. According to my friends with teenage daughters, it only gets worse. It’s so true what LMFAO says on Party Rock Anthem: Everyday I’m shufflin’!


Robert Davis is a Toronto-based singer-songwriter and children’s entertainer. Visit his website: www.robertdavis.ca