Are You Serious???

February 11th, 2008 @ 5:07 pm by Mrs. Lovebird

It amazes me what aspects of the wedding Mr. Lovebird actually has strong opinions about. I found out recently that one of those areas was what music we would play at the wedding.

(image via here)

I’ve already told you about our search for our first dance song, and no, we haven’t found it yet. But the last couple of months, every time we drive somewhere, we go through tracks to see what we want to play at the wedding. I was surprised how much we differ on this issue.

For example, one of the songs that came on and Mr. Lovebird said, “we have to play this!” was M.E.T.H.O.D. Man by the Wu-Tang Clan. He then proceeded to sing along to it. ”M.E.T.H.O.D. Man!, M.E.T.H.O.D. Man!, M.E.T.H.O.D. Man! ” I was like, “um…., No!” And then he had to ask, “Why not?” At which I wouldn’t justify with an answer.

Then Ho by Ludacris came on, and he said, “We have to play this, everyone loves this song!” and I said, “Yea, I don’t think so. That is not an appropriate song for a wedding.” He replied, “I think it’s a wedding song.” To which I said, “This isn’t a house party we are throwing, it’s a freaken wedding. Next time you want to throw a house party, you can play this song.”

I can go on and on about other songs he suggested and most of my responses were, “Are you serious???” This experience has also made pay more attention to the lyrics of the songs we listen to. I’m totally guilty of just singing along to only choruses and never bothering to listen to the other parts of the song. When I saw that 50 Cent’s Amusement Park was on next, I was thinking to myself, “Ooo, maybe this is something the little kiddies at the wedding would like.” Then I noticed for the first time the song starts off with, “Shawty you don’t have to take your panties off… Just move ’em to the side… If you wanna ride on the roller coaster… Baby come on and ride.” I mean it wasn’t my first time hearing the song, but “panties” in the first sentence? How come I never noticed before?

To say the least, most of our car rides we are playfully arguing over and dancing to songs for the wedding. Sometimes it’s him attempting to dance to a song because he wants to play it when I tell him, “people can’t dance to this.” I’ve actually thrown out percentages of how many songs he can play in the rap/rock category. Whether or not he will agree to it is another story. I’ve agreed to play some of his rock songs during the dinner portion of the reception and some of his more non-PG music towards the end of the night.

But I’m curious as to how others have dealt with this, or is this not even an issue. I mean if we didn’t have 70 year old lawyers and 3 year-old toddlers coming to the wedding, I wouldn’t care, but I feel like I need to do some censorship. And it’s hard because a lot of the songs we like aren’t the most children-friendly….where do you draw the line?

And just for laughs because I found it while looking for a picture for this post…

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11 Responses to “Are You Serious???”

Member

tberry (message) 487 posts, Helper bee

I have already ruled out a ton of stuff. My rule is no swearing and no blatent talk about sex, guns, killing, cheating and anything along those lines. I don’t mind songs that insinuate a little bit of sex but I also want it to be wholesome enough that the kids can hear it and have no idea what is being talked about. We have a minimum of 8 kids under 10 and probably at least 15, all of which are either members of our bridal party or the children of them. There is so muchmusic out there and at 1 -3 minutes per song I think we can handle finding things we like and can dance or eat to. One of the rules is that we can’t eliminate a song by genre. So we are going to have a little bit country & a little bit rock and roll; plus some great jazz, big band, blues, celtic, etc…We have very eclectic tastes to we can really mix it up and everyone will like at least a few songs. I have only eliminated one group of artists. No Rap! It just is not dance or dinner conversation condusive and since we are not big fans we are all set. Hop hop we can have towards the end of the night but no rap.

2/11/08 @ 5:41 pm (reply)

Guest

Linda

Yeah, I can’t believe how many songs I like are totally inappropriate for a wedding. I remember dancing at a friend’s wedding to Pour Some Sugar on me while her 7 year niece rocked out. We thought that was funny and slightly disturbing.
I’m going to put those kind of songs towards the end along with FI’s techno stuff that only him and a few of his friends will dance to. My friends are more top 40.

2/11/08 @ 5:42 pm (reply)

Member

beanchar (message) 549 posts, Busy bee

That pic— wow. I guess her Ensure-shake brings all the boys yard! You go granny!

As for the off-color tunes, better to leave those for an after-party— or your next house party. In addition to the diapers/Depends set, no guest should really have to hear the word “panties” at a wedding reception.

2/11/08 @ 5:43 pm (reply)

Guest

It really depends on the feel that you want. It was important to us that the dancing part of our night really felt like a party. We have spontaneous dance parties just about every time our group of friends gets together and we wanted to play all of those favorites. We chose censored versions of some and just let others go as they are. No one noticed, even the 3 year olds, and 70 year old lawyers. If you start listening to the lyrics of every song and weeding out all those that talk about broken hearts, cheating, hooking up or other non-wedding topics, you end up with “Celebrate” and “YMCA”.

2/11/08 @ 5:48 pm (reply)

Guest

Chrissie

We had a daytime wedding and not much space for dancing. It was important to us to have more of a fun afternoon feel. B/c of this and since the hubbs like alterna-bands and I like JT, 50, etc., we decided to go with Elvis, Ray, Stevie, Frank, etc. Basically lots of 50s, 60s and 70s music. We did have a few more modern songs, but they were on the tame end (Norah Jones, etc.) It was a really good fit for us.

2/11/08 @ 6:41 pm (reply)

Guest

Nicole

Ugh! I am so glad someone finally posted about this, I was beginning to think I was the ONLY person with music drama! FI’s favorite band is 311, but he has his WHOLE fraternity pledge class coming (yeah like 50 of them) who are major country boys, yet we were both band nerds in high school so we have a great appreciation for classical and I am an oldies junkie (Etta James, Beatles, etc). So yeah, we are having issues to say the least! (Oh and the other complication of it being a black tie wedding…yeah throw that in too!)
This is what we came up with so far: play the *instrumental* version of songs we like that may include inappropriate “panty” lines, during the cocktail hour and other down times otherwise play generation friendly music the whole time and we are having an after party so the ones who appreciate a lil 50 cent in their lives will be happy.

Please post what you end up doing! I’d love to know so i could come up with a better plan!

2/11/08 @ 6:54 pm (reply)

Hostess

suzanno (message) 2,694 posts, Sugar bee

Haha - its funny how the very idea of kids or elderly aunts makes you listen a lot more closely. There are plenty of popular songs that FI and I like, and yet when we find out that his daughter has them on her iPod we are like “Really.” I’m not sure if it disturbs me more that she might like the song and have no idea what the lyrics are about (at 20) or that she might actually understand the song and have no problem singing along in front of her dad and I. And the whole thing makes me feel suddenly very old.

2/11/08 @ 7:09 pm (reply)

Guest

Sarah

Whenever this comes up, I feel like I should brag about how brilliant I was to convince the groom to take swing dance lessons with me, so that we only really wanted 40s big band music at the reception so we could show off our moves. Plus I never had to explain to him why his mom might not be into Nine Inch Nails. But I have to admit it was completely accidental: I was taking swing dancing, I asked him if he wanted to come along, and three years later, the DJ’s play/don’t play list looked like this:

No Michael Buble
Chronologically or stylistically pre-Elvis
No Michael Buble

Took all of five minutes to decide.

My fallback idea might work for you, though: every half hour, move into a new decade of music. That way, once the Amy Winehouse comes on, ideally Grandma and the toddlers will have toddled off to bed.

2/11/08 @ 9:37 pm (reply)

Guest

Sarah’s fallback idea is what my cousin did at her wedding. They started with the electric slide, because that’s what always gets people on the floor, at least at a Black wedding (her mom had been practicing, so cute!). They started with 60’s music, so we had three generations on the dance floor. As they moved forward, some of the older folks gradually left the dance floor, but we definitely had a blast. That’s what I’m planning for my wedding (if I have dancing).

2/11/08 @ 10:04 pm (reply)

10.

Guest

Amy H.

We’re having instrumental jazz for cocktails and probably all instrumental piano during dinner (maybe a vocalist to sing some standards if we can afford it and can find someone great). For after dinner/the band action, we’re doing chronological as well — starting with big band/jazz swing orchestra (Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Gene Krupa); on to Glenn Miller and up through Elvis; then 70’s classic party songs and some funkadelic; then by the last hour, probably anything goes — it’ll mostly depend on what the band knows from the last three decades. FI and I agree on all this, but tend to disagree on individual recorded songs to be played during the band’s breaks. . . but I can’t complain too much, since I’m the one who wants Bawitdaba!

2/12/08 @ 2:36 am (reply)

11.

Guest

Guilty Secret

Wow I never thought of this. We’re not having any children at our wedding, so it’s not really a concern. I know what you mean about setting the tone though. We are entrusting our friends to choose the music… I’d better brief them carefully for the task!

2/12/08 @ 7:14 am (reply)