"Monday Morning at the DMV Blues" Shuffle

The Blueberry's twin brother

So apparently the Blueberry's registration expired back in November and HERC never received a renewal - unlike the past 30 years of automobile ownership.  He did get a letter last week warning him that the registration had indeed expired and that late fees and penalties were accruing.  (Nice of them to wait a month before notifying him to insure fees.)  As he's always done since they put it online, HERC visited the website and punched in the pertinent numbers.  This time, for the first time ever, he got an error message: "Unable to access vehicle record." So HERC cleared the cache and tried it again with same result.  Before he left the site, he noted the hours of operation of the nearest DMV office (8 to 5 M-F) and punched the appointment into his iPhone.

Now HERC has this streak going, almost 10 consecutive trips to the DMV dating back nearly a decade, where he hasn't spent more than 15 minutes in a single visit.  He knows people have experienced worse, much worse waiting times and even worse, much worse service but he's never had a bad experience there.  He showed up Monday just before 8AM and there is a line of people already waiting to get in the not yet unlocked door.  Start the clock. 

Three ladies at the reception desk made the line go quick and then it was HERC's turn.  He handed one of them the letter he received and she punched it into computer.  She gasped a little "oh".  Then she said "Maybe I can save you a little time" and disappeared behind the curtain.  Less two minutes later, she was back and directing HERC to step over to the DMV Express, a series of four machines set up beside the reception desk to help people "self-checkout".  He punched in the numbers, selected the one year renewal (a two year option was offered at a $100 discount) and swiped his card. (Only a $12 late fee.)  New registration and license plate tag printed out and HERC gathered them up and left the building. Stop the clock.

Eight minutes!  A new record!  And only a little longer than the drive time according to Google Maps:

These are three songs that shuffle played from the Spotify cache of nearly 2,000 songs on his iPhone on the way to the DMV and the two songs that played on the drive home which was surprisingly quicker.  (It's seems weird that they are all Seventies tunes but a quick check shows that decade makes up a full quarter of said cache.  What are the odds of five in a row, though? Seriously, HERC wants to know what the odds are.)

"Magnet & Steel" — Walter Egan, Not Shy [1978]:
Starts off the morning on a smooth note and HERC is singing along before he has backed out of the driveway.  He loves that toy piano sound on the chorus and those sweet backing vocals by Buckingham-Nicks.  SHUFFLE GOODNESS only because if he called it SHUFFLE GOLD, then surely the rest of the shuffle would've sucked.

"Kiss You All Over" — Exile, Mixed Emotions [1978]:
Kind of a logical choice to segue into - HERC has Spotify set up for an 8 second cross fade so there's never any dead air - and once again as he pulls up alongside his fellow commuters, HERC is singing along.  But this is the full-length album version with an extra verse not the more familiar 45 edit so he's quickly tongue-stumbling through the lyrics.  The song brings to mind the show Hello Ladies, which closed every episode with a soft rock gem, including this one on the premiere episode.  SHUFFLE GOLD

"Moonlight Feels Right" — Starbuck. Moonlight Feels Right [1976]: Great song. One of HERC SR.'s favorites, too and maybe the only 45 that both father and son owned simultaneously. Besides that memory, HERC drifts back to a past column by jb, where the man remembers the song fondly and his Facebook conversation with David Shaver, one of the group's two keyboardists who are not the lead singer. But what stands out the most is the reader comment from cindy where she confesses a crush on Shaver and recounts her sweet 16th summer working at Disney World in 1976-1977. "Ain't nothing like the sky to dose a potion" indeed. 
SHUFFLE GOLD 

(The song above was paused at about the 2:00 mark, in the midst of the vibraphone[!] solo, as HERC parked at the DMV.  It picked up where it left off for the ride home.)

"Hot Summer Nights" — Night, Night [1979]:
The original version of this one is on the same album as "Magnet & Steel" and stalled at #55 on the Hot 100.   The British session players supergroup Night took it to #18 just nine months later. The song has long been a HERC favorite and he clung to his scratched up vinyl album for years until that special day he discovered Renaissance Records had issued it on compact disc as a 2fer along with the group's second album, Long Distance.  It was one of HERC's earliest online purchases, nearly 17 years ago.  By the way, the hottie-voiced lead singer is Stevie Lange, one of ultra-producer Robert John "Mutt" Lange's ex-wives.  SHUFFLE PLATINUM er SHUFFLE GOLD

"Ebony Eyes" — Bob Welch, French Kiss [1977]:
Finishing up with the galloping riff-heavy rocker from former Fleetwood Mac guitarist whose departure from the band led directly to the hiring of Buckingham-Nicks.  (Stevie returns the favor by shaking and banging her tambourine in this live performance.)   While this is not HERC's most favorite Bob Welch song (that honor goes to this tune, recorded during his stint with the Mac), it is a damn fine song that pairs nicely with, among others, Cliff Richard's "Devil Woman". SHUFFLE GOODNESS