Mia Dyson compels me to sing poorly in the car

Some music suits certain environments. The music of Mia Dyson, the talented Melbourne blues singer/guitarist/songwriter, is perfect for smoky, lonely clubs at 3 am on a Wednesday. Or so I've been told - what kind of lowlife do you take me for?? If you can't take in her music in that perfect environment, it's also very good to listen to while you cruise around in your car in air-conditioned comfort on a Tuesday afternoon in suburban Adelaide, like I did this afternoon.

Some music compels me to sing along. Some of my singing is probably quite good too. For example, no-one has ever thrown anything at my car while I drive past singing, and this is a good thing, because I would not be brave enough to stop and confront them, so the repair costs would have to come out of my insurance and I would have to pay the first $300 or so.

But I digress. Mia Dyson's music compels me to sing along, but unfortunately I can't do it at all well. This is primarily because I don't know the words, and in fact can't even understand them. Mia Dyson's vocal style is to sound a little like she's got most of a bottle of scotch under her belt, or like she just got up after a nasty fall. Lots of atmosphere, but not much intelligibility. So in trying to sing along I have to shout out the odd word that I recognize with great gusto and elan, and fill in the rest with what I call "mouth guitar", which is where instead of singing you make the noises of what you think may be a guitar, like this: "beeeow dern derrrn bur der der baaaah".

If anyone ever bugs my car I will probably die of embarrassment. But who would bug my car?? 60 Minutes used to have a bit of surveillance footage every now and then, featuring cops handing each other brown paper bags under the dashboard, presumably chock full of donuts, but I think they've gone more tabloid than investigative these days, and anyway I earned those donuts fair and square. Still, one day it'll happen and I'll be famous on youtube. Keep your eyes and ears peeled.

Bup bernt diddididdididdy bernt diddididdy be baaaaap ....