The reason the Canadian pop-rock-country band Barenaked Ladies always have appealed to me is because it is so obvious we all are originally from the same region of North America. When Ed (the remaining lead singer) crooned in 1998 about “the foam on the creek is like pop and ice cream/a field full of tires that is always on fire/to light my way home” on “Light Up My Room,” I could vividly remember taking the Greyhound with my Grandma on a late 1980s summer day trip to Buffalo, and seeing both out the bus window on the way home.
Last spring, the band released their first album without co-founder Steven Page. The second song on the album, “Summertime,” is an ode to Western New York-Southern Ontario weather; a response to those not from the area who ask, “How do you put up with all the lake effect snow, wind and cold?” The answer? “We’re all pushing through till summertime.”
I have been fielding many questions in the same vein lately now that Greater Boston has been hit with three snowstorms in a month’s time. “How did you put up with weather like this?! How does your family back there handle it?” So, Bostonians, my answer and advice to you in song form. “Keep on pushing through for summertime.” May it become your winter 2011 anthem.
Summertime – Barenaked Ladies (YouTube)