Song of the Day: 'Give It Up' by Chrissie Hynde and Annie Lennox

I'm what you'd call a selective obsessive compulsive. Despite being a professional copy editor, I think nothing of littering my blog with typos (or worse) -- when I'm in writer mode, who has time to go back and review their work? -- yet when it comes to my music collection, I will leave no "i" undotted or "t" uncrossed. Case in point when I decided to import my Pretenders collection into iTunes over the weekend, a endeavor as performed by me that would render the average person unable to stop their sobbing. Now I'm not talking about the band's nine main albums -- those have been in my computer for years. But in my obsessive compulsiveness, I also have another 36 sources of material -- a Flexipop single from 1981, UB40 collaborations, soundtrack contributions to "The Living Daylights," "1969," "Indecent Proposal," "Wayne's World 2," "G.I. Jane," "Fever Pitch," "The Other Sister" and "The Wild Thornberrys," tracks on tribute albums to Jimi Hendrix, James Bond themes, Burt Bacharach, Gram Parsons, Bruce Springsteen, the Doors, Sun Records, John Lennon and the Ramones, plus a duet with the Chairman of the Board, collaborations with Moodswings, Tube & Berger, a PETA benefit plus assorted b-sides, live covers and the bonus material included on the Rhino reissues of the band's classic first four albums. Back when I was producing CDs with my friend Greg, I was content to have these songs all lumped together on compilation discs. But with iTunes, my idiot savant mind would not rest until each and every one of these 226 songs was in its rightful place in chronological order -- complete with proper artwork -- so I wound up staying up till the sun came up Sunday, finally able to sleep knowing everything was at long last where it belonged. During my research, I came across this gem of a song that I wasn't even aware until about 3:30 a.m. Sunday morning -- a rollicking cover of KC and the Sunshine Band's "Give it Up" performed by Chrissie Hynde and Annie Lennox during the Colombian Volcano Relief Concert at the Royal Albert Hall in London on February 9, 1986. (You'll also Pete Townshend on guitar, on a break from his child pornography "research.") Maybe I was a little loopy by then, but it sure seemed like the most adorable thing I've seen in ages. I've been Chrissie Hynde's biggest fan for 30-some years -- unlike Debbie Harry, I've never even tried to meet her ... because I'm afraid of her -- and I wasn't even aware she knew how to smile, much less let go and have fun! Watch for yourself. If nothing else, you'll get a kick out of Chrissie's pants!

P.S. As obsessive as I am about having song and the chronology of my music, for some strange reason it doesn't bother me that, say, Debbie Harry gets alphabetized under "D" rather than "H." I have friends who go through all their artist and change them -- Harry, Debbie -- yet my brain is OK with it.