My favorite songs of Summer 2013.

     A brief reminder to please submit any questions that you would like me to answer in my upcoming vlog! It will be posted this week. :-) Feel free to ask uestions about blogging, fashion, faith or getting-to-know-you type questions are welcome, but really anything is welcome! You can leave your question as a comment on this post, or e-mail it to me. :-)

     If you've been reading my blog for awhile, you better should know that I'm a huge fan of 90s/early 2000s pop music, aka the music of my elementary school years. Boy bands, girl bands, one hit wonders, pop princesses... if it's from those years and you name it, then I love it! Last semester I was blessed with the opportunity to host a 90s/early 2000s radio show at my former college's radio station. It was awesome training for my future career, and kind of a dream come true in itself for me! I loved getting to share the music I was passionate about with a college community.

I think I've shared this photo before... but this was my last day of volunteering at the radio station in May 2012!

     But anyways, I still listen to music that is current now as well. Since I hope to have a career in radio it is important that I keep up with the charts! Every summer there are a few mainstream pop songs that I fall in love with, and these are the tunes that become the anthems to my summers. For example, everytime that I hear the 2010 hit "Cooler Than Me" by Mike Posner, I remember many lazy days that I spent at the beach spent with high school friends (especially my guy friend T since that was his favorite song at the time!). This was the last summer that I didn't work, so I put my copious amounts of free time into beach bathing!

     Below are a few picks for my favorite songs of this summer!

• "What About Love" by Austin Mahone 

     I have read that Austin Mahone is described as the "second-coming of Justin Bieber." Although there are a few JB songs that I like, I am definitely not a Belieber, so I doubted that I would like much of Austin's music. Well, I was wrong! I have been loving this fun pop anthem! I think that Austin has a great voice (for this type of pop song), and the music has a 90s boyband feel to it! And continuing on that note, I love one of the lyrics is "bye bye bye"... I'd like to think that whoever wrote this put it in there to reference *NSYNC's greatest song. :-)

• "Right Now" by David Gutta ft. Rihanna 

     Let me start off by saying that while I think that Rihanna is a talented singer, her immoral lifestyle choices and many of her lyrics keep me from buying her recent music. On her last couple albums many of the songs have had extremely explicit sexual content. However, there are exceptions (such as her clean song "Diamonds"), and I think that this new song that she recorded with French producer David Guetta is definitely on the better side! Yes, there are a couple verses that hint at sexy very flirtatious  behavior, but overall I think the message of the song is to celebrate youth and living in the moment. The  beat of this song is contagious, and whenever I hear it on the radio I want to get up and start dancing!

• "Crooked Smile" by J Cole ft. TLC

     This song has some of the most positive messages out of many of the songs on the Top 40 charts this summer! There are some swears in the original, but I just listen to the radio edit, so I can take away the good stuff from this song instead of the bad. I'll let some of my favorite lyrics explain to you why I love it: 

     "Love yourself girl, or nobody will"

     "No need to fix what God already put His paintbrush on"

     "And baby girl, you're a star, don't let 'em tell you you're not."

     "And if you need a friend to pick you up, I'll be around, and we can ride with the windows down, music loud."

     It's pretty rare to find popular rap music these days that has such empowering lyrics, so I am thrilled that this song has done well! And of course I must add that another reason why I love this song is because it features one of the (recently reunited) top girl bands from the 90s... TLC! 

      What are some of your favorite songs for Summer 2013? 

     xoxo Miss ALK

     P.S. And make sure to read the blurb about my vlog at the start of this post if you haven't yet!!