Follow-up: songs on repeat

[pseydtonne]

I had originally noted Wilco's "Heavy Metal Drummer" as the song I was playing when I was writing my previous entry. By the time I'd finished, I'd dug up a copy of Blue Rodeo's "What Am I Doing Here?" and realized that was the real song for my mood.

This leads me to some open-ended questions I hope y'all will answer:

1. When you note the song playing, do you simply hit the "detect my music" setting, type what you're actually playing, type what you wish you were playing, or type music suitable to your mood?
2. What's the last song that made you play it over and over about twenty times because it just hit those mental resonances you needed?
3. Did you ever play a song for the sole purpose of smoking someone out?
4. DId you used to think you were wicked indie? Do you now feel some guilt because you don't have the time to hunt for good tunes anymore?
5. Does anyone else think Jello Biafra's a switch-hitcher? I met him after more than a decade of being a fan and damn if he didn't set my gaydar off. He wears a leather jacket but doesn't ride a motosickle, he ran for mayor of San Francisco, he has a girlfriend but... yeah, he's gotta be bi. Gotta. 'Splains too much. Then again, since it does, maybe I'm just playing Columbo without a murder victim.

Blue Rodeo. Too bad I didn't even try to get into these guys when they still toured small clubs around my home town. What a dolt I am. I wouldn't have understood them when I was 15, but I do now.

Quick rundown. The song in question was written after their first ever gig in the U.S., which was at the Erie County Fair (the largest county fair in America, by the way). Drunk kids kept yelling at them to get lost; other drunk kids just ignored them and made out with each other. The lyrics are short:

On this useless night
With you so far away,
I stand in front of this Ferris Wheel
and I wonder what am I doing here?
and I wonder what am I doing here?

And all the drunks just stumble by
And mumble their abuse.
Tell me what is the use?

After so long, nobody's wrong;
after so long, nobody's right.

Shot song, but they just sing it so well. It's frustration with a smile, it's a day job in front of a banner ad, it's thank you for calling please hang up anytime.

I should be in bed. After all, I could use a hug, so I'll give one.

-I've played the song eight times since I start typing so I guess I type fast but it'll be nine times after I've run the spell-checker, Dante

Comments

[epanastatis.livejournal.com]

1. Type what I'm actually playing, but since my entries usually take a while to write, I can sometimes pick and choose which song would be appropriate to enter.
2. Gang of Four, Anthrax, around the time that mysterious white powders kept showing up around New York City and freaking people out.
3. Dude, you're going to have to explain this question.
4. FUCK YEAH! Though in my case, of course, it wasn't so much "wicked indie" as "bad-ass avant-garde." I swear now that I've got a CD-RW drive on my computer, once I get broadband I'm going to turn into a filesharing beast.
5. Of course, but I think everyone is...

Once you explain question 3 I'm inclined to gank this for my journal.

[pseydtonne.livejournal.com]

By "smoking someone out" I mean trying to get a truthful reaction from someone by pulling a stunt on the person. Think of the old smoke-filled room at a political convention. You get nonsmokers in one of those rooms and have the old men smoke their cigars. After a while, the young nonsmokers will wilt and tears will fill their eyes while the old-timers won't notice, or so it'll seem. Eventually, the reform-seeking kids can't take the smoke and they bail. Then the old men continue to run the country until one of them chooses a younger suck-up and teaches him how to smoke.

It's the cruel process of exclusion implemented through the infliction of taste. A light version is the time I played only the Portuguese part of "The Girl from Ipanema" over and over at 3 AM (remember that? I think you were still my apprentice then) until anyone called in. I brought in my vinyl copy of that album and had it on one turntable, then had the station copy on the other turntable. Once I let one play, I'd cue the other one up to the opening. Just before Astrud would sing, I'd pot her down and bring Joao's milquetoast voice back in. It wasn't until the eighth round that I got a call.

When you get down to it, "Ken's Last Ever Radio Extravaganza" was an ongoing smoke-out. No matter what, the show had to piss every listener off each time. Even if you liked what was on, it would have to be ruined (hear a song you like, then have it cut off as it heads into the bridge by starting the second verse of an unsimilar song). I suppose that kid is headed for a career in Hollywood.

-so what does 'gank' mean? Dante

[pseydtonne.livejournal.com]

Maggie has just informed me that, even after that explanation, she had no idea what I meant. So I said to her, "you play a song over and over to drive a person crazy." She said, "see? Simpler is better." She also explained that ganking means you're gonna cop that for your journal, which is fine.

Do I suck that much at explanation?

-mrowr, Dante

[epanastatis.livejournal.com]

In which case, my answer to question 3 is the same as my answer to question 2.

[epanastatis.livejournal.com]

I was your apprentice then, and I still tell people the Ipanema story.

I think Ken occasionally volunteers and guest DJs at WFMU (not to be confused of course with the much cooler Ken who is General Manager of the station and co-hosts Seven Second Delay with the guy who produced Monk).

[lyonesse.livejournal.com]

1. i pick whatever i'm currently hearing. sometimes this is internal soundtrack; sometimes it's external. the difference is surprisingly non-vivid to me.

2. "tatu dream"

3. i'm not sure what "smoking someone out" means. i don't think so, but ??

4. i would never use a phrase like "wicked indie", but i do wish i had more good music going on right now. one thing i miss terribly about seattle was the acoustic revolution.

5. i'm one of those annoying people who doesn't much speculate about the personal lives of people i don't actually know, which is to say, haven't the faintest :)

[mendaciloquent.livejournal.com]

1) Never use it.

2) Lately it's been Hedningarna's "Drafur och Gildur".

3) When I smoked, I was usually the one being smoked out, so I never really had the option.

4) I was an avant-snob, considered indie regressive.

5) I saw him at a Melt Banana show once. He struck me as being very sweaty.