The Soundtrack to My Life (allegedly)

iPod No Responses »
Dec 262006

So I found this following exercise out in the blogospher and thought I’d give it a whirl:

1. Open your music library (iPod, iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, etc)
2. Put it on shuffle
3. Press play
4. For every question, type the song that?s playing
5. When you go to a new question, press the next button
6. Don?t lie and try to pretend you?re cool?

Here’s what my iPod chose from the 11,845 songs currently on it.

Waking Up: Mushaboom (VV Mix) by Feist
First Day at School: The Seed by Nobody and Mystic Chords of Tomorrow
Falling In Love: Here Today by The Chameleons
Fight Song: See The World by Gomez
Breaking Up: Dog by Bob Dorough
Prom: Conduit For Sale! by Pavement
Life: Let It Be Me by The Beatles vs Shaggy
Mental Breakdown: This Ain’t No Picnic by The Minutemen
Driving: Laramie, Wyoming by Richmond Fontaine
Flashback: The Honey Month by Augie March
Wedding: I Aint Losing Any Sleep by The Sunshine Underground
Birth of Child: Where Gravity Is Dead by Laura Veirs
Final Battle: Giving It All To You by Liz Phair
Death Scene: In Every Sunflower by Bell X1
Funeral Song: Too Many Games by Maze
End Credit: Interlude (Milo) by Modest Mouse

My self-analysis…

Waking Up: Mushaboom (VV Mix) by Feist- So the original would be a good waking up song for me- upbeat, somewhat wistful. But this five and a half minute remix is bit redundant andgoes on far too long. Perhaps I can shave a few minutes off my morning routine?

First Day at School: The Seed by Nobody and Mystic Chords of Memory- A lightly grroving slice of modern psychedelia. An extended metaphor, something I picked up along the way during my schooling, so not a bad match.

Falling In Love: Here Today by The Chameleons- A bit downbeat for a soundtrack to falling in love, but certainly heartfelt enough. About mid-song, things open up a bit, and while the dour mood never lets up. Forlorn, if this is a teenage view of falling in love, they got it right for me…

Fight Song: See The World by Gomez- What begins as what seems it would be the wimpiest fight song ever, comes in with the second line of "Now you’re trying to pick a fight with everyone you meet". The chorus of "See the World/Find an Old-Fashioned Girl" implies that fighting may not be the way to go for the protagonist of this song- and sure enough, later on the plea to "lay down your arms" comes in. This is a fight song I can get down with.

Breaking Up: Dog by Bob Dorough- A crazy blast of beatnik jazz- "The dog trots freely in the street and sees reality/and the things he sees are bigger than himself". Much more happens to the dog, but all along, he trots freely. "He will not be muzzled". Sounds like the dog is taking the break-up in stride, which is I’m sure how we’d all like to remember handling break-ups…

Prom: Conduit For Sale! by Pavement- We’d all like to believe we liked cool music in high school. Pavement makes a nice soundtrack for a hipper-than-thou prom, perhaps in an alternate universe, one where I went to high school several years later on so this song was out when I went to prom.

Life: Let It Be Me by The Beatles vs Shaggy- A mash-up of The Beatles Let It Be and Shaggy’s It Wasn’t Me. Lyrically, I’m finding nothing that speaks about my life, but I do enjoy mash-ups, and life itself could be considered the ultimate mash-up- a bunch of unrelated things that somehow fit together nicely. Ugh, did I write that?

Mental Breakdown: This Ain’t No Picnic by The Minutemen- I couldn’t have picked a better song. The drudgery of work and fitting into a world that isn’t fair. Short and to the point, but makes a mighty racket along the way.

Driving: Laramie, Wyoming by Richmond Fontaine- It mentions driving throughout and has a lonesome, country highway feeling to it throughout- think Springsteen’s Nebraska album. Nice choice, iPod.

Flashback: The Honey Month by Augie March- The woozy ragtime intro leads me to believe this is a flashback to a previous life. The intro gives way to a slow shuffle that is pretty obtuse lyrically but suggests that this is a flashback, it’s a length, hazy one.

Wedding: I Aint Losing Any Sleep by The Sunshine Underground- The night before my wedding I was outside the hotel at 3 a.m. as the fire alarm went off at the hotel. But the wedding went great. This song has a fair amount of nervous energy to it, but is still enjoyable. I’m stretching to make this soundtrack concept work, aren’t I?

Birth of Child: Where Gravity Is Dead by Laura Veirs- Another mostly acoustic number with a far away feel to it. There’s a sense of wonder to it (am I stretching again?) and it’s got a nice sound to it. Something about this song reminds me of how long of a day it was when Chloe was born, and how well we slept that night, even with the hourly interuptions.

Final Battle: Giving It All To You by Liz Phair- Sounds like I’m surrendering the final battle. Not a bad return to form for Ms. Phair, sounding fine with giving in. Which is cool, as I’m not much for battles myself.

Death Scene: In Every Sunflower by Bell X1- Melodically, very nice for a death scene- a quiet departure. "I wouldn’t swap the pain/For never knowing you/I wouldn’t swap the pain/’Cos it was worth it for the view". This soundtrack is starting to come together…

Funeral Song: Too Many Games by Maze- So apparently, my funeral is going to be some sort of stepper’s party, where the Courvoisier flows freely. There’s no way to make sense of this one- the iPod is on shuffle, that’s all.

End Credit: Interlude (Milo) by Modest Mouse- %9 seconds, not a lot of credits. A baby coos from the midway point to the end. In every ending there is a new beginning?

So what have I learned about myself?

1) I like a lot of the songs on my iPod. Gosh, how did THAT happen?

2) If someone says "Hey, could this song possibly relate to X event?", I’d certainly give it the old college try to make it fit.

Posted by Tim V at 1:20 pm

I(pod), Robot

iPod No Responses »
Feb 152005
I’m a somwehat rational person. I know my iPod’s shuffle is random. It can’t pick playing order based on theme, style, etc. But look at what I was listening to in shuffle mode this morning:

"Baby Love" by Diana Ross and The Supremes

followed by

"Diana Ross" by The Concretes

Of the 2100 or so songs on my iPod, I have about 20 Diana Ross/Supremes tunes (a Best Of CD).

I only have one song called "Diana Ross". What are the chances that a song by Diana Ross is followed by a song CALLED Diana Ross? Kinda freaky, huh?

After The Concretes, my iPod plays a song by Pavement and I’m back to normal.

A minute into the song it hits me:

The Concretes
Pavement

(Twilight Zone music plays…)

Posted by Tim V at 3:47 am

Invasion of the Pod People

iPod No Responses »
Jan 132005
Apple just introduced it’s smallest and cheapest iPod, the Shuffle. It’s smaller than a pack of gum, holds up to 240 songs and starts at $99. More people than ever will now become Pod People.

I didn’t really notice the Pod People all that much until I became one myself a month ago. But once you become one, you can easily spot others. It’s the ubiquitous white headphones that give them away. You really notice them once you have one. I heard reports that muggers would look out for them and target their wearers- with some iPods getting up to a few hundred dollars, it could be a nice quick score for a common thug.

I also heard reports of something else that I didn’t know whether to believe or not. That sound on the white headphones isn’t very good, and that they should be replaced by the user with a better pair.

I’m not one of these audiophiles that require monster cables, high-end equipment, etc.- my musical budget is generally 90% software (music) and 10% hardware (stuff to play it on.) I’m even accustomed to the earbud-style headphone that come with the iPod- I’ve been using the Sony version with various Walkmen for years. Yet after two weeks of use, I noticed that a drum sound on the standard-issue white headphones sounded a bit tinny- as though a speaker had blown.

I tried my Sony earbuds on the same song. Not tinny at all- and generally a wider range of sound.

So if you see me walking down the street now, you wouldn’t know I was a Pod Person. That’s just fine with me- I know who I am.

Other Pod-itudes:

  • In addition to the headphones, I also read that the aesthetically pleasing white and chrome iPod picked up more scratches than the common lottery ticket. This is quite true, especially on the screen and the shiny chrome back. I’m looking to get myself a case, further separating myself from the all-white iPod nation.
  • I’ve had the iPod for about a month- I’m currently at 2,017 songs. I’m torn between continuing to load my vast collection onto it and holding off until after the Timmy Awards for 2004 are complete. I’m trying to systematically review all of the candidates- I have a number of them to determine a ranking for, and a few who are on the borderline for inclusion. Thankfully, I have all but maybe two of these albums on the iPod, so it’ll be considerably easier to review them than in years past. I’ll probably continue to load music on, but my 2004 playlist will garner much of my attention until the Timmys are complete.
Posted by Tim V at 11:19 pm

Who's an Idiot? I am

iPod No Responses »
Dec 232004
I somehow managed to delete all 675+ songs from my iPod and my iTunes library. How stupid of me.

I tied cleaning up my iTunes library on my PC and deleted all the tracks there. I then tried to "sync" my iPod and iTunes- only one playlist, mind you- and the iPod was quickly replaced by everything currently in my iTunes library, That’s righ: NOTHING. All of the songs were wiped out!

The bright sides, and there are many:

  • I now know how to avoid trouble with iTunes. Manually update. ALWAYS manually update!
  • As my lovely wife put it, "At least this happened now, rather than when you have thousands of songs on it." How true. The days of thousands of songs are not far away, too..
  • Even though I’ve only had it a week, it holds 12,000 songs and I only had less than 700 on it, I felt it was already in need of being weeded out. I learned some lessons about uploading- just because you have a CD handy, that doesn’t mean you need to add it to your iPod. Be selective, and you won’t be hitting the skip button constantly.
  • I was able to quickly recover all the songs I lost that I downloaded or added from work, as opposed to those I added from home. So I was back at 450 songs in no time (well, I had to get, install and run an udelete program, but it was no time in the grand scheme of things.
  • 24 hours later, I have 616 songs on the iPod, many of which are more likely to stay on than the previous batch of tunes.

Disaster averted, lesson learned. iPod and I had a spat, but we’re reunited, and it feels so good.

Posted by Tim V at 11:32 pm

iPod is My Co-Pilot

iPod No Responses »
Dec 212004
Now don’t mistake the above title for me breaking the second commandment. My relationship with the Creator is the same as it was before last Wednesday. But something profound did happen that day, and I’m here to tell the world all about it.

I bought an iPod.

Now for someone with a music collection as vast as mine, this has been almost a religious experience. Instead of seeing the light, I’m hearing it. Mind you, I’ve only used up a paltry 2.5 GB so far out of a possible 40. Which means 635 songs in, 11,365 to go.

I’ve had Walkmen before, and they’re great. But to have more than 20 songs available at your fingertips without changing a disc or tape. And to have that number of songs available be limited only by the time you have to put them in the iPod itself? That’s music lover’s heaven.

My plans for the iPod are wide reaching. Get all of my favorite cover versions in one place. Have all of the Timmy Award winning albums from the past 5 years available at the touch of a finger. Put the "one or two good songs" off of hundreds of CDs that contain only that onto the iPod and get rid of those discs once and for all.

And today I learned something else about my iPod. It can be as smart as I let it be.

These are the songs I heard on the way to the train this a.m., and during my train ride. I used the Shuffle Songs feature, which will guide me through all 635 tunes in an allegedly random order.:

Evil by Interpol: The 2004 Interpol album will win a Timmy Award, and this is a great song- surprisingly upbeat for them, and for a song called Evil.

Owner of a Lonely Heart by Yes: A stern reminder from my iPod that it, like my body, is a temple, and I must watch what I put in it if I want it to work for me. It seemed like a good idea to load this song when I took tunes from the Classic Axe compilation, but it’s come up twice in 4 days, and I’ve hit skip twice. It’s coming off today.

High Party by Ted Leo and The Pharmacists: Ah, back on track. This album was my #1 in 2003, and this is a strong cut from it. The train platform is cold, but the volume is way up- and as a result, so are my spirits.

Crap. I went to charge the iPod, and I lost my Shuffle Songs order from this a.m. Nevertheless, I heard some Beastie Boys, some Supergrass, and other songs that made me smile. And if I load my tunes wisely, this will always be the case. If I am good to my iPod, it will be good to me.

I’m telling you, this thing is awesome.

Posted by Tim V at 11:35 pm
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