Musical Musings
John Scalzi’s been doing a lot of music blogging over at WHATEVER, with some discussion by Chad Orzel at Uncertain Principles.
It’s been fun to see their back-and-forth on the perfect length for the perfect pop song; from Scalzi’s 3:00 to Orzel’s 4:33 (very funny, Chad) to Scalzi’s 2:42 and Orzel’s 2:42 concurrence.
I didn’t get into the discussion because I don’t know if I’d recognize the perfect pop song if it kept adding itself to my Party Shuffle, and I was in the middle of the Cover Songs sequence, but it’s been fun to watch. (Besides, a lot of my 3:00 songs are Schoolhouse Rock.)
I should do a histogram of the track lengths in my iTunes library; from some 0:04 tracks (They Might Be Giants, some of the “Fingertips” from Apollo 18) on up to 13:40 (Frankie Goes To Hollywood, “Welcome to the Pleasuredome”). There’s also a 14:10, but that one doesn’t count because it’s really a 4:04 song, 10 minutes of silence, and six seconds of irritating noises.
Scalzi’s latest is Hateful Christmas Songs which has generated a bunch of comments. Some of my favorites are mentioned, but I have the Dr. Demento Christmas album, so my taste in holiday songs is already pretty suspect.
Some quick notes from my Holiday playlist:
Most Versions: “Silent Night”, 6 (Jewel, Lisa Hannigan, Sinéad O’Connor, Stevie Nicks [twice, two different versions], and Wilson Phillips).
Shortest: “Deck The Stills”, Barenaked Ladies (0:32)
Longest: “Green Christmas”, Stan Freberg (6:56), but that’s mostly spoken-word; Wham’s “Last Christmas” at 6:44 is the longest song.
