dianaschnuth

I showed one of my co-workers my 2009 Year In Review this week, and he mentioned that I might be able to turn some of that data into useful information. He meant more along the lines of incorporating a matrix into my mileage and calculating how many calories I burned over time, while dynamically updating my weight over time to increase accuracy.

What I immediately thought of, though, was music.

Last.fm can be a great predictor of what music I might like. So can Pandora. Even so, I find myself hearing a song, saying, “Yeah, I like that,” marking it as such on the website, then never coming back to it again.

I don’t remember where I heard about TuneGlue, but it uses data from Last.fm to display an expanding web of related artists. It’s not just the data, though; the interface is half the fun. Go try it for yourself and see what I mean: input the name of an artist, then hover over the tiny LP that appears. Select “expand” to see related artists spring out from the first. Drag them around and watch them spring back into position, then choose another artist to expand. Rinse and repeat.

My musical taste is firmly rooted in ’90s alternative, as evidenced by my Top 10 Most Played Artists of 2009: eight of the ten could arguably be said to have reached their peak of popularity in the 1990s. I assumed, therefore, that if I searched for one, another would be closely related.

I was right:

I searched for Greg Dulli, then expanded to see his bands and side projects. It only took me two degrees of related artists to get to Sugar, part of the Bob Mould conglomerate that I counted as #3 on my list.

This isn’t exactly getting me NEW-new music to listen to, but it’s at least getting me to some new-to-me music. A few of these bands I’ve heard of and can name one song: Screaming Trees with “Nearly Lost You“; The Lemonheads with “It’s a Shame About Ray“; Buffalo Tom with… what was their song? Oh, right: “Taillights Fade” (thanks, Google). Some of these artists I’ve heard of, but couldn’t name a song off the top of my head: Bettie Serveert, Ned’s Atomic Dustbin. Then there are a few that are new to me: My Jerusalem, Soulsavers, Superchunk, Jeff Klein, Matthew Ryan.

If we were still in the mid-’90s, I’d borrow some CDs from the library and from friends and make myself a mixtape. As it is, I’m unfettered by any sort of time constraint, since I plug my 30GB iPod into the trusty Kia Forte every day during my 20-minute commute.

I’ll probably acquire a few songs by the artists I don’t already know — most likely, I’ll snag the most popular songs as listed on Last.fm — and I’ll throw them into a playlist with the songs I know (and already have on my iPod).

I do miss the days when I could turn on the radio and every song was awesome, and every music store had an “alternative rock” section, and everyone had at least one friend who could regularly introduce them to great new music. It seems like such a challenge now. It’s possible, yes, with indie music podcasts and whatnot, but the results aren’t as consistently awesome.

If I end up liking the playlist I concoct, I’ll let you know…

[OK Go – This Too Shall Pass from OK Go on Vimeo.]

Found this as a link posted on my high school band director’s Facebook page. His comment: “I like it! Of course, now I am pondering how I can dress my kids in camouflage that will work on astroturf! Hmmm… show ideas abound!”

As for me, I’ve decided that I really need to check out this band a little more, beyond just this and Here It Goes Again.

Back in 2001, Aaron made this compilation of Christmas music that he’d downloaded over his dial-up internet. See, he hated Christmas music, for the most part, but knew that there were some cool Christmas songs out there.

He burned copies for a few of his friends, who played it for their friends, and everyone loved it. And now, seven years later, you, too, can share in the joy that is…

Christmas Music That Doesn’t Suck!
(download .zip, 61.6 MB)

1. The Ramones – Merry Christmas (I Don’t Wanna Fight)
2. The Ventures – Jingle Bells
3. Stiff Little Fingers – White Christmas
4. El Vez – Feliz Navi-Nada
5. Cheech and Chong – Santa Claus and His Old Lady
6. Bruce Springsteen – Santa Claus is Coming to Town
7. Disco Noel – Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
8. Adam Sandler – The Hannukah Song
9. John Lennon – So This Is Christmas (War Is Over)
10. Bing Crosby and David Bowie – Little Drummer Boy
11. They Might Be Giants – Santa’s Beard
12. The White Stripes – Candy Cane Children
13. Bob and Doug McKenzie – The 12 Days of Christmas
14. Weird Al Yankovic – Christmas at Ground Zero
15. The Arrogant Worms – Christmas Sucks
16. Henry Rollins – ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas
17. Pansy Division – Homo Christmas

Please note that Track 17 is NSFW, and was purposely put at the end of the CD to facilitate easy removal/omission of the one potentially offensive song — say, if you were going to make a copy for a co-worker or your uncle or something.

Share, enjoy, but don’t let The Man catch you sharing the joy. Happy Holidays!

I love my iPod — don’t get me wrong. It’s portable, it holds a crapton of songs (currently 3149, plus 13 videos and 109 photos), and it’s wearing a neat Japan-inspired skin.

But I really miss mixtapes.

It’s not like I got that many of them — Aaron gave me two notable ones, but I never really traded mixtapes like he did back in high school. I made a lot of them for my own use, though — mainly with incredibly cheesy or obvious titles like “Energy Mix” and “Mellow Mix” and “The 70’s: Selections from Mom’s Record Collection.”

There was just something about the linearity of the mixtape creation experience. I felt like I had to have a plan, or at least a vague idea of what kind of flow (or intentional lack thereof) I wanted to achieve. I had to assemble the source material, usually other cassettes or CDs, but occasionally vinyl. (I don’t think I ever sourced a mixtape from 8-track. And yes, I did have a working 8-track player in the ‘90s.) If I used a song from another tape, I had to cue it up to just the right place on the tape. And then I sat down for the next hour and a half and listened to my creation as I was creating it, hovering over the pause button, waiting for the song to finish fading out before pausing the tape and cueing up the next song. Usually, right after I put the next song in to record, I’d write the artist and title down on the J-card in ballpoint pen, then find something else to do for three minutes (probably reading a Star Trek novel, or doing homework). Then I’d get near the end of side A, and wonder if I had enough room for the next song, and squint into the little window on the front of the tape deck, and make a decision. Either I’d pick a short song (or amusing filler bit, like something from the Clerks soundtrack or Monty Python) and hope I’d make it, or I’d risk wrecking the flow and just fast-forward to side B.

Creating a mix CD or a playlist or what-have-you these days requires so much less time and effort, which has its pros and cons. You’re not required to listen to the masterpiece you’re creating. There’s less guesswork in how much music will fit: either you get a graphical representation of your 80-minute allotment; or, in the case of a playlist, the sky’s the limit. Rarely is a handwritten tracklist included with a mix CD; since you’re on your computer, anyway, you’d probably either type it and print it out, or e-mail the tracklist, or just have your application of choice create a CD insert for you from the filenames or ID3 tags. Not quite as personal.

I’ve almost seriously considered joining one of those Mix of the Month groups online, where everybody creates a mix CD, burns several copies with some art (or at least a tracklist), and gives it to everyone — but I think I’d rather do something like that with my friends. Maybe just for a while. And make it a real audio CD, not a collection of mp3s that we might listen to eventually. Then all of our friends would a.) have a reason to see each other at least once a month (except the long-distance ones, like Amy, who’d probably get a zip file and a jpg via e-mail); and b.) all be able to discuss successful mixes together. Like the legendary Fries mix from Aaron’s high school days. Or his Pixies tape. Or “Hüsker Whü?” (Though everyone would also be able to talk smack about everybody else’s musical taste, too… I could see Heathbar doing an all-Billy Childish mix, or me giving out a poorly-received Emo mix.) We could even remaster those old legendary mixes onto CD — that might be fun.

And, no — despite all my nostalgia for the old days of tape trading, I wouldn’t give everybody Maxell XLII-90’s. Although, now that I think about it, I actually could record from my iPod to cassette…