Waiting for Gouda

I really want to regale you all with exciting new tales of the banal and inane, but there is a bit of unfinished business first.

Not that anyone really cares (not even me, so I reckon that this post fairly well epitomizes most of the Wordpress site in existence), but I thought I would mention that the Silly Music Project wrapped up shortly after my most recent post.

What started on August 14, 2008 at 9:55 AM CDT came to a close on November 25 at 1:25 PM CST. (So says iTunes.)

From its humble beginnings (”About A Girl” by Nirvana) to its brief, weird end (”/=/=/” by Andrew Bird), the silly music project never failed to entertain.

There were songs I hadn’t heard in a long time, and there were songs I never want to hear again.

There were long songs. The Decemberists’ “Come & See/The Landlord’s Daughter/You’ll Not Feel the Drowning” clocks in at 12:26. Now, based on that title you might think that it’s really three songs. But believe me, if you listened to the track you would definitely think that it’s really three songs. But hey, they’re the musical geniuses. If they say it’s one song, then it’s one song.

Technically, it was only the longest of the non- “Hey, we stuck about ten minutes of silence at the end of the last song on the record so we could further stick a bunch of sonic garbage at the end of that and call it a ‘hidden track’” tracks. Let me just say to anybody making a record out there… please don’t do that. It’s stupid. If you really think that crappy recording of you and your drunk mates dicking around in the studio belongs on the record, then by God spend an extra five seconds coming up with a name for it and give it its own track number. Otherwise, have some respect and save that crap for the box set, where it will only annoy the people who are really asking for it.

For the record, the longest “Yes this really is all one normal song” track goes to Miles Davis “All Blues” (11:36). I had to skip Public Enemy’s “Superman is Black in the Building” which is the longest “Here’s a rap song that devolves into some weird spoken work sermon by Chuck D. type thing” track (11:51). Oh, and then came “The Crane Wife 1 & 2″ by… The Decemberists (11:20). What is up with those guys?

There were also short songs, led by Modest Mouse’s “Dig Your Grave” (0:15), although if I’m going to be fair, this is really just an example of what happens when my earlier advice about hidden tracks is taken and they stick it in the middle of the record. It consists of some plinky, plunky jack-in-the-box music laid against some very menacing whispering about how the whisperer either hopes that I am dead or hopes that I am not dead. Can’t really tell, what with the fact that he is whispering. Thanks, fellas.

Then there is a whole passel of Intros, Interludes, Postludes, Skits, and other assorted nonsense. Here’s some more advice: knock this crap out, too. Do you know how many times the average listener will play through your stupid “skit” on your CD without skipping it?

0.74 times. That’s right. Some people will play it all the way through once, and if it is funny or interesting, they may be momentarily entertained. But it will never be funny or interesting more than once. After that one time, it will be “that stupid f***ing skit that I have to skip every time”. Me, I skip that crap the first time. The second a track starts and I hear two or more members of a posse talking, and it doesn’t rhyme…. GOODBYE.

(You know who you are, Dr. Dre, assorted Doggs, coinage, and chocolate candies that don’t melt in my hands.)

So the project has been over for a couple months, and I’ve got a problem. For over three months, the alphabet decided what songs I would listen to. And now, left to my own devices, I am paralyzed with indecision. I simply can’t decide what to listen to anymore. There are too many choices.

Maybe I should do reverse-alphabetical by genre.

“Unknown”, here I come!