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YouTube Music Videos

Saturday, October 20, 2007
Evidently, there is a booming cottage industry, heretofore unbeknownst to me (imagine!), of amateur videographers creating music videos for their favorite groups and songs. At the end of this post is a list of cool videos to They Might Be Giants songs that my boys and I found recently.

I say, it's about time! I was just entering high school when MTV came out, and I remember lying in bed composing a video to Rush's La Villa Strangiato, which of course would involve some kids stumbling upon a haunted house and being chased by monsters. (Diversion: I just created a Raymond Scott station on my Pandora profile. Read it to find out what this has to do with anything.) It was sooooo disappointing to me that most MTV music videos were so lame: the band onstage, the band on the bus, the band lip-synching out in a field somewhere. Where's the storytelling?

So, now YouTube has finally afforded those with a more creative vision (and the production skills) to do better. Following is the list of TMBG songs we have found:


Sadly, still no one seems to have done a creative video to La Villa Strangiato, just plenty of bootlegged concert footage. Any videographers looking for a fun project?

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Favorite Music

Tuesday, April 29, 2003
Update, Oct 2007: To view my most up-to-date listening, check out my Pandora.com profile.

This is one part of a two-part series, the other being Favorite Authors. I was going to have them both on a single page, but it got too wordy. I wouldn't even have bothered, since it seems sort of an egotistical exercise anyway, except that I do enjoy sometimes finding interests I have in common with others who list them in this way, so therefore I present them to you. Please feel free to leave comments below if you feel so moved, I'm always willing to talk at length about any of the topics on this page (Or any of the other pages in this section, for that matter).

The first group I ever became a real "groupie" of was Rush, in high school in the early-1980s. This band has had several distinct phases since it's founding in the late '60s. I am most partial to what I call their "middle period", which I define as from 2112 up through Moving Pictures. This period, in my opinion, is the most musically interesting, experimenting with odd time meters, extended tracks with non-standard structure, and great solos. Prior to that period is very Led Zepplin-influenced heavy metal, which is not my favorite genre, and after it, they tended to settle more into the standard 3-4 minute verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge/chorus style of song, which I always find monotonous (even when they do it).

A few remarks about some particular songs:

In college, I paid a lot of attention to art rock bands from the '70s and early '80s: Yes; Emerson, Lake, and Palmer; Jethro Tull; and Kansas. As a pianist myself, I truly enjoy listening to Keith Emerson play, even though some of ELP's music as a whole can be a bit egotistical. (Some have said masturbatory.) Some of my favorite pieces of sheet music are transcriptions of ELP's Trilogy album, which I sometimes flatter myself into thinking that I can sort of play. Must-listen Kansas songs include "Miracles Out of Nowhere", "Journey from Mariabronn", "Song for America", and "The Spider", a frenetic instrumental that doesn't stay in the same time signature for more than 2 measures at a time, mostly involving odd numbers, which I can't even begin to imagine composing. (Possibly an altered state of consciousness was involved? JUST A CONJECTURE...)

Of course, there is also jazz. I think I can say in this category that my all-time favorite is Dave Brubeck (a pianist, of course), although of course he's not so current as he was, being in his 80's now. But I did hear him perform live just a few years ago, and he was truly amazing -- he's still got it. Other jazz pianists that have caught my ear are McCoy Tyner, Laszlo Gardony, Keith Jarrett, Sir Roland Hanna, and Marcus Roberts. Non-pianists would include any of the Marsaleses, especially Wynton.

I would also put Bela Fleck in the jazz category, probably the world's premier jazz banjo player. Although most people have thought of the banjo as strictly a bluegrass instrument for the last 50 years, he correctly points out that banjo was integral to early New Orleans-style jazz, which, granted, is not the same jazz as exists today. I do have to admit, however, that I liked the group even more than I do now back when Howard Levy was with them. He is a great keyboardist *and* an amazing harmonica player. Also an all-around interesting person, from what I see on his website. I saw him live in Chicago once, in a little club where I could actually go and talk to him on break. It was great.

There's no other way to describe They Might Be Giants than Just Plain Weird. Weird lyrics. Weird music. Weird. But strangely catchy and hum-able. If I get started quoting lyrics, I won't be able to stop, so I won't start. I'll just send you to this great link, which also includes chords, some midi, and listener attempts at interpretations.

One thing I like best about TMBG is they have a real talent for writing the darkest lyrics to really catchy upbeat music, which is a very humorous effect. Listen, for example, to "Dead" from Flood, or "Turn Around" from Apollo 18, or "Where Your Eyes Don't Go" from Lincoln. Also, what other band do you know of that makes such frequent use of accordian *and* baritone sax, and sometimes breaks into polka? Or makes a song out of Pavlov's salivating dog experiment ("Dinner Bell", Apollo 18), or a string of wordplay on how an young child in America in the 1960's would mis-remember current events of the time ("Purple Toupee", Lincoln)?

I really want to learn to play the accordian and form a They Might Be Giants cover band. It would be called "They Might Be TMBG".

I first heard Brian Woodbury's song "The Oranges" on Peter Schickele's Public Radio International show Schickele Mix, and I immediately loved it, but was unable to find it until it was recently re-released by Fang Records. From the CD Brian Woodbury and His Popular Music Group, "The Oranges" combines catchy piano work with (later in the song) a trombone and violin to create a sound reminiscent of both early Chicago (the brass) and also Kansas (the violin). "The Oranges" is meant to be the opposite of "the blues" (get it - orange and blue are are opposite colors?), and the song succeeds in being totally and completey happy without being syrup-y or Pollyana-ish. It's currenty my wife's and my favorite song. Two of the other songs also happen to feature the guys from TMBG.

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