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THE LONG AND SHORT OF IT
Mar. 28th, 2022 10:10 pmPART 1: GO LONG OR GO HOME
Recently in one of the music groups I frequent on the Facebooks, someone posted a link to this article from Far Out magazine listing the Top 10 best songs over 9 minutes in length.
I admit I have issues with Far Out – they do some good stuff, and then they do either tabloidy music legends (i.e. The Time Bob Dylan Insulted John Lennon To His Face, or something along those lines) or music lists like this that tend to be written entirely from the perspective of someone who listed five songs they could think of that they like and then Googled the rest. Or so it seems to me.
And fair enough – “best songs” music lists are always subjective, and they don’t need to be authoritative or comprehensive. And a few of the “Top 10 best songs over 9 minutes” that Far Out selected are ones I might have picked myself. But it just seemed like there were a lot of gaps in this one that occurred to me right away. And of course the obvious course action in situations like this is to make yr own damn list if you think you're so smart.
And so I did.
METHODOLOGY: As the point was to fill in gaps, I opted to leave off all the songs on the Far Out list. I also opted to limit it to 20 songs because it’s already 4.5 hours long as it is.
Which of course means my own list has plenty of gaps in it – no Yes, no Crimson, no Tull, etc. Which is fair. But I was also trying to avoid too many obvious choices – though I did put in a few, because let’s be honest, if your “best long songs” list doesn’t include “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree”, yr list is broken.
PART 2: BEAT THE CLOCK
Then someone posted another Far Out link: 15 beautiful songs under two minutes.
And, well, you know. It's a decent list, and the emphasis is on “beautiful”. But I just think if yr going to do a list of short songs, there should be some Minutemen on it. To say nothing of Melt-Banana.
And so:
This one was fun, not least because I’ve been interested in the art of the short song ever since I read an article where Brian Eno talked about how he was contracted by Microsoft to create the opening chime for Windows 95. He became obsessed with the challenge of creating a complete fully realized music piece that conveys everything you want it to convey in the shortest possible time. Eno speaks:
I’d have included it if it was on the Spotifys.
METHODOLOGY: Like with the Go Long playlist, I left off all the songs on the Far Out list, although the only one I would have used is the Tom Waits song. I also made an effort to not rely too much on 80s hardcore punk, which was often super-short by design and could easily have taken up the entire list.
DISCLAIMER: Neither of these playlists are meant to be “Best Of” lists. There may be far better songs out there I don’t know about. I just picked songs I like.
Take your time,
This is dF
Recently in one of the music groups I frequent on the Facebooks, someone posted a link to this article from Far Out magazine listing the Top 10 best songs over 9 minutes in length.
I admit I have issues with Far Out – they do some good stuff, and then they do either tabloidy music legends (i.e. The Time Bob Dylan Insulted John Lennon To His Face, or something along those lines) or music lists like this that tend to be written entirely from the perspective of someone who listed five songs they could think of that they like and then Googled the rest. Or so it seems to me.
And fair enough – “best songs” music lists are always subjective, and they don’t need to be authoritative or comprehensive. And a few of the “Top 10 best songs over 9 minutes” that Far Out selected are ones I might have picked myself. But it just seemed like there were a lot of gaps in this one that occurred to me right away. And of course the obvious course action in situations like this is to make yr own damn list if you think you're so smart.
And so I did.
METHODOLOGY: As the point was to fill in gaps, I opted to leave off all the songs on the Far Out list. I also opted to limit it to 20 songs because it’s already 4.5 hours long as it is.
Which of course means my own list has plenty of gaps in it – no Yes, no Crimson, no Tull, etc. Which is fair. But I was also trying to avoid too many obvious choices – though I did put in a few, because let’s be honest, if your “best long songs” list doesn’t include “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree”, yr list is broken.
PART 2: BEAT THE CLOCK
Then someone posted another Far Out link: 15 beautiful songs under two minutes.
And, well, you know. It's a decent list, and the emphasis is on “beautiful”. But I just think if yr going to do a list of short songs, there should be some Minutemen on it. To say nothing of Melt-Banana.
And so:
This one was fun, not least because I’ve been interested in the art of the short song ever since I read an article where Brian Eno talked about how he was contracted by Microsoft to create the opening chime for Windows 95. He became obsessed with the challenge of creating a complete fully realized music piece that conveys everything you want it to convey in the shortest possible time. Eno speaks:
“The thing from the agency said, ‘We want a piece of music that is inspiring, universal, blah-blah, da-da-da, optimistic, futuristic, sentimental, emotional,’ this whole list of adjectives, and then at the bottom it said ‘and it must be 3.25 seconds long.’
I’d have included it if it was on the Spotifys.
METHODOLOGY: Like with the Go Long playlist, I left off all the songs on the Far Out list, although the only one I would have used is the Tom Waits song. I also made an effort to not rely too much on 80s hardcore punk, which was often super-short by design and could easily have taken up the entire list.
DISCLAIMER: Neither of these playlists are meant to be “Best Of” lists. There may be far better songs out there I don’t know about. I just picked songs I like.
Take your time,
This is dF
