Disc 01 / 48

There has been a Timothology of one kind or another since 1996. I used to make literal mixtapes as a hobby and eventually decided to do the complete history of pop and rock music in America, but out of order because I didn't want to get stuck with strict chronology. The 1996 and 1998 Timothologies were both on tape, but I no longer have the masters or copies; they're gone to the ages. I bought my first CD burner in 2000 and had to manually set the levels for each song as well as manually start and stop the recordings for each track. It took about two and a half hours to burn a 74 minute disc with the equipment I had, and copying the discs took place in real time (an hour and change for a 70 minute disc).  Since then I've bought different CD burners and duplicators and now just use the burner in my desktop PC to copy a 77- minute disc in under five minutes or so.

As the technology made it easier to copy discs, the Timothology grew from an 18-disc set in 2000 to a 24-disc set in 2002 to a 32-disc set in 2005 and a 48-disc set in 2013 (which I started making master playlists for in 2010). The 2002, 2005 and 2013 set sizes were chosen because there were CD wallets that would hold that many discs. The next size up is 64. If there are still music CD-Rs in 2022 that's apparently what I'll be doing for the next iteration of the Timothology. My hobby has gone from being beyond the cutting edge to just a thing lots of people did to retro while my methods remained largely unchanged. This amuses me.

The current set is called Timothology:  Strange Aeons, a nod to Lovecraft as well as the realization that I've been making mixtapes for more than twenty years (and people who have the older versions can chart my changing musical tastes from set to set). Some of the discs have themes; some are just a lot of songs stuck together because I liked the order they were in.

The first disc is my overture; like every version of the Timothology going back to 1996 it starts with the Joe Meek composition "Telstar", a song I will never actually shut up about. The rest of the playlist is a selection of songs I place in the top 1% of pop and rock--there are a lot of songs as good as this stuff, but nothing better. And as a second theme, these are all songs that I tend to sing along with in the car. My apologies to all travel companions who tried to have an actual conversation with me when I started singing along with Bo Diddley out of nowhere.

Timothology:  Strange Aeons Disc 01 / 48
Theme:  Return to the Project and Overture
Label phrase:  "Here is another bunch of music."

01)  Telstar / The Tornados
02)  Johnny On Top / The New Math (Jet Black Berries)
03)  Shombalor / Sheriff and the Revels
04)  Sheena is a Punk Rocker (ABC single version) / The Ramones
05)  I'll Be Mellow When I'm Dead / "Weird Al" Yankovic
06)  Wait a Minute / Tim Tam and the Turnons
07)  True Confessions / Tonio K.
08)  Make a Circuit With Me / The Polecats
09)  Career Opportunities / The Clash
10)  Brontosaurus Stomp / The Piltdown Men
11)  Wig-Wam Bam / The Sweet
12)  My Sweet Love / John Mellencamp
13)  Total Eclipse of the Heart / Hurra Torpedo
14)  Oh L'Amour / Erasure
15)  Vultan's Theme (Attack of the Hawkmen) / Queen
16)  Love Missile F1-11 / Sigue Sigue Sputnik
17)  Song Away / Hockey
18)  She Drives Me Crazy / Fine Young Cannibals
19)  Pills / Bo Diddley
20)  Riot Squad / Cock Sparrer
21)  AKA Driver / They Might Be Giants
22)  Radio Nowhere (album version) / Bruce Springsteen
23)  Devil's Right Hand / Johnny Cash
24)  Pizza Pie / Norman Fox and the Rob Roys with Sid Bass and His Orchestra
25)  Jilted John / Jilted John
26)  Story of My Life / Social Distortion