Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Disc 26 / 48

Not really a lot to say about this one other than that it's a theme disc that is almost exclusively pop and rock with almost no intrusions from other genres. It's almost certainly the whitest disc out of the whole 48 CD set. The instrumentals (other than the obligatory "Telstar" cover) are a song where a manual typewriter is used as a percussion instrument, one where someone chants the NASA acronym for a space walk and the Kinks leaving the vocals out of a song where they'd be spelling L-O-L-A Lola a bunch.

The Tonio K. track is supposedly the first song containing the word "motherfucker" to play uncensored on American radio; there's also an AK-47 firing live ammo as part of the percussion during the big finish of that song.

Timothology:  Strange Aeons Disc 26 / 48
Theme:  Songs where they spell out words (or just yell letters)
Label phrase:  "Boston cream pie is really more of a cake."

01)  A / The Billy Nayer Show with Gregory Russell Cook
02)  Vacation / Connie Francis
03)  Something On Your Mind / Hilly Michaels
04)  Saturday Night / The Bay City Rollers
05)  Pinhead / The Ramones
06)  I'm Henry VIII, I Am / Herman's Hermits
07)  R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A. / John Mellencamp
08)  Washington, D. C. / The Magnetic Fields
09)  T.C.B. or T.Y.A. / Bobby Patterson
10)  The Typewriter / Leroy Anderson
11)  Cadillac / Bo Diddley
12)  Hell / The Squirrel Nut Zippers
13)  Jocko Homo / Devo
14)  Lola (Instrumental) / The Kinks
15)  S-E-X-X-Y / They Might Be Giants
16)  Girl Friend / Jonathan Richman
17)  Maker of Smooth Music / Dick Kent
18)  Rock, Calypso Joe! / The Treniers
19)  Dig / Nervous Norvus
20)  E.V.A. / Jean Jacques Perry
21)  The Safety Dance (extended version) / Men Without Hats
22)  Dammit Janet / Barry Bostwick and Susan Sarandon
23)  Johnny Loves Me / Glenda Collins
24)  Ugly / Fishbone
25)  H-A-T-R-E-D / Tonio K.
26)  Telstar / Evan Johns and His H-Bombs
27)  Monkey Vs. Robot / James Kochalka Superstar
28)  Ramones / Motorhead

Disc 25 / 48

Two things led to this themed disc:  First, I love me some one hit wonders. Bands that only hit the chart one time (deserved or not) have a special place in my heart. I could have stuck "867-5309" on here just as easily as anything else on the disc. Second, my mother always complains that she doesn't recognize any of the songs on the Timothology when she listens to them. So it seemed obvious to make a disc full of songs that are hugely recognizable from bands that people who aren't musical superobsessives might have heard of. Or, to put it another way, this is the best hour and eighteen minutes you'll never hear on the radio.

Timothology:  Strange Aeons Disc 25 / 48
Theme:  If you know one song by these bands / artists, it's on here.
Label phrase:  "Even the mild is extra hot."

01)  I Walk the Line / Johnny Cash
02)  Beat It / Michael Jackson
03)  Talk Dirty to Me / Poison
04)  Love Train / The O'Jays
05)  Peggy Sue / Buddy Holly
06)  Blitzkrieg Bop / The Ramones
07)  Telstar / The Ventures
08)  I Love Rock N' Roll / Joan Jett and the Blackhearts
09)  Mr. Big Stuff / Jean Knight
10)  Tubthumping / Chumbawamba
11)  All Day and All of the Night / The Kinks
12)  Bo Diddley / Bo Diddley
13)  Down on the Corner / Creedence Clearwater Revival
14)  Girls Just Want to Have Fun / Cyndi Lauper
15)  Have I the Right / The Honeycombs
16)  Jack and Diane / John Mellencamp
17)  Summertime Blues / Eddie Cochran
18)  Wipe Out / The Surfaris
19)  Hey Ya! / Outkast
20)  The Reflex / Duran Duran
21)  Hound Dog / Elvis Presley
22)  Da Doo Ron Ron / The Crystals
23)  Istanbul (Not Constantinople) / They Might Be Giants
24)  Blue Moon / The Marcels
25)  Surrender / Cheap Trick
26)  Frankenstein / The Edgar Winter Group

Sunday, August 4, 2013

Disc 24 / 48

I've gone to B Fest, a 24 hour long bad movie marathon, every year since 2001. Since 2002, with one exception, I've made a mix disc of B movie songs to hand out at the event as well (usually free, sometimes not when I can't afford to give away a $300 project to people who want a CD). People have actually asked me to sign their giveaway discs in the past, and as far as I can tell they weren't being ironic about their desire to have an autographed Fest disc.

This is the culmination of the Fest mixes; songs about movie monsters, space travelers, kung fu superstars, sea monsters, movie-going itself (and home video), as well as two unconventional magic users--or three, if you count Vladek Sheybal's uber-fey take on the Antichrist. The theme was used for disc 24 because film is projected at 24 frames a second. It's also the halfway point of the Timothology itself.

Johnny Cash apparently wrote and recorded a theme for the film Thunderball without being contacted by the movie studio to do that. It's really too bad they didn't use it. I think it's a lot better than the Tom Jones theme we got (which was supposedly written in 20 minutes because the producers did not like the song "Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" that Jones was going to record. They rejected it because it didn't have the movie's title in it). Which is not to bag on Tom Jones, but even great pop singers can use more than 20 minutes' practice before laying down a track.

Timothology:  Strange Aeons Disc 24 / 48
Theme:  Songs about B movies and other related interests
Label phrase:  "A tiny net is a death sentence."

01)  Drive In Movie / The Cheepskates
02)  Star Wars / Big Daddy
03)  Hey Boy / The Billy Nayer Show
04)  Godzilla / Blue Oyster Cult
05)  Mothra's Song / The Peanuts
06)  The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins / Leonard Nimoy
07)  Book of the Dead (2003) / The Staggers
08)  The Imperial March (Darth Vader's Theme) / The Evil Genius Orchestra
09)  They Walk Among You / Jet Black Berries
10)  Kung Fu / Ash
11)  Theme from Spectreman / Artist not credited
12)  Thunderball / Johnny Cash
13)  Creature From the Black Lagoon / Dave Edmunds
14)  The Innsmouth Look / Darkest of the Hillside Thickets
15)  The Horror of Party Beach / Sloppy Seconds
16)  Let's All Go to the Lobby / Filmack Studios
17)  Mothra / Those Darn Accordions!
18)  Silver John / Joe Bethancourt
19)  The Purple People Eater / Sheb Wooley
20)  Green Slime / The Green Slime
21)  Nasty / The Damned
22)  Surf Trek / The Rubinoos
23)  Secret Agent Man / The Dickies
24)  She's Fallen In Love with the Monsterman / Screaming Lord Sutch and the Savages
25)  Monkey Hustle / Jack Conrad
26)  You're My Rose / Kitra Williams and Reflection
27)  Telstar / Venus Gang
28)  (I Know How to Be) A Master / Vladek Sheybal
29)  I am the Wizard of Speed and Time / Mike Jittlov
30)  Saturday Night at the Movies / The Drifters

Disc 23 / 48

For the 2005 Timothology, I was lucky enough to be using a CD burner that didn't have to be manually started or stopped for each track. It did record in 1:1 time instead of 12:1 like the burner on my PC, so the discs still took a lot of time to record and they had to be done in a single session and then finalized (iTunes makes it orders of magnitude easier to make a mix disc). This meant it'd be at least 80 minutes to record an 80 minute CD and I couldn't shuffle the tracks around easily without lots of scratched-out entries in a spiral notebook.

The day that John Kerry conceded the Presidential election to George W. Bush I burned a disc full of depressing songs because I knew how much of a disaster his second term would be (by paying attention to journalism about Dubya's life and career before he became a politician and by paying attention during his first term). The idea was too good not to reuse, especially because there's some great miserable pop songs out there. And this at least quarantines them all on one disc so they can't get out into the general population and make people feel sad in the middle of a different disc.

Special thanks to my friend Sean, who said "Why don't you just end the disc with "Deteriorata" and then offer people a bottle of sleeping pills?" when we were talking about the 2005 'Thology. I got one of those things accomplished on this disc.

Timothology:  Strange Aeons Disc 23 / 48
Theme:  Musical melancholia
Label phrase:  "A BLOO BLA BLOO BLOO BLOOOO!"

01)  The World is a Monster / Rocky Porter
02)  Tulips on the Table / Dan Reeder
03)  Nobody Waved Goodbye / The Cryin' Shames
04)  Fallout Shelter / Billy Chambers
05)  Dirty Old Town / The Pogues
06)  Case 795 (The Family) / John Mellencamp
07)  The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore / The Walker Brothers
08)  I Was a Teenage Atomic Zombie / The Spider Bombs
09)  Cause / Rodriguez
10)  The Cave / Johnny Paycheck
11)  Harlem Nocturne / The Viscounts
12)  Tears on My Pillow / The Imperials
13)  Town Without Pity / Gene Pitney
14)  Pouring Water on a Drowning Man / James Carr
15)  Better Late Than Never / Tonio K.
16)  Telstar / Thurston Moore and Don Fleming
17)  Raining in My Heart / Buddy Holly
18)  I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry / Johnny Cash
19)  Center of Asia / Paul Pena
20)  Ghost Riders (In the Sky) / The Ramrods
21)  The First Cut is the Deepest / The Koobas
22)  I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive / Hank Williams
23)  You Can't Put Your Arms Around a Memory / Johnny Thunders
24)  Better Off Dead / Bill Withers
25)  Deteriorata / National Lampoon

Disc 22 / 48

Typing this one up, I think I missed an opportunity to do a disc where all the songs had parentheses in their titles. I see four that wound up on here pretty much by accident, and it could have been neat to do that. Some other time, some other Timothology, I guess.

I see I put "Chug-A-Lug" and "Happy Hour" together, too. Possibly "Drinking and Driving" by the Business, Jimmy Gilmer's "Bottle of Wine" and other songs about boozohol could have been another disc theme. I seem to have discovered the secret graveyard of Timothology themes on this one.

Every time I listen to "Fire Brigade" I smile, imagining all the backup singers crowding around a mike to yell WEE OO WEE OO WEE OO WEE OO during the choruses.

Timothology:  Strange Aeons Disc 22 / 48
Theme:  None
Label phrase:  "Too late! Purple beef poisoning!"

01)  A Grand Day Out / Julian Nott
02)  Hey Mr. DJ, I Thought You Said We Had a Deal / They Might Be Giants
03)  Fire Brigade / The Move
04)  Lady of the Night / Henry and the Bleeders
05)  You Can't Sit Down / The Dovells
06)  Twenty Miles From Shore / Hawkshaw Hawkins
07)  The Boy in the Bubble / Paul Simon
08)  Wild Weekend / The Rockin' Rebels
09)  (You're So Square) Baby, I Don't Care / Cee Lo Green
10)  Runner (single version) / Manfred Mann's Earth Band
11)  A Man Size Job / Denise LaSalle
12)  There's Something at the Bottom of the Well / The Moontrekkers
13)  (White Man) in Hammersmith Palais / The Clash
14)  Memphis Soul Stew / King Curtis
15)  Time is On My Side / Irma Thomas and Allen Toussaint
16)  Perfect World (album version) / Tonio K.
17)  Telstar / The Champs
18)  Duke of Earl / Gene Chandler
19)  Baby, It's You / Petty Booka
20)  Opportunities (Let's Make Lots of Money) / The Pet Shop Boys
21)  Dance with the Devil / The Hypnomen
22)  Chug-A-Lug / Roger Miller
23)  Happy Hour / The Housemartins
24)  26 Miles (Santa Catalina) / The Four Preps
25)  Walkin' Down the Line / Bob Dylan
26)  Rumble Seat / John Mellencamp
27)  Ice Cream Man / Jonathan Richman

Friday, August 2, 2013

Disc 21 / 48

One more themeless disc.

When I started doing this project on CD, I was looking for some way to make the labels memorable--the first time I burned a set of Timothology 2000 (which was 24 discs, if I remember right), I played around with the label software and made a red label for disc 1; red fading to orange for 2, orange for 3, and so on with the last couple of discs being purple that then faded to red. It was actually a pretty good concept, but I burned an entire multipack of printer ink learning that the family's shitty old printer made the final result completely terrible. It didn't match the preview versions on the computer and instead of the label being covered with red ink it was striped thanks to the print heads going back and forth on 1/8" lines to color in the whole label.

So I switched to black and white immediately. The label phrases were stuck on to avoid having 80 percent of the label be blank and the tradition has continued until now.

Timothology:  Strange Aeons Disc 21 / 48
Theme:  None
Label phrase:  "Anything can be recycled. You just have to try hard enough."

01)  Everyday of the Week / The Students
02)  Life in the Foodchain / Tonio K.
03)  Old Man Conroy / Grover Kent
04)  Through Being Cool / Devo
05)  Beatnik Fly / Johnny and the Hurricanes
06)  Peg Legged Father / The Billy Nayer Show
07)  Pictures of Matchstick Men / Status Quo
08)  Chick a 'Roo / Ricky Wayne and the Flee-Rakkers
09)  You Really Got Me / The Kinks
10)  Since You Been Gone / Rainbow
11)  Sunset Strip / The Riptides
12)  Crimson and Clover / Joan Jett
13)  Brass Monkey / The Beastie Boys
14)  Wild Night / John Mellencamp
15)  Telstar / Dennis Scott
16)  Barbara Ann / The Beach Boys
17)  Handy Man / Del Shannon
18)  Wig-Wam Bam / The Donnas
19)  Substitute / The Who
20)  Ballroom Blitz / The Sweet
21)  Hocus Pocus / Focus
22)  Let Her Dance / The Spitballs
23)  A Million Miles Away / The Plimsouls
24)  The Salt in My Tears / Martin Briley
25)  Looking for an Echo / The Persuasions
26)  Give Paris One More Chance / Jonathan Richman

Thursday, August 1, 2013

Disc 20 / 48

For some reason I decided to follow up the negativity disc with the questions disc; I think I remember working it out and deciding that questions followed by negativity was more of a bummer than the other way around.

Special thanks to Josh 'BergerJacques' Shepherd from the B Movie Message Board for telling me about Those Darlins. My friends like to tell me about new music just as much as I like spreading the word about interesting bands and songs via this project. I remember asking for help on the "songs with the word fuck in the lyrics" disc and for disc 26 on the BMMB and the obsessive nerds there came through with flying colors. Thanks, guys.

"Happy music for alienated fuckups" is how I've taken to classifying the Timothology. Somehow I forgot to mention that during the previous nineteen posts.

Timothology:  Strange Aeons Disc 20 / 48
Theme:  Musical questions
Label phrase:  "Did you not see the slide punch?"

01)  Book of Love / The Monotones
02)  Who Do You Love / The Woolies
03)  What's New Pussycat? / Tom Jones
04)  What Should I Do? / The Shaggs
05)  What If I Came Knocking / John Mellencamp
06)  Who's Making Love? / The Blues Brothers
07)  Telstar / Barry Cleveland
08)  When Will You Die / They Might Be Giants
09)  Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn't've) / The Buzzcocks
10)  What You Talkin' About? / Paul Pena
11)  What Kind of Fool Do You Think I Am / Bill Deal and the Rhondels
12)  (What's So Funny About) Peace, Love and Understanding / Elvis Costello
13)  Who'll Stop the Rain / Creedence Clearwater Revival
14)  Why Do Fools Fall in Love / Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers
15)  Is There Something I Should Know / Duran Duran
16)  Hab Ich Das Recht / Aud Wilken
17)  Who Put the Bomp (in the Bomp, Bomp, Bomp) / Barry Mann
18)  Who's Gonna Mow Your Grass? / Buck Owens
19)  Just a Dream? / Fred Myrow and Malcolm Seagrave
20)  What is This? / Bobby Womack
21)  Is It Because / The Honeycombs
22)  Who's That Knockin' At My Window? / Those Darlins
23)  Who's That Knocking / The Genies
24)  How Come I Can't See You In My Mirror? / Tonio K.
25)  Who Killed Davey Moore? / Bob Dylan
26)   Do You Love Me? / The Dave Clark Five
27)  When Will I See You Again / The Three Degrees
28)  What Do All the People Know / The Monroes