Most of the time, I fall in love with music for the obvious reason: how it sounds. But there are millions of songs out there and only limited time to listen, so you need to filter somehow. Blogs, recommendations, etc. are one way, but sometimes there’s nothing so reasonable behind it. Today, I wanted to talk about some songs I encountered in slightly less conventional ways, but which I’ve grown to love.
First, names: of the band, the album, or the song…sometimes it’s just so clever that you can’t help but give it a shot (any reference to Antarctica or robots is certain to win me over, and I don’t even need to go over how I fell in love with “You Are the Generation That Bought More Shoes and You Get What You Deserve”). It doesn’t always work out (I bought a record called Zombies! Aliens! Vampires! Dinosaurs! last winter and only upon actually listening did I discover the monstrosity of sappy emo-faux-punk that I had exposed myself to), but it’s a surprisingly accurate way to find new stuff I’ll enjoy. Perhaps because anyone with a mind capable of coming up with a quirky title that I love is probably well-enough tapped into my wavelength to make music I like, too.
A great example is this one, the reason I first listened to Beulah, and is still my favorite song by them:
If We Can Land a Man on the Moon, Surely I Can Win Your Heart – Beulah
It also features another thing virtually certain to win me over: a classical instrumental interlude. Maybe it’s just because I loved it when The Beatles did it, but I really am almost powerless in the face of such things.
Second, great pictures. I read a fair number of blogs, and kept running into people talking about Blair and, without exception, using this picture:
The rainbow of paint on her arm, the colors on the canvas, the Mona Lisa smile…it drew me in completely. And then you find out that she actually has a song called Mona Lisa, and there’s just no chance of resisting.
Mona Lisa – Blair
Third, geeky sci-fi references. There is just no way I could not love a song about wanting to have sex with Jean-Luc Picard. I mean, seriously.
Jean-Luc Picard – Sexy Finger Champs
Picard is clearly the best Star Trek captain, by the way, but I’ll take Mal Reynolds over any of ’em.