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Song Title Recognition


n8cJohn

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Our bass player printed out our set list for this weekend's show and passed it around to 5 co-workers of various middle ages (40s and 50s) - and asked them to mark which songs they were familiar with just based upon the song title and artist name. The results were pretty interesting. Here is a pic of the marked up list:

SetlistSurvey.jpg

As you can see (I hope) - one guy used a green dot, one person used a red star, one person jused a red dash, one person used a red circle and one person used a black check mark.

I never would have guessed that a person of near my age exists in this country who never heard of American Girl - or Saturday Night's Alright. Or that two people dont recognize Ants Marching, or that 3 of them would not know can't find my way home by title/artist, etc.

On the whole list - there are only 5 that all five people knew. And one of those was Dani California.

Interesting, indeed.

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Interesting, but IMO for this to have any bearing on casual bar-going audience knowledge, it would have to be based on auditory data not written.

Put more simpy: lots of people recognize a song to hear it - even one they like - but could not necessarily tell you the artist or title correctly.

Escape - Rupert Holmes
Hair of the Dog - Nazareth
Closer - Nine Inch Nails
Baba O'Reilly - The Who
Space Oddity -David Bowie
River of Dreams - Billy Joel

etc.

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Quote Originally Posted by MikeyParent View Post

Put more simpy: lots of people recognize a song to hear it - even one they like - but could not necessarily tell you the artist or title correctly.

Escape - Rupert Holmes
Hair of the Dog - Nazareth
Closer - Nine Inch Nails
Baba O'Reilly - The Who
Space Oddity -David Bowie
River of Dreams - Billy Joel

etc.

You mean:

Do You Like Pina Coladas- Rupert Holmes
Son Of A Bitch - Nazareth
I wanna **** you like an animal - Nine Inch Nails
Teenage Wasteland - The Who
Major Tom -David Bowie
In The Middle of The Night - Billy Joel


My favorite is:

Small Town Girl- Journey

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Quote Originally Posted by MikeyParent View Post
Interesting, but IMO for this to have any bearing on casual bar-going audience knowledge, it would have to be based on auditory data not written.

Put more simpy: lots of people recognize a song to hear it - even one they like - but could not necessarily tell you the artist or title correctly.
Damn good point! Hell - it's not just the audience. I've been surprised on a number of occasions to discover that the names of tunes in my repertoire weren't the exact title of the song.
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We were playing some Merle Haggard songs and some guy requested "that prison song."

We knew the music and lyrics but couldn't remember the name.

Lucky most bars these days have a fancy internet juke box that makes it easy to figure out song names.

The best part is looking up artist catalogs and song names is free!

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Quote Originally Posted by jeff42 View Post
You mean:

Do You Like Pina Coladas- Rupert Holmes
Son Of A Bitch - Nazareth
I wanna **** you like an animal - Nine Inch Nails
Teenage Wasteland - The Who
Major Tom -David Bowie
In The Middle of The Night - Billy Joel


My favorite is:

Small Town Girl- Journey

icon_lol.gif
Nailed it!
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Quote Originally Posted by toddkuen View Post
We were playing some Merle Haggard songs and some guy requested "that prison song."

We knew the music and lyrics but couldn't remember the name...
Maybe "Sing Me Back Home" or "Mama Tried"?

jamieb
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Quote Originally Posted by MikeyParent View Post
Interesting, but IMO for this to have any bearing on casual bar-going audience knowledge, it would have to be based on auditory data not written.

Put more simpy: lots of people recognize a song to hear it - even one they like - but could not necessarily tell you the artist or title correctly.

Escape - Rupert Holmes
Hair of the Dog - Nazareth
Closer - Nine Inch Nails
Baba O'Reilly - The Who
Space Oddity -David Bowie
River of Dreams - Billy Joel

etc.
I am a guy who is way more like just a guy off the street than a band guy when it comes to music. I played in bands when i was young for a few years then dropped out and just became a casual music listener where music was just background noise. I typically dont know the names of songs or the artist on tons of hit stuff in the 80s. I dont have a clue about 90s rock. I did listen to modern country as back ground noise. If I see a thirty somthing bands set list , it might not know a single song on the set list. I have been back in a bands for like 5 years now. I know the stuff we play, and most of that is new to me since there is so much texas songwriter stuff on it.

I would guess if you took a person who didnt buy music or was an audio file type ,, they would tell you stuff much like I am saying. I guess for me,, if i wasnt playing it , I didnt pay much attention to music. I even managed to never have played brown eyed girl in a band till a few years ago. Back then we played pretty well all top 40 ,, so if you were between bands when a hit dropped , you might not have played it. seems crazy I know.
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Quote Originally Posted by TIMKEYS View Post
... If I see a thirty something bands set list , it might not know a single song on the set list....
I wouldn't be surprised to see that I'm in the same boat ... not being able to recognize any songs by their titles ... however, dimes to donuts, I've heard the vast majority of the tunes on their list - enough such that I could likely follow the chord changes / and most of the format if I had to sit in and play it with them.

Not knowing the songs is NOT the same things as not knowing the names of songs.
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Quote Originally Posted by SpaceNorman View Post
I wouldn't be surprised to see that I'm in the same boat ... not being able to recognize any songs by their titles ... however, dimes to donuts, I've heard the vast majority of the tunes on their list - enough such that I could likely follow the chord changes / and most of the format if I had to sit in and play it with them.

Not knowing the songs is NOT the same things as not knowing the names of songs.
I can typically play most things on the fly if its just a matter of getting the chord progression. Lots of the modern stuff requires a good deal of programming to get the synth sounds. To be honest I still dont listen to much music other than stuff by artists we cover. So that hasnt changed over the years.
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Quote Originally Posted by TIMKEYS

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I can typically play most things on the fly if its just a matter of getting the chord progression. Lots of the modern stuff requires a good deal of programming to get the synth sounds. To be honest I still dont listen to much music other than stuff by artists we cover. So that hasnt changed over the years.

 

I feel like you missed my point. Even though I don't listen the most the material that typically comprises the playlists from a band of thirty somethings - I don't live in a vacuum. Whether it was playing on the juke box at the sports bar I frequent after playing hockey, on the radio in the background at the party store or the doctor's office, on the car radio when we took my kid's truck to run an errand, etc. - chances are good that I've heard most of that material somewhere along the way. I couldn't tell you the name of the song - are the artist that performed it - but, damn, I know I've heard that tune before. Even if I don't know the tune - most of 'em are at least familiar to me - and familiar is usually good enough.
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