a verse without a chorus
Kip Williams
the heck. It's only Usenet!
A few short years ago,
I can still remember how the music
Used to make me wince.
And I swore, if I had the tools,
I'd disable all those fools
And maybe we'd have quiet ever since.
But February finally did it
The soulless music zombie bit it
Next stop, Chap. 11!
'Twas elevator heaven.
I'm pretty sure that I grinned wide,
And may have even swelled with pride
As I said something apt and snide
The day the Muzak died.
http://preview.tinyurl.com/muzak-bankruptcy
Kip W
Lee Gold
So farewell
To the music from Hell.
P.F. Bruns
All those cheesy rearrangements we remember too well
Turned waiting rooms to penitentiary cells
With violins and tubular bells
Violins and tubular bells
And oh, how my skin did creep
When "Dirty deeds and they're done dirt cheap"
Played out instrumentally
I've always liked the clarinet
But there's no composition yet
That can make it play AC/DC
When I heard it I had just a hunch
That it might just make me lose my lunch
Had to leave the restaurant
Whole new world of "Do not want"
And so it's true I celebrate
That rotten music's final fate
Silence never felt so great
The day the Muzak� died
We started humming...
[next?]
Karen Rodgers
So bye, bye, those arrangements awry
No more sappy strings playing Miss American Pie
Those good old songs ....
Karen R.
Sean Cleary
At a workplace, I put wide transparent tape over the speaker.
Peace, but got removed: not good as no alarm messages possible
or so said management. I felt that in a general emergency I would
notice
For your chorus, expected that the tune was
American Pie,
Bye, Bye, Tuneless and deride
Drove something nasty and sharp
right through my insides
Saying Rather this than hear that da-died
My effort Needs too much improvement
So what do you not like about elevator music?
Old protest songs minus the words set to amuse people who do not know
what they were about?
Sharp songs mellowed to death? Made too cute?
No place to think?
Forced earworms?
Tell me and maybe someone can help with the chorus.
Sean
Kip Williams
> So what do you not like about elevator music?
> Old protest songs minus the words set to amuse people who do not know
> what they were about?
> Sharp songs mellowed to death? Made too cute?
> No place to think?
> Forced earworms?
> Tell me and maybe someone can help with the chorus.
I disliked the compulsory nature of the listening experience.
I disliked the toothlessness of the arrangements -- vocals and solo
instruments replaced by choirs of zombie strings and just plain zombies.
It's possible I might have liked some of the individual pieces without
the context of wall-to-wall ubiquity. I got a phone call in the 80s from
a soft-rock station that was starting off, and explained to the caller
that even though I probably liked many of the individual songs, I
couldn't take nothing but soft pieces, one after the other. One of the
things I like about classical music is that it gets louder and softer,
faster and slower, builds to a climax, and all that.
I also bristled over the manipulative programming. Wake-up music in the
morning, go-to-work music in drive time, eat-food music at lunch.
Everything designed for maximum egg laying. I mean, worker productivity.
Even the lack of announcer was an annoyance. Any time I heard something
I liked, there was no way I could ever find out who played it or what it
was.
So: faceless, controlling, watered-down, conformist pablum. That's a
start, anyway.
Kip W
Kip Williams
I like the direction Lee and P.F. were going in, but your outright call
out to Don McLean's original seems worthy of inclusion as well. Some
good stuff today!
Kip W
Karen Rodgers
<n...@a.valid.address.for.newsgroups> wrote:
>So bye, bye, those arrangements awry
>No more sappy strings playing Miss American Pie
>Those good old songs ....
that were mangled and fried
I'm glad to say that Musak has died!
I KNEW the rest was in there.
Karen R.
Karen Rodgers
I wish I'd gotten the whole chorus at once. But thank you.
Karen R.
Joe Kesselman
> I also bristled over the manipulative programming. Wake-up music in the
> morning, go-to-work music in drive time, eat-food music at lunch.
> Everything designed for maximum egg laying. I mean, worker productivity.
Mood management and background-conversation masking is precisely what
Muzak was selling. If you were paying attention to it, it was either
installed improperly or used improperly.
Your mistake was in thinking that it was music.
Paul Rubin
> Mood management and background-conversation masking is precisely what
> Muzak was selling. If you were paying attention to it, it was either
> installed improperly or used improperly.
I have heard that if you called Muzak and made a comment on any of
their recordings, they took it off their playlist regardless of
whether your comment was favorable or unfavorable. That you noticed
it at all meant that it wasn't doing its job.fnord
Joe Kesselman
of what the folks at Muzak claimed their service provided.
msminlr
office that was located in a large bank building.
The elevators played Muzak, and there was a placard warning that
conversations in the elevator *were* monitored.
So if the Muzak served up a tune that I knew the filk lyrics to, I'd
sing them.
Meantime, I'm printing out this whole thread, and will assemble the
various sections into a lyric-and-chords sheet, and try it out at the
local coffeehouse open-mic once I get up to speed on the chords
[again...I had them a couple of years back, but haven't played that
parody in quite a while].
Margaret
On Jul 3, 9:47 pm, Joe Kesselman <keshlam.cat.nos...@verizon.net>
wrote:
Kip Williams
I took a cab upstairs last week
And all I could hear was people speak
No speaker soiled the human sound.
So I rode up to the fourteenth floor
Where Mantovani'd made me snore
And I heard music, news, and chatter all around.
In cubicles, small speakers played,
A hundred one decisions made,
The workers made their choices;
A score of different voices.
The HR guy, a friend of mine
Said productivity was fine.
It saved dough for the bottom line
The day the Muzak died.
So bye, bye, those arrangements awry
No more sappy strings a-playin' Miss American Pie
Those good old songs that they mangled and fried
Yes, I'm glad to say that Musak has died!
(Lee/PF chorus would be used earlier; this one has a good sound for the
finale. Small metric changes in Karen's version are suggestions by me
and can be overruled by others. Still room for some middle verses.)
Kip W
Karen Rodgers
<k...@rochester.rr.com> wrote:
>So bye, bye, those arrangements awry
>No more sappy strings a-playin' Miss American Pie
>Those good old songs that they mangled and fried
>Yes, I'm glad to say that Musak has died!
>
>(Lee/PF chorus would be used earlier; this one has a good sound for the
>finale. Small metric changes in Karen's version are suggestions by me
>and can be overruled by others. Still room for some middle verses.)
Works for me, that's much better.
Karen R.
Kay Shapero
says...
>
> I also bristled over the manipulative programming. Wake-up music in the
> morning, go-to-work music in drive time, eat-food music at lunch.
> Everything designed for maximum egg laying. I mean, worker productivity.
>
> Even the lack of announcer was an annoyance. Any time I heard something
> I liked, there was no way I could ever find out who played it or what it
> was.
>
> So: faceless, controlling, watered-down, conformist pablum. That's a
> start, anyway.
>
Once upon a time when I worked in a place with Muzak, I considered
sneaking in a tape or two of Spike Jones but, alas, never worked up the
nerve to locate the player.
--
Kay Shapero
FAQ: http://www.kayshapero.net/filkfaq.htm
address munged, email me at kay at domain name
http://www.kayshapero.net
Kay Shapero
37g2000yqp.googlegroups.com>, msm...@gmail.com says...
> In one of my past jobs, I got sent to run errands to an engineering
> office that was located in a large bank building.
> The elevators played Muzak, and there was a placard warning that
> conversations in the elevator *were* monitored.
> So if the Muzak served up a tune that I knew the filk lyrics to, I'd
> sing them.
Applause!
Sean Cleary
Oh Wow!
Sean
John from Detroit
Ah but there are some funny stories about MUZAK pirates.... And how they
got caught -- ..- --.. .a -.-
Oh, newsreader update.. No joy on Eternal-September... Way too slow
Using AIOE at the moment to read the NG's. Seems ok. and I'm able to
post though there is an issue with retaining sent messages (Something I
wish not to do anyway)
John from Detroit
>> I liked, there was no way I could ever find out who played it or what it
>> was.
There is a service where you hold up your call phone, call a number and
the computer on the other end identifies the music... Or so they claim
never used it... Supposed to be good enough that if you hum a few bars
it will ID it.
Sean Cleary
> > In article <WKu3m.3508$3o6....@newsfe24.iad>, k...@rochester.rr.com
Not all elevator music is MUSAK. Some is local radio stations sending
a special line to the customer.
Sean
