Hingehead's music collection

Ridiculous Fact No.2

Dateline 20080319 - the most common song length is 3 minutes and 40 seconds.

NB not all songs catalogued have data in song length field.

Go on.......

Well, as you asked so nicely:

Ridiculous factoid No.3

Dateline 20080320 - The most prolific sole commercial publishers of songs in the collection are:

Mushroom with 648 songs
EMI with 543
Warner Chappell 468
Rondor 387

Ridiculous Fact No.4

Dateline 20080320 - The oldest recording in the collection is:
Indianola by Wilbur C. Sweatman's Original Jazz Band
Written by S.R. Henry/D. Onivas
Players:
Wilbur Sweatman - Clarinet/Director
William Hicks - Trumpet
Major Jackson - Trombone
Dan Parish - Piano
Henry Bowser - Drums

Recorded in New York City 25 June 1918

Columbia single #A-2611

More about Wilbur

Yes, please go on.

Ridiculous Fact No.5

Dateline 20080320 - The shortest track is 3 seconds:

First inaugural address to the I.A.C.E. Sherborne House 1979 by Robert Fripp

fasquinating....quiet time, is it?

Not really - all done with preset sql queries I wrote ages ago - I just click and it tells me.

Mushroom is no 1.
That's interesting.
You must be an Oz music expert, hinge.

Actually, as fond as I am of oz music, I suspect that Mushroom handles publishing for the multinationals if the recording is pressed locally.

I'm still trying to understand what exactly publishing means.

Just goes to show how little I know, doesn't it?


Now please continue .......

Ridiculous Fact No.6

Dateline 20080325 - The most common song titles are:

Home 11 different songs with this title
Heaven 10 different songs with this title
Stay 10 different songs with this title
You 8 different songs with this title
Angel 8 different songs with this title
Surrender 8 different songs with this title

For the most covered song you'll have to wait for the next ridiculous fact

Not a long wait

Ridiculous fact no.7

Dateline 20080325 - the most covered song is Summertime (Gershwin/Heyward) covered by:

Tori Amos
Sidney Bechet
Big Brother and the Holding Company
Art Blakey Quartet
John Coltrane
Sam Cooke
Miles Davis
Fun Boy Three
Shelly Manne and his Men
Billy Stewart
Sarah Vaughan
Gene Vincent and his Blue Caps
The Zombies


Actually the most covered is stairway to heaven (I have about 100 versions, just haven't catalogued them all yet). Fever and Stardust also get honorable mentions:

Fever

Norma Benguell
Sam Butera
Patti Drew
Little Willie John
Peggy Lee
Richard Marino and his Orchestra
Suzi Quatro
Helen Shapiro

Stardust
Louis Armstrong
Nat King Cole
Bing Crosby
Duke Ellington
Glenn Miller
Artie Shaw
Frank Sinatra
Marjorie Stedeford with The Six Swingers
Ben Webster

What? No Robeson? No Sublime?

Do you take requests?

How many with the word "Blue"?

I do now!

458 with the character string 'blue' (which includes blues, blueberry, redblue etc)
199 with the word blue, ranging from 'Adonis blue' by Voice of the Beehive to 'Yellow and blue' by Ice Cream Hands

Sorry about Robeson and Sublime.... eclectic doesn't mean completist...

Ridiculous fact no.7

Dateline 20080326 - The years with the most recordings in each decade are:


2005 677
1991 879
1983 886
1979 1034
1967 498
1959 275
1942 39
1939 35
1929 25
1918 1

Too Much Heaven -- Bee Gees???

Yep, it's in there - but just as a track off a compilation.

1979 - my last year of high school and new wave exploding out of the remnants of punk.

A roll call:
Debuts:
B-52s
Pat Benatar
The Cure
Fischer Z
Gang Of Four
The Go-Betweens
Human League
Jimmy and The Boys
Joe Jackson (two albums)
Lene Lovich
Kirsty MacColl
Madness
Mental As Anything
Mi-sex
The Motels
Gary Numan
The Pretenders
The Specials
UK Squeeze (cool for cats)
Sugar Hill Gang (rappers delight - rap gets chart action)

Back from the dead:
Jo Jo Zep and the Falcons
Marianne Faithful - Broken English
Roxy Music - Manifesto
Sparks - No 1 song in heaven
Split Enz - True Colours
Kenny Rogers - The Gambler

Last salutes:
The Eagles - The Long Run (well until hell froze over anyway)
Led Zepellin - In Through The Out Door
Pink Floyd - The Wall (well the next album was arguably a Roger Waters solo album and after that he left)
David Bowie - The Lodger (the last of the Berlin trio with Eno - after that he got off the drugs, went to the gym and lost any sense of pushing the boundaries)


Tracks that still haunt us:
I will survive - Gloria Gaynor
The Pina Colada song - Rupert Holmes
I was made for loving you - Kiss
My Sharona - The Knack
Pop Muzik - M
Echo beach - Martha and the Muffins
The Rose - Bette Midler
The devil went down to Georgia Charlie Daniels Band
I don't like Mondays The Boomtown Rats

More one hit thudders
We belong to the night Ellen Foley
Sunburn Graham Gouldman
Born to be alive Patrick Hernandez
You can't change that Raydio
Knock on wood Amii Stewart
Stay with me till dawn Judie Tzuke (OK, I actually quite like the percussion production on this one)
Just when I needed you most Randy Vanwarmer
Get used to it Roger Voudouris
Halfway hotel Voyager
Ring my bell Anita Ward


Other Notables
Blondie's Eat To The Beat
Robert Fripp's Exposure (I bought one of the only 17 copies sold in Australia that year apparently)
Godley and Creme's Freeze Frame
The Clash release London Calling
Midnight Oil, The Cars, Devo, Cold Chisel and the Police released their second albums
XTC's Drums and Wires
Neil Young's Rust Never Sleeps
Frank Zappa's Sheik Yer Bouti and the Joes Garage Trilogy

Other non-music notables:
The original Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, a radio play
Life Of Brian