You Can't Stop the Music!

by Charles Miller on November 5, 2003

I was looking at my iTunes playlist this morning, and realised that I've started getting bored with my music. The problem is that I've got a few hundred songs that I tend to gravitate towards at the expense of the several thousand others.

So, in the interest of novelty, here's the deal:

  • I will play through the 3362 songs on my iPod in alphabetical (well, ASCII) order by song-name, starting with Regurgitator's ! (The Song Formerly Known As), and finishing with Faith No More's Zombie Eaters.
  • I may only use rewind to hear again the song I just listened to, if I happen to really like it.
  • I may only fast-forward to skip songs that are duplicates (I just discovered I have three copies of Filter and The Crystal Method doing (Can't You) Trip Like I Do), or songs I actively dislike.
  • I will resist as best I can the urge to skip songs that I am merely indifferent to, or that don't fit my mood.
  • No other navigation of the playlist is permitted, except to find where I last left off.
  • Exceptions may be made for newly purchased albums with songs that fall in the "already played" part of the playlist.

I should be done in a couple of months. :)

Starting off, it's surprising how many songs start with punctuation: particularly parentheses. I also have four songs starting with double-quotes, and they're all from Philip Glass movie soundtracks (One from Dracula, three from The Hours).

Now Playing 16/3362: (Exchange) by Massive Attack, off Mezzanine.

Aside: I just Googled for Philip Glass, and found this:

The IBM glass engine enables deep navigation of the music of Philip Glass. Personal interests, associations, and impulses guide the listener through an expanding selection of over sixty Glass works.

Funky. Must have a look at it some time.

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