Errors-To: owner-tmbg-digest@tmbg.org Reply-To: tmbg-digest@tmbg.org Sender: owner-tmbg-digest@tmbg.org Precedence: bulk From: owner-tmbg-digest@tmbg.org To: tmbg-digest@tmbg.org Subject: tmbg-list Digest #3-406 tmbg-list Digest, Volume 3, Number 406 Wednesday, 11 February 1998 Today's Topics: RE: TMBG: First impressions TMBG: first song addiction non-TMBG: "bad" words TMBG: FS TMBG: TMBG - precious and few TMBG:Maybe we'll never know Re: TMBG: First impressions TMBG: TMBG and NON- (list junk & song refs) Re: TMBG: First impressions Re: TMBG:Maybe we'll never know Re: TMBG: First impressions Re: TMBG: First impressions Re: TMBG: First impressions Re: TMBG: First impressions Re: TMBG: First impressions Re: TMBG: First impressions TMBG: First impressions Re: TMBG: In the presence of greatness Administrivia: If you wish to unsubscribe from this mailing send mail to tmbg-digest-request@tmbg.org for instructions on how to be automatically removed. --------------------------------------------------------------------- The views expressed herein are those of the individual authors. --------------------------------------------------------------------- tmbg-list is digested with Digest 3.3d (John Relph ). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message-ID: <01BD35BB.CADD5020@s116b.rcn.nmt.edu> From: Nick Wolf Subject: RE: TMBG: First impressions Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 00:35:26 -0700 Halleluja...material to work with. Granted, this has probably bounced around this list millions of times over, but I've never seen it so I'll send it around again. What song was it that got you hooked on Them? For me, as with a lot of you, I suspect, it was a mixture of Purple Toupee (For which I suffer withdrawals if I don't hear it enough), and Birdhouse in Your Soul. What about for the rest of you? Refund (Who posts this apology for being an @$$ a while back: I'm sorry) -----Original Message----- From: MatFoley99@aol.com [SMTP:MatFoley99@aol.com] Sent: Monday, February 09, 1998 8:09 PM To: tmbg-list@tmbg.org Subject: Re: TMBG: First impressions Howdy! I just got on this list recently, and so this is my first chance to make a comment. Unfortuantely, I live in Gainesville, Florida, and haven't gotten the chance to see the Johns live yet. Well, getting on to the "First Impressions" part, a friend of mine got me started on the Giants almost a year ago, and after a lot of his, "Chris, you really gotta listen to these guys, they're the best," I finally got a taste of Their genius. Mostly, I remember it being the song, "Kiss Me, Son of God," that got me hooked. Since then, I haven't looked back, but did find it difficult to get used to the John Henry album. But, after awhile I grew to love it more and more, and it's a favorite of mine...but actually, they're ALL my favorites. So, now you know my story. Chris MatFoley99@aol.com "You have to make one crazy demand when holding hostages so you can plead insanity if you get caught" -Steve Martin ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 03:20:46 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199802100820.DAA23497@mail4.uts.ohio-state.edu> From: salien Subject: TMBG: first song addiction for me, actually, it was don't let's start... i'd heard everything on flood first, and loved it, but still never actually bought anything by them... then i visited a friend out of state who had miscellaneous t, and heard it a couple of times, and liked it as well. but when i came back, i discovered i had the first four lines of DLS stuck in my head, but could not remember the rest of it. it bugged the heck out of me, so finally i was cd shopping and saw the pink album, saw that it had DLS as well, and immediately bought it... eventually, i got the rest of DLS into my head, and my addiction was sated enough for me to to realize i liked the rest of that album a lot, too... and three excellent albums seemed like a good enough reason to look deeper into the band. so i started collecting the rest of their stuff, and have now officially classified my love of tmbg as an obsession, so as to justify nearly any expenditure of money in the pursuit of more tmbg stuff. (: -salien 'I know too many people unhappy In a life from which they'd love to flee. Watching others get everything offered they're wanton for discovery' -Sarah McLachlan, 'Circle' ------------------------------ From: nmoos1@rachel.chatham.edu Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 07:12:52 -0500 (EST) Subject: non-TMBG: "bad" words Message-id: <01ITEMEWN832D8ZQGH@ritvax.isc.rit.edu> > (I could also get started ont he idea that everythink > people say should be "banned" is only because someone in society at some time > said it was bad. For example, why are certain words bad? Who decided which > words would be bad & why didn't they pick words like "floppy" or "tree" to be > bad words? It's a mystery...) Actually, you are almost totally correct in your speculation. most words people think of as "curses" are words that the French thought sounded vulgar when they invaded England at some point. with the royal courts completely controlled by Normans, eventually the only class of people that continued saying these so-called bad words were the lower classes of commoners; the middle and upper classes refrained from using the modern profanities in order to mimic the nobles of their time. --pnaomi, who currently takes only Math and Science courses, but still proposes that we invade England and tell the nobles that the words "hootini", "ear", and "marmoset" are tres gauche... ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 07:09:41 -0700 Subject: TMBG: FS Message-ID: <19980210.071057.16486.3.TMBgirl@juno.com> From: tmbgirl@juno.com (JOda: Master of Yedi) hEY HEY! > I realized the other day after listening to FS >that it's really grown on me. I didn't like it that >much at first (well, as much as one can dislike TMBG-- >They could attach Their name to white noise and I'd buy it), >but it's a much better listen for me now. for me... it's the total opposite... i totally dug FS when it first came out and slowly but surely it has become my least favorite album by them :( i'm seriously looking forward to the next album tho... i think it could be their next "flood" (which as much as all of you guys hate floodies, you are the same people that say you hate the fact that they're not popular so...) >DAVE, former Movementarian take it easy, JOrdaN, "I Want to play..." _____________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com Or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866] ------------------------------ Message-ID: <01BD35ED.207D3640@EMS1> From: "Pletikapich, John (OH35)" Subject: TMBG: TMBG - precious and few Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 06:30:26 -0800 Coincidence regarding all of this talk about "Precious and Few": I was wasting time at Circuit City while a friend was making a purchase, and I noticed a CD called "VH1 - 8 Track Flashback - The One Hit Wonders" or somesuch. Lo and behold, there was "Precious and Few" by Climax. In addition, there was :Rock and Roll, Part 2" by Gary Glitter, author of a song (Hello(?)) covered by Monopuff. I really like that one hit wonder stuff , but this collection was a real disappointment. -- john ------------------------------ Message-ID: <34DDC550.2D46A3D2@mix-net.net> Date: Sun, 08 Feb 1998 10:46:44 -0400 From: CCampbell Subject: TMBG:Maybe we'll never know The person that I am communicating with via E-mail who claims to be John Flansburgh wrote this, "Okay, I understand that you're not totally sure that it's me. If you really don't want to believe it's me, then fine. Just talk to me like I'm anybody else you'd meet. Otherwise, just accept that I am. I find it pointless to go on and on just trying to prove who I am. See ya, Johnny P.S. If anybody comes to you questioning my identity, just say this: "Either accept who he is, or don't care." I just thought I should pass it along, I can't be totally sure its him, but Its a nice fantasy anyway! ------------------------------ Message-ID: <34DDCBFE.4E759584@mix-net.net> Date: Sun, 08 Feb 1998 11:15:13 -0400 From: CCampbell Subject: Re: TMBG: First impressions My first impression, It all started when one day my sisters friend, who we were car-pooling with, brought a tape with him, it had about 70% of flood on one side, and other popular songs on the other. We listened to one side, and when it got to the Flood side, we all thought it was really wierd, but we liked some of the songs. After that (I was only like 10 at the time) my sister bought the Flood cd, and we learned to love it. A few of my sister's friend's gave her 10th generation copies of Lincoln and A18. My sister just liked the band, but I LOVED the band, now (age 14) I own all theres CD's and listen to the 120% of the time! Well BYE -Chris "Feeny" Campbell P.S. John F (or not), said he didn't write the messages on the 'list' and that Linnell dosn't use the internet. ------------------------------ From: Matthew Coon Message-Id: <199802101803.NAA12554@omni.cc.purdue.edu> Subject: TMBG: TMBG and NON- (list junk & song refs) Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 13:02:59 -0500 (EST) > > If you take all the unintelligent & tasteless stuff off the internet then > there's nothing left!! > Although this is a somewhat apt description of the internet since its mass commercialization (as opposed to, say, ten years ago, when the net was still predominantly intelligent people politely sharing interesting - and admittedly often tasteless - information). It's interesting how things have changed, although it's still an exaggeration to say that everything on the net is now unintelligent. Recall, though, that when the tmbg newsgroup was launched on Usenet, there was a conscious decision made here to keep the mailing list separate. Part of the motivation for this decision was, as I recall, to keep ourselves insulated in order to try to keep the maturity level of the list up (and to avoid redundancy). It's actually worked pretty well. Just read the NG to put the quality of the list into perspective!! > For example, why are certain words bad? Who decided which > words would be bad & why didn't they pick words like "floppy" or "tree" to be > bad words? It's a mystery...) > It's not a mystery - there are clear socio-historical reasons, but this is not really the point. A message that merely says, "Dumb dumb dumb stupid dumb idiot weenie moron..." is just as worthless as one that says the same thing using "vulgar" words because it is an unstructured, emotional, knee-jerk reaction. Substituting exotic vocabulary doesn't raise the information content or contribute anything worthwhile to the list. Nobody should be trying to dictate taste. However, the list is a certain form of community, and if you submit something utterly tasteless (especially if it is not creative), you may annoy some people. If you submit a mindless, incoherent diatribe (especially if it is pointlessly vulgar) you *will* annoy people. And if you annoy people on the list you can expect to hear about it for a long time:-) Moving from list-stuff to purer TMBG-type-stuff, this latest cycle of "Precious and Few" talk (isn't this in the FAQ? It should be.) tempts me to point out that I have collected a number of TMBG song references at http://omni.cc.purdue.edu/~coon/allusion.htm Due to the completely underwhelming response when I debuted it about a year ago, I never got around to doing much with it. I'm thinking of spiffing it up now, and I have sampled a pile of sound clips to add to it (disk space allowing). If anyone has any suggestions or can help me with compressing WAV files using either RA or MP3, I'd be glad to hear from ya. m@t (captain verbosity) ------------------------------ From: DrWormX@aol.com Message-ID: <929c40b7.34e0c8a4@aol.com> Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 16:37:38 EST Subject: Re: TMBG: First impressions I probably got hooked with It's Not My Birthday, which I love so incredibly much, but I'm not quite sure. A few more possabilities are Nightgown of the Sullen Moon, Purple Toupee (as you said), Ana Ng, and I Should Be Allowed to Think. Again, it is so hard to pick favorites, but here are a few of mine. Matt Turn around, turn around, there's a human skull on the ground You're so 1990, and it's 1994 A bad-ass mother G.I.Joe, for your little mind to blow http://members.tripod.com/~drworm ------------------------------ From: DrWormX@aol.com Message-ID: <551fb92a.34e0c9f0@aol.com> Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 16:43:09 EST Subject: Re: TMBG:Maybe we'll never know it's not. get over it. this sample of a conversation just proves it. Matt Turn around, turn around, there's a human skull on the ground You're so 1990, and it's 1994 A bad-ass mother G.I.Joe, for your little mind to blow http://members.tripod.com/~drworm ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 16:11:37 -0800 (PST) From: winningh Subject: Re: TMBG: First impressions Message-ID: My first memories of They are from Tiny Toons, however the first album my brother bought was the Pink one and I got hooked by Following an Angel. Though FS and JH both grew on me with time, Lincoln remains my least favorite, no matter how hard I try. Sarah "Why were people arguing with Augiewan after he wasn't there anymore anyway?" Winningham ------------------------------ From: WeirdGiant@aol.com Message-ID: Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 21:04:38 EST Subject: Re: TMBG: First impressions << Halleluja...material to work with. Granted, this has probably bounced around this list millions of times over, but I've never seen it so I'll send it around again. What song was it that got you hooked on Them? For me, as with a lot of you, I suspect, it was a mixture of Purple Toupee (For which I suffer withdrawals if I don't hear it enough), and Birdhouse in Your Soul. What about for the rest of you? >> It was Particle Man and (mostly) Istanbul that caused me to buy They, and it was definetly Birdhouse In Your Soul that started the addiction. Of course, I've moved on from those Flood days. Ah, the memories.. ~Ryan "Tintin" Leach ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 18:33:32 -0500 Subject: Re: TMBG: First impressions Message-ID: <19980210.183837.7478.2.johnhenry5@juno.com> From: johnhenry5@juno.com (Andy Nich0ls) Since we're on the topic, the first cd I heard was Flood. My friend told me he wanted me to listen to a cd, but he wouldn't tell me what it was. I was kinda surprised to find it was They Might Be Giants. I listened, but I didn't really like it at first except for a few songs. That next winter my sister ( the almighty MNDA) got me John Henry for X Mas. I now have all of their cds and some of their singles. I'd have to say that my favorite is John Henry. (No, I'm not just sucking up to you Amanda!) I especially like A self Called Nowhere. Andy Nich0ls _____________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com Or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866] ------------------------------ From: Spoonerism@aol.com Message-ID: <1a4893ca.34e111b2@aol.com> Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 21:49:20 EST Subject: Re: TMBG: First impressions Well, let's see... I know, the list will hate me for this, but seeing "Particle Man" and "Istanbul" on TINY TOON ADVENTURES sparked an interest in the band for me. Several years later, when I went to Disney World, I heard them playing "Istanbul" near Epcot (tm) Center and vowed to myself "I WILL buy that album when I get home!" I even safely stored a $20 traveller's cheque in my pillowcase to be sure I didn't spend it. (I spent all my other money, however). So, I returned to seasonably cold Connecticut and called stores around looking for Flood. I found one, bought it, and listened to it for a while. Well, it was then that I was aware of the band, but when I heard "The Statue Got Me High" on the radio (yes, the radio), I immediately went out and bought Apollo 18 (Which, by the way, is my all-time favourite TMBG album) and later bought all the rest of the albums, even without hearing any of the songs on them beforehand. Well, now you know my story, and you can all die happy. On a somewhat related note, does anyone have a bootleg of the Near- President's Day show circa 1997 in Toad's Place in New Haven? That was my first TMBG concert and I would really like to relive the experience, so to speak. EMail me and we can set something up!!! -Casey! "Ev'ry jumbled pile of person has a thinking part that wonders what the part that isn't thinking isn't think of" -They Might Be Giants ------------------------------ From: Monotreme3@aol.com Message-ID: <6547dfd6.34e11722@aol.com> Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 22:12:31 EST Subject: Re: TMBG: First impressions I can remember well my first impressions of TMBG. I thought they sucked. My friend Jacob would mumble this song to himself all the time. We'd be sitting there working on something in English class (oh yeah... this is seventh grade) and he'd be saying these words. It was incredibly annoying. Finally I said, "Listen, if you're gonna keep singing that crap, at least tell me what the hell it means. Or even what you're saying." He proceeded to tell me, and I proceeded to answer him with: "What!? What the hell is that? Why don't you just write it down for me?" So he wrote this: "Where your eyes don't go/ a filthy scarecrow waves its broomstick arms/ and does a parody of each unconscious thing you do/ when you turn around to look it's gone behind you on its face it's wearing your confused expression/ where your eyes don't go." I was like, "Um... okay. Well... why don't you make me a tape of this and I'll tell you what I think. So he did. I listened. I liked. I also found that it was the same band who'd done Istanbul not Constantinople and Particle Man. So I had all the best stuff on this one awesome tape (which eventually got stolen) and later I bought Misc. T (my first) and Apollo 18. I hated Flood the first time I heard it. So... anyway... I've loved Them ever since, and converted a friend, too. Okay. That's it. Sorry for the length. Paint me orange and call me dramatic. Or insane. Either will do. -Carey ------------------------------ From: BenMoobil@aol.com Message-ID: <447ae348.34e11a2a@aol.com> Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 22:25:28 EST Subject: Re: TMBG: First impressions well ok lemme tell you my story then. It was a dark and stormy night in 1985 (well actualy it was a like a rainy tuesday afternoon) but anyway a cousin of mine was over and he had a tape of Don't Lets start form one of there shows he has bootlegged and i was like thats kinda cool and i couldn't get the name of the band out of my head then i saw the video for DLS either later that year or early the next ( i forget which) but the video hooked me i was like WOOOOOOOOOOOW and then i wen't out and bought the tape and heard Evertything Right is Wrong Again and i was hooked for life. ANd now i force all my friends to listent o TMBG and they all end up liking them so i think TMBG is the best thing to ever happen in my life and people i know appreciate there musical ability so i am content as can be! (-: The Ben "has no cool name to put in parenthesse and can't spell either" ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 22:45:30 -0500 (EST) From: Melanie Kummer Subject: TMBG: First impressions Message-id: <01ITFJ74R65U9VYWSS@XAVIER.XU.EDU> The very first CD I bought by TMBG was "John Henry." I remember hearing a little bit of "Flood" when I was in high school, but my taste is music was different when I heard it, so I really didn't pay much attention to it. I heard "Snail Shell" on the radio a few times, so I decided to go ahead and buy the whole album. A few months later I wanted to hear more of their music, so I looked for web pages with sound clips. The next album I bought was "Flood." It didn't take long before I owned all of their full length albums and whatever singles/eps I could find (I'm always searching for more). This is how my TMBG addiction began. :) Melanie ***************************************************************************** Melanie Kummer | "Stand on your own head KUMMER@xavier.xu.edu | for a change." kummer@cerebro.xu.edu | 507726@xavier.xu.edu | - They Might Be Giants ***************************************************************************** http://xavier.xu.edu/~kummer/index.html ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 22:49:20 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: From: Bob Gonsalves Subject: Re: TMBG: In the presence of greatness >Linnell *is* the computer one; he's the one who did the John Henry >HyperCard stack on the old Elektra TMBG page. Ooh, ooh. Do you actually have this, or know someone who does? Bob Gonsalves, Research Director Pink Noise Studios Art*Technology*Politics home: http://www.pinknoiz.com/ ------------------------------ End of tmbg-list Digest #3-406 ******************************