[originally posted on tumblr]
I've finished compiling this year's Poor-Ass Christmas Collection, the tenth in the line to bear that name. As with every year, i'm convinced that this is the best one yet; but if ever i don't feel that way when it's ready, then it wasn't ready, right?
Since this is the tenth PAC (affectionately dubbed "Trevor's Poor-Ass 10-Mas" ...get it?), and since i'm a giant fucking nerd, i wanted to put together some statistics. If this sort of thing is uninteresting to you, i don't mind. As with most things that i do, i wrote this for me. So enjoy it, or don't.
I've probably told this story in previous PAC-related posts, but here it is again: the first PAC came together in 2004 just because i was burning off all the mp3s i had downloaded to my dad's computer ahead of him doing a hard drive reformat. The first mix i made in doing this turned out, i thought, to be pretty great, so i made a few more copies to give to some friends. I made four. I know who received each; whether they still have them or not, i don't know. The following year was more of a, "Hey, wouldn't it be cool to have all of these songs on the same CD?" type deal. I had been pretty happy with the idea of a Christmas mix the previous year, so i thought i'd continue it, and made a dozen or so copies. 2006 was the first to truly bear the spirit of what Trevor's Poor-Ass Christmas has become: a compilation of all the things i've listened to heavily over the course of the year. Back then it was just "oh, it's December, what have i been listening to?"; nowadays, there's iTunes and play counts and me building Spotify playlists over the course of the whole fucking year.
Unsurprisingly, the band with the most appearances on these compilations is damidol, making their sixth appearance this year. Tied for third are Biffy Clyro, PJ Harvey, and t.A.T.u., with five each.
I usually limit each band to one track per compilation, but almost all of the CDs have one artist with two tracks. Only one time, in 2008, did i put three tracks by one artist on the comp. It was Sleater-Kinney. 2013 is actually the first year since 2007 to feature no duplicate bands.
2005 is the shortest PAC at 78:18. 2001 is longest at exactly 80 minutes. The rest are all 79 minutes and some-odd seconds. That's really close to being interesting, right? 2011 also has the most songs, at 27. 2004, 2006, and 2007 are shortest at 21. The longest song is I'll Take the Rain (Jamie Candilorio remix) by REM on the 2007 disc at 6:11; the following year saw the shortest song, All by Descendants, at 0:04.
For a while, i always made sure the compilations had at least one cover song and at least one song with the word "Dog" in the title. The reasoning? Both trends started as accidents, and after noticing them, i continued intentionally. The covers thing starts with the very first one in 2004 and the Dog thing begins in 2006 (although 2005 has a band called Dogstar). In 2010 ("200X"), i circumvented both of those conventions, maybe because i was bored with them, or maybe because i simply didn't have anything to include that fit those criteria. The inclusion of The Stooges' I Wanna Be Your Dog in 2009 had seemed a bit forced (i had been listening to a lot of The Stooges that year, but that song in particular seems kind of like cheating). Last year had a Wolf, though, and this year has a Cat...
Here's a weird trend i hadn't noticed until just now: The White Stripes have three appearances, all four years apart. Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground in 2004, Blue Orchid in 2008, and Walking With a Ghost in 2012. Maybe it's an omen that they'll reform in 2016 with an awesome album.
I've somehow never duplicated a song title, even simple ones like "Free" or "Down," except when i've used a cover version of an original that already appeared. PJ Harvey's Rid of Me came up on 2008, Black Light Burns's cover in 2009; Tegan and Sara's Walking With a Ghost shows up early on 2012 and The White Stripes's cover later on the same disc.
There's actually only 8 songs out of 228 that start with the word "The." I don't know what this means, but it sure is interesting.
Despite being called my two favorite bands for a long, long time, neither Eve 6 nor The Offspring have ever appeared on a Poor-Ass Christmas CD. It might be because neither has produced anything worth listening to since 2003... (although Eve 6 side project The Sugi Tap appeared once)
I had noticed in 2010 that female vocalists outnumbered male on the PAC, i thought was glaringly obvious, and an oddity in the notoriously male-dominated music industry, and i liked it. I had thought it was the first time the gender breakdown had ever even come close to that (the very first PAC had only one female vocalist on it), but it turns out i was wrong - the songs were evenly split 11 to 11 all the way back in 2006! And i hadn't even noticed! That's pretty cool. Anyway, since 2010, there have been more female vocalists on every compilation except 2011, where the men won by a single track. I swear i'm not doing this on purpose. But it does show a significant shift in my preferences over the course of the decade.
Hmm. I think i'm done being boring for tonight, i'm pretty tired. But these are the things that i think about all the time and never let out of my nerdy, nerdy head.
I've finished compiling this year's Poor-Ass Christmas Collection, the tenth in the line to bear that name. As with every year, i'm convinced that this is the best one yet; but if ever i don't feel that way when it's ready, then it wasn't ready, right?
Since this is the tenth PAC (affectionately dubbed "Trevor's Poor-Ass 10-Mas" ...get it?), and since i'm a giant fucking nerd, i wanted to put together some statistics. If this sort of thing is uninteresting to you, i don't mind. As with most things that i do, i wrote this for me. So enjoy it, or don't.
I've probably told this story in previous PAC-related posts, but here it is again: the first PAC came together in 2004 just because i was burning off all the mp3s i had downloaded to my dad's computer ahead of him doing a hard drive reformat. The first mix i made in doing this turned out, i thought, to be pretty great, so i made a few more copies to give to some friends. I made four. I know who received each; whether they still have them or not, i don't know. The following year was more of a, "Hey, wouldn't it be cool to have all of these songs on the same CD?" type deal. I had been pretty happy with the idea of a Christmas mix the previous year, so i thought i'd continue it, and made a dozen or so copies. 2006 was the first to truly bear the spirit of what Trevor's Poor-Ass Christmas has become: a compilation of all the things i've listened to heavily over the course of the year. Back then it was just "oh, it's December, what have i been listening to?"; nowadays, there's iTunes and play counts and me building Spotify playlists over the course of the whole fucking year.
Unsurprisingly, the band with the most appearances on these compilations is damidol, making their sixth appearance this year. Tied for third are Biffy Clyro, PJ Harvey, and t.A.T.u., with five each.
I usually limit each band to one track per compilation, but almost all of the CDs have one artist with two tracks. Only one time, in 2008, did i put three tracks by one artist on the comp. It was Sleater-Kinney. 2013 is actually the first year since 2007 to feature no duplicate bands.
2005 is the shortest PAC at 78:18. 2001 is longest at exactly 80 minutes. The rest are all 79 minutes and some-odd seconds. That's really close to being interesting, right? 2011 also has the most songs, at 27. 2004, 2006, and 2007 are shortest at 21. The longest song is I'll Take the Rain (Jamie Candilorio remix) by REM on the 2007 disc at 6:11; the following year saw the shortest song, All by Descendants, at 0:04.
For a while, i always made sure the compilations had at least one cover song and at least one song with the word "Dog" in the title. The reasoning? Both trends started as accidents, and after noticing them, i continued intentionally. The covers thing starts with the very first one in 2004 and the Dog thing begins in 2006 (although 2005 has a band called Dogstar). In 2010 ("200X"), i circumvented both of those conventions, maybe because i was bored with them, or maybe because i simply didn't have anything to include that fit those criteria. The inclusion of The Stooges' I Wanna Be Your Dog in 2009 had seemed a bit forced (i had been listening to a lot of The Stooges that year, but that song in particular seems kind of like cheating). Last year had a Wolf, though, and this year has a Cat...
Here's a weird trend i hadn't noticed until just now: The White Stripes have three appearances, all four years apart. Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground in 2004, Blue Orchid in 2008, and Walking With a Ghost in 2012. Maybe it's an omen that they'll reform in 2016 with an awesome album.
I've somehow never duplicated a song title, even simple ones like "Free" or "Down," except when i've used a cover version of an original that already appeared. PJ Harvey's Rid of Me came up on 2008, Black Light Burns's cover in 2009; Tegan and Sara's Walking With a Ghost shows up early on 2012 and The White Stripes's cover later on the same disc.
There's actually only 8 songs out of 228 that start with the word "The." I don't know what this means, but it sure is interesting.
Despite being called my two favorite bands for a long, long time, neither Eve 6 nor The Offspring have ever appeared on a Poor-Ass Christmas CD. It might be because neither has produced anything worth listening to since 2003... (although Eve 6 side project The Sugi Tap appeared once)
I had noticed in 2010 that female vocalists outnumbered male on the PAC, i thought was glaringly obvious, and an oddity in the notoriously male-dominated music industry, and i liked it. I had thought it was the first time the gender breakdown had ever even come close to that (the very first PAC had only one female vocalist on it), but it turns out i was wrong - the songs were evenly split 11 to 11 all the way back in 2006! And i hadn't even noticed! That's pretty cool. Anyway, since 2010, there have been more female vocalists on every compilation except 2011, where the men won by a single track. I swear i'm not doing this on purpose. But it does show a significant shift in my preferences over the course of the decade.
Hmm. I think i'm done being boring for tonight, i'm pretty tired. But these are the things that i think about all the time and never let out of my nerdy, nerdy head.
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