YOUTH CULTURE POLLED MY DOG: They Might Be Giants (first 21 years) POLL RESULTS

love mr me

he ended up sad!

xp *thumbs up*

48: Letterbox
540 points, 9 votes

on Flood LP, 1990

live on MTV's 120 Minutes, 1989:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxcTXrMHHs0

in lower audio quality on 120 Minutes in 1988
covered by OKGo c. 2006

One of my favorites on Flood. My friend and I used to play the song on repeat to try and decipher the lyrics to the bridge

i fuckin love mr. me, and it always reminds me of my mom, who got a kick out of the "yo yo yo" vocals.

Completely forgot about "Letterbox" somehow. It's 1990 again here, all of a sudden.

Lyricaly it's a bit of an odd character sketch by their standards since there doesn't seem to be anything much wrong or strange about the narrator - he just thinks searching for things with his metal detector is really neat.

I think of the lyrics to Metal Detector as being of a piece with those other Linnell songs about someone turning away from other people to focus on some solitary esoteric obsession, 'Down at the shore there's a place where there's no one vacationing' 'Then everything on the top will just suddenly stop seeming interesting' seems to come from the same place as 'And though I once preferred a human being's company they pale before the monolith that towers over me' or 'There's only one thing that I like and that is whistling in the dark'

in these songs there's usually a contradictory desire for human contact as well, but on the narrator's own terms, to join him in the obession: 'I've got something to help/make you understand', 'And now it is your turn Your turn to hear the stone and then your turn to burn The stone it calls to you You can't refuse to do the things it tells you to' 'Some day somebody else besides me will call me by my stage name, they will call me Dr Worm'

is it correct to hear an oblique suggestion of cannibalism in Dinner Bell? I guess because of the 'shoulder, bicep, elbow, arm, forearm, thumb, wrist, knuckle, palm, middle, pinky, index, ring' bit? and the connection it makes between the person waiting for the dinner bell and Pavlov's dog, noting the similarity of a human and an animal in the context of food seems to hint at the idea of eating humans

I imagined the 'shoulder, bicep, elbow...' bit as an impulse traveling down the signal path on its way to pick up and ring the bell.

had never realized they were singing actual words there - felt like backwards made up esperanto or something. shorum castle numco town...

and i buy the metal detector user as fitting in with these other pursuers of obsessions... hmm. well still i mean whatever happens in "statue" it seems more intense and maybe destructive ("the statue made me fry") but of course that lyric could also just be doubling down metaphorically on more pedestrian ways of describing a benign crystallizing moment of exposure to art or a person.

metal detector person seems kinda settled and well-adjusted altho i suppose you could read it as the portrait of an eccentric who's become extremely detached from reality (engaging only with unseen and indeed unnamed objects through technological mediation) but is rationalizing it as having a wise, detached perspective that lets him focus on more interesting things. delusions of grandeur or of superior insight come up in other linnell lyrics - "destination moon," "no one knows my plan"

46= See The Constellation
541 points, 9 votes

Dial-A-Song as My Lone Constellation c. 1991
on Apollo 18, 1992

See The Constellation kind of prefigures the shift to more rock sounding stuff on John Henry, but I think it wouldn't work as well with the full bound sound, the staccato electronic rhythm section really works here

I seem to recall that the true lyrics to the weird part of Dinner Bell ending with “and and walk walk a a way way” we’re the subject of much debate in the TMBG online community on the 90s

"I was in the sky, all dressed in black" is such an elegant way of conveying the twist/revelation here. One of Flans's best lyrics throughout: "no cigar, no lady on his arm - just a guy made of dots and lines"; " but the city lights got in my way." I mentioned the Paperback Writer quality upthread - the super locked-down electronic rhythm both makes it feel *more* like peak, super-tight mod combo Beatles, and more alien and original with the punched-in sampler backing vocals and stuff. Such a cool recording.

clearly Weird Al was a fan of this song

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvM6bNwfTIg

years and years later i found out that "I Remember Larry" is a very specific parody of/tribute to the new wave obscurity "Calling All Girls" by Hilly Michaels. but there's easily a bit of TMBG in there... though not as much on his intended Giants tribute on the same album, "Everything You Know Is Wrong"

I've probably mentioned this before but I'm impressed by how well "Everything You Know is Wrong" apes Linnell's songwriting and singing style given that it completely misses the point lyrically - no TMBG song is just a string of non sequiturs like that

that's a great point. but Al likes wacky and "weird" non sequiturs and i feel like his "style" parodies tend to cleave lyrically to his home turf. usually he's parodying a more straightforward artist and so the humor is partly in the juxtaposition of their style and his wackiness. since tmbg are already sorrrrta wacky, it comes off feeling like he doesn't really get Them. i'm guessing al's actually a huge fan though so i think he just hit a double when it could have been a home run.

Everything You Know Is Wrong made me revise my opinion of Weird Al - perhaps the lyrics don't entirely nail Linnell's style, but I suppose it is an affectionate parody. It's about as good as anyone will ever manage.

My main nitpicking issue was that the accordian solo is too technically complicated - they only tried that kind of playing once on The Famous Polka, so it felt a touch gratuitous. But it's a minor niggle.

"Everything You Know is Wrong" nails the TMBG music style with a melody so catchy, I have to imagine TMBG were at least a little jealous, like Mark Mothersbaugh with "Dare to Be Stupid". It's an awesome song. Most of the phrases in EYKIW could be or are straight out of TMBG songs, but yeah, the way they're put together is pretty random. I wonder if Weird Al was just trying to hit as many as possible, rather than write a straight TMBG song

"I was in the sky, all dressed in black" is such an elegant way of conveying the twist/revelation here.

wait i have no idea what you mean

the chorus on "See the Constellation" is so great. I agree there's sort of a mod-era Beatles vibe to it. ending is awesome as well. I think the best TMBG tracks are the ones you can just sit and listen to on repeat for a half hour...this is definitely one of those. I think it was my #5.

It's a jam-packed Linnell phrasing/melody, just stuffed with Al-type signifiers - "Uncle Frank," "rabid wolverine in my underwear," "and said I was a darn good sport," "the floating disembodied head of Colonel Sanders" etc., all from his normal playground of junky American trash and Dr. Demento rabid-wolverine-is-just-a-funny-phrase-okay? stuff. I suppose there are some things that might come from specific TMBG concepts, like prosthetics (from "We Want A Rock"), "my evil twin," an awkward encounter with St. Peter (from "Road Movie to Berlin"), etc.

Listening again, the musical details are so so great... the horns coming in towards the end of the first verse, or the wham-wham-wham-wham guitars under "but I get the room next to the noisy ice machine." I'd be surprised if anybody else has done as loving a tribute to their style.

Anyway, love this song, especially whatever chord it is the harmony hits on the word "sky" in the chorus

here it is, the first song i regret not voting for. that's a grade-A (for AC/DC) guitar riff.

xxpost oh just like, he's been laying on the ground looking at a constellation, and then in the last line of the last verse, he realizes he's been the constellation all this time. maybe the train came along and hit him and killed him.... or maybe it's just finally hit home for him how liberated/autonomous he is, having passed from his town to the city lights to now, the unknown of the railroad and the sky. the train, after all, is gone and not coming back, so it can't be hitting him: rather, he's realizing just how much his life is no longer on anybody's track at all. it's a more upbeat, if more ambiguous, version of the moved-to-the-city angst of the beach boys' "that's not me" (to pick another 1966 reference point). ambiguous and interesting because there's something scary and alone and horrifying about being detached from material things and human contact (here again i think of "wings of desire"). i'm also reminded of another phrase i was really taken with towards the end of high school, when kurtz is described in heart of darkness as having "kicked himself loose of the earth."

yeah i voted way too low for this one, the songcraft and lyric are both brilliant. should have been top 25.

You are all convincing me I voted this one too low. I had it at #62.

On the one hand, my immediate reaction is "I voted too low" but when I actually look at my top 25, what would I dislodge? Lotta great songcraft coming up.

None of my top 22 have appeared (#23 through #25 all have) though a few of them I'm now starting to doubt will have made the countdown at all.

Only my 21 and 24 have appeared out of my top 25 but I definitely have some idiosyncratic faves up there which probably aren't placing

46= Sensurround
541 points, 7 votes

recorded for Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie, 1995
re-recorded as b-side for S-E-X-X-Y, 1996

TOO LOW

my favorite of their straightahead rock band songs. what a great linnell concept: biology vs. culture, where conventional 'nurture' is almost completely bypassed: the mother's selection of earthquake proves the determining factor, the personality shaped in barely explicable ways by a shoddy disaster-movie gimmick. and i'd be differently formed is such an amazing way of phrasing it. and then it all leads, apparently, to the character's present-day fascinations and fantasies - or maybe just his realization that for him, a back-to-the-womb scenario leads not to pre-cultural biological existence but to the SenSurround speaker. he's discovering "new authenticities" a decade early.

i know the power rangers version best and still think it has the right sound/mix. of course after listening to the b-side one (which i find too forced a sugar-rush kind of performance, like "boss of me"), the earlier one sounds sluggishly slow. the "quiet part" break is definitely better as a pet sounds/brazil 66 piece though. man the album would be so much better with this on it somewhere.

Hey, speaking of songs in the top 25, I had this at #16. It's the best version of the sound they were going for on John Henry.

45: I've Got A Match
543 points, 6 votes

on Lincoln LP, 1988
earlier Dial-A-Song version

my #20. possibly an even better irreconcilable-differences lyric than "they'll need a crane," certainly a meaner one, though the fact that it ends with a "collapse" suggests an even more complicated emotional picture. "i'm gonna die if you touch me one more time / well i guess that i'm gonna die no matter what" - wow.

I have always loved this song and at some points would have told you it was my favorite song on Lincoln - in the end I voted it at #19, my fourth highest placing song from the album.

my #24. the most costello-esque song they've done.

re: "Crane" - - - "love people are there, the smell of love is everywhere" is clearly getting at a similar thing to the restaurant where "the other nightmare people [...] i mean, nice people" like to go, but here the cruelty of the circumstance is specifically what a good time everyone else is having at this park or sex party or whatever. the drama in "crane" is more tragic perhaps, as in that one it's clear that they used to love each other and built a life together but it's gradually disintegrating and has to end. in "i've got a match" any trust or affection is long gone and out of the picture, a present-day snapshot of Lad without any sense of the larger story. it reminds me, vaguely, of "gaucho."

"You think that I want to be understood" is one of my favorite TMBG lyrics.

Sensurround was my #2. the bit that goes "Made the fakeness realistic..." is one of my favorite TMBG parts period. still can't believe it didn't make one of their albums.

44: Which Describes How You're Feeling
544 points, 8 votes

demo version on 1985 cassette, b-side on The Statue Got Me High, 1992
re-recorded for Apollo 18, 1992

Can't really justify why I put "Crane" so much higher than "Match." Maybe it's that the payoff line in Match is too on-the-nose for me.

Fucking love the syntactic ambiguity of "Which describes how you're feeling all the feeling all the time"

I've never liked this song at all. Surprised it has so many fans!

I didn't like it much on Apollo 18. The demo version however is great