17:28 <VoxPVoxD> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrCgjGnlQRQ Stewart's apartment is uncharacteristically loud, as his music is turned up to rise over the sound of the vacuum. There's always some chore or other that needs doing, and it's an easy way to make the world feel a little more manageable. 17:37 <trenchfoot> Nels' attentions are pulled away from her schoolwork as she listens to the music through the walls. That's not really an instrument she's heard of before, but the tune is... pleasant enough? Would be rude to interrupt in the middle of vacuuming, so she listens, and then mimics it back to pass the time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6b68Yz6t98 Then she just gives up and goes over to knock on Stewart's door, because how does it make 17:37 <trenchfoot> that sound? 17:39 <VoxPVoxD> It takes a few knocks to get Stewart's attention. Nels hears, in turn, the sound of the vacuum shutting off, the sound of the music shutting off, and the sound of the door unlocking. Then Stewart is there. "Oh, hey! Was I too loud?" 17:40 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Um, not exactly - I was just... what was that? It doesn't sound like anything I've heard before." 17:41 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh! Sorry. That's called a vacuum cleaner. It's a machine we can use to get dust off of our floors and carpets." 17:42 <VoxPVoxD> "It gets kind of loud." 17:42 <trenchfoot> Nels amends: "That too, but - the music." 17:44 <VoxPVoxD> "Ohhh. That was, uh, Sonic? Sonic 2, I want to say? Chemical Zone." He realizes belatedly that they're still in the doorway and lets her in. "Are you hungry or anything? I've got cold pizza..." 17:49 <trenchfoot> She steps inside and doesn't stare, except at his computer briefly. "No, that's fine. And - I can come back later if you'd like, I'm interrupting your cleaning, but... when you have the time, could you tell me more about this 'Sonic'? They seem like quite a musician." 17:54 <VoxPVoxD> "..." Oh shit. I skipped steps again. Let's wind it back and pay attention this time. "...I'm happy to a break. But yeah, ah, 'Sonic' is not the name of the artist who made that music. Sonic is name of the - why don't we sit in the living room - the name of the game the song was composed for." 17:56 <VoxPVoxD> "The song was composed by a man whose name I don't know, for a... computer, basically." 17:56 <VoxPVoxD> "Is the instrument, I mean." 17:57 <trenchfoot> She'll take a seat wherever's convenient, as long as it has a back. "I didn't realize games had music. Or that computers could make those sounds..." Does he have his computer visible from the living room? She'll be looking in its direction, regardless. 17:57 <VoxPVoxD> "A computer that you can play like a musical instrument is called a 'synthesizer', or a 'synth'. Which, now that I say it out loud, sounds pretty cyberpunk." 17:58 <VoxPVoxD> "Let's leave 'what is cyberpunk' for another time." 18:00 <trenchfoot> Nels opens and then closes her mouth, then considers. "And do they all sound like that Chemical Zone?" 18:00 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh, no, they sound like... like anythimg, basically." 18:01 <VoxPVoxD> "Holy shit!" 18:01 <VoxPVoxD> "You've got a hundred years of music to hear for the first time." 18:01 <VoxPVoxD> "That's really cool." 18:02 <trenchfoot> Nels: "I do..." The thought suddenly seems daunting. "Where would I even start?" 18:02 <VoxPVoxD> "I'm... completely inadequate to this task. But we can start. Come in here," he says, waving her into his office. 18:02 <VoxPVoxD> "I'm... completely inadequate to this task. But we can start. Come in here," he says, waving her into his office. 18:04 <trenchfoot> She follows close behind, unsure of where this is headed. He doesn't seem to have a record player anywhere... 18:05 <VoxPVoxD> This room is set up like an ersatz recording studio, with soundproof baffling hung on the walls, large lights diffused through curtains, and windows sealed against the outside with blackout curtains. There are what might be three or four whole computers in this room, judging by the array of boxes, screens, buttons, and neatly bundled wires. There's one huge, high-backed chair in front of 18:05 <VoxPVoxD> the machines. 18:07 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart's bringing in another chair from the kitchen. "You take the big chair, I can mess around with stuff better from this. 18:09 <trenchfoot> She sits, looking all around at the wires and where they lead to and from. The variety of screens and things that she probably shouldn't touch would make her head spin, if she thought about it too much, but she's still going over the idea of one hundred years of music. 18:09 <VoxPVoxD> After setting up the little chair on the right side of the desk, between two keyboards, Stewart presses a series of buttons rapidly and the three large screens light up. The bottom ones show what Nels might already know to be 'websites', while the top one is a lengthy array of short lines of text that Stewart makes vanish before Nels can read any of it. 18:10 <trenchfoot> His system seems to be much faster than hers. Still, it was a cheap set and it does what it needs to. 18:11 <VoxPVoxD> "So, alright, the first thing I want to say: there is more music made every year than a single human being will ever be able to listen to. From albums, singles, soundtracks, compositions, sets, live performances, even unpublished material that sneaks out into public hands. You're going to be feeling overwhelmed, and that's fine. That's not going to go away. We all feel like that." 18:12 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Ominous and sort of terrifying, but also relieving to know I'm not alone." 18:15 <VoxPVoxD> It was said Stewart's Autumn Mantle grew three sizes that day. "That's also to say that I am only going to be able to show you a tiny part of what's out there, because I only know a tiny part of what's out there. So I recommend also getting other people's perspectives, and exploring on your own." 18:16 <VoxPVoxD> He sits back. Shit... where do you even start. 18:18 <trenchfoot> She nods. Maybe she can figure out how to have that Google play music for her, when she gets back to her place... 18:19 <VoxPVoxD> "I guess the next thing I'll say is that if you just want to learn information, like you want to pinpoint a specific thing or you just want to cram for some reason, we have this thing called Wikipedia, which is basically a huge store of information people volunteer to write and edit. You go here--" typetypetype "--I'll write these out for you--" typetypetype "--and you can look at, 18:19 <VoxPVoxD> say, 1919 in music, 1920 in music, 1921 in music, and so on. Each year, with specific historical throughlines of note, specific important events and people, hit songs in different genres..." 18:19 <VoxPVoxD> "Pick a year." 18:22 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Um, 1970." Fifty years. Halfway mark. 18:26 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart types it in. "Boom, 1970 in music. Then we can go to biggest hit singles... here, like this is a 1970 song." Nels sees a video play: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvUQcnfwUUM 18:26 <VoxPVoxD> StewarT: "...and that was 1970 hair." 18:29 <trenchfoot> She makes a face. Still... "If I couldn't see them, you could've told me this was something I just hadn't heard from when I was a kid." 18:30 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "And that's just one of a million different kinds of music from then. Here's another:" 10https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cce72tWrn0E 18:36 <trenchfoot> Nels just taps her foot and starts humming along unconsciously. "Wow," when the song finishes. "And that's two popular songs from the same year? I guess radio really helped... but this is all on the internet now?" 18:37 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah. There's ways to buy or steal or listen to almost any song you want, any time you want, anywhere you want. Our phones play music too, you can put music on them or, or podcasts. We talked about podcasts before." 18:38 <trenchfoot> She's extremely excited to start looking this stuff up at home, if she can figure out how to find all of this. "Wait, how do you steal the music if it's available for free?" 18:41 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "People who let you listen to music free usually have some plan to make money off it, like they're selling ad space, or they're trying to get attention for their next album for sale, or it's a loss leader to get you to give them your private data so they can sell *that*, or something." 18:41 <VoxPVoxD> "Stealing the music gives you the song to do whatever you want with without anyone else getting any money. In theory." 18:44 <Crion> There's a knock on the door, subdued and measured. 18:45 <trenchfoot> She understood most of that. "Do the artists still-- oh!" She smooths out her skirt. "I'll just - wait here?" 18:45 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart's head whips around like an antelope's on the savannah, but after a tense beat he says, "Oh, shit, right. Stay here a second." and goes to answer the door. 18:45 <Crion> Canterbury's standing outside, leaning against the molding, in his usual hoodie. This close you can smell him -- or more properly, his mantle. Fresh, crisp winter air, without the smokeyness of autumn in it. 18:46 <Crion> "Hey mate." 18:46 <Crion> "Shouldn't do this in the hall." 18:49 <VoxPVoxD> "Yeah, come in." After shutting the door, Stewart snaps his fingers. "Actually, do you wanna... stick around a bit? Nels is curious about something and more perspectives will help here." 18:50 <Crion> "Oh..." He thinks and shrugs. "Sure. I'm supposed to be watching you two after all. It's been long enough that anyone watching me knows what I'm doing." 18:50 <Crion> Is there a counter or table nearby in the main room? 18:52 <VoxPVoxD> Yeah, a long counter serves as the primary separation between the living room and the kitchen. There's keys, old mail, and a squat jug full of violently orange flowers. "Nels, Canterbury's here. He brought weed and he's gonna help explain music." 18:53 <Crion> He takes a bag from under his hoodie and puts it on the counter. "Forty qu--" He pauses. "Forty dollars." That looks like a lot more weed than forty dollars should buy. 18:53 <Crion> How old does Nels look, again? 18:55 <VoxPVoxD> Money changes hands and Stewart leads Canterbury into his computer room, where he'll flip a second switch under the light switch and turn on a fan in the vent over the door. 18:55 <VoxPVoxD> "Thanks again, man, this is such a load off my mind not having to find a dealer." 18:56 <trenchfoot> She looks around 20, 21. Nels makes her way out from the office and looks at the 'weed'. She uh, probably hasn't smoked before? 18:56 <Crion> Canterbury nods. His four eyes all blink at once. "Be careful on it. That's from Union. Little bit goes a long way. Calls it 'Hearts in Atlantis.'" 18:58 <Crion> To Nels, he'll nod. "Miss." 18:58 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Hello, Canterbury. Thanks for looking out for us," though she's still looking at the substance. 18:58 <Crion> "Pleasure to be of service." 18:59 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart shows the bag full of fat green dried plant buds. "Did you have weed in 1920? Uh, uh, cannabis, or marijuana, or, or, reefer...? Any of this ringing a bell?" 19:03 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Vaguely? Cannabis does, anyway. I think I knew someone who liked it, but he liked heroin better." 19:03 <Crion> Canterbury makes a noise and shakes his head. 19:05 <trenchfoot> Nels: "So I've been told," she nods to Canterbury. 19:06 <Crion> "Oh nah, miss. It was opium among my...I guess they were mates." 19:06 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "This isn't anything like heroin, but it'll make your thoughts fuzzier, make music sound better. Might make you hungry. If you smoke too much you can get nervous or paranoid. Anyway, no pressure. I was trying to figure out how to approach showing Nels some of the music she hasn't heard yet." 19:06 <VoxPVoxD> He switched from speaking to Nels to speaking to Canterbury there. 19:08 <Crion> Canterbury nods. "For me -- I was taken in '37, right before the war, and came back oh. Ten years ago. For me, the thing that sort of -- made everything make sense, really, was the eighties. Eighties popular music. That's the bridge between the familiar and when instruments stop sounding like instruments any more." 19:12 <trenchfoot> Nels hmms thoughtfully. "Stewart was playing something from 'Sonic' when I knocked. I'm - curious how they changed, other than that. Seems like I could've done a lot with them." 19:12 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, in the 1980s you've got, like, new wave, early hip hop, post-punk, metal, R&B... it was when synthesizers, like the one that was playing the song you heard, got popular." 19:15 <trenchfoot> She makes a note to remember those phrases for later. Maybe this will help her study, or maybe there's some kind of studying music that people have. Hmm. 19:15 <Crion> "Which isn't to say I dislike the eighties at all. The eighties had Bonnie Tyler." 19:16 <Crion> "They also had a lot of cocaine, which people want to associate with Winter but really, really isn't our bag." 19:17 <Crion> He's rolled a joint but looks to Stewart for permission before lighting up. 19:17 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart waves a hand. It's all good. So here's a big list of 80s songs. Why don't we start here and see which direction we explore in. We can put our faith, for now, in the algorithm." 19:18 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart waves a hand. It's all good. "So here's a big list of 80s songs. Why don't we start here and see which direction we explore in. We can put our faith, for now, in the algorithm." 19:18 <Crion> Ahhh. "Damn good stuff. Wonder how their set up is. Probably involves some wizard shit." 19:19 <VoxPVoxD> Nels sees Stewart scroll through a long list of artists and song titles next to squat rectangular images. 19:22 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Oh! How about this one." She gestures to the screen showing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AIOAlaACuv4 19:22 <trenchfoot> She liked fast cars. Of course, 'fast' back then is... not fast at all anymore. 19:23 <Crion> Canterbury chuckles and shakes his head. 19:23 <Crion> "My Court's kind of song." 19:23 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart plays it. "Oh, I think I've heard this one before." He'll pack a bowl while it plays, and offer to Nels but not make a big deal of it. 19:26 <VoxPVoxD> When it plays out: "What do you think? 19:27 <Crion> "She's not wrong," says Canterbury, after a contemplative puff. "We all do make that decision." 19:29 <trenchfoot> She accepts the bowl, but hands it back. "You first. Show me. And -- it feels. Hmm. It reminds me of - before. But that wasn't to be talked about, and now here it is just laid out in song..." 19:31 <trenchfoot> Nels: "What's 'Hotel California'?" 19:31 <Crion> Canterbury actually smiles at that. 19:32 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart demonstrate show to operate a Bic lighter and corner a bowl. He chokes when Nels asks that, but recovers to reply, hoarsely, "Let me load it up." 19:32 <VoxPVoxD> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqSKl7sdUa8 19:33 <VoxPVoxD> On a dark desert highway... 19:35 <VoxPVoxD> It occurs belatedly to Stewart that his father probably once also sat around getting stoned and listening to Hotel California. 19:37 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Not as good as Fast Car. And - I don't care for that last verse. At all." 19:38 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Hotel California is a... divisive song." 19:39 <Crion> "Doesn't help most concert versions are 12 minutes long. Some bands can pull that off. Not The bloody Eagles." 19:39 <trenchfoot> Her face lights up when she sees the sidebar. "Oh! Tony mentioned that one!" She points to Free Bird. Although - these are times on the corners... "Did they just stop making short songs after a while?" 19:40 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Song lengths vary based on the genre and the time period. Free Bird and Hotel California are both songs where a guy spends a lot of time goofing around on the guitar between verses." 19:40 <VoxPVoxD> "They're both from around the same time, I think." 19:40 <VoxPVoxD> "I was raised to call that kind of music 'dadrock'. Music our dads wouldn't listen to, if our dads were roughly the age implied by my current age." 19:40 <VoxPVoxD> *would listen to 19:40 <trenchfoot> She nods solemnly. "Goofing around on the guitar is a good reason to have the songs go for that long." 19:41 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh oh oh!" 19:41 <VoxPVoxD> "Jimi Hendrix." 19:41 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Who's that?" 19:42 <VoxPVoxD> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLV4_xaYynY 19:46 <trenchfoot> She exhales through her nose. "He's excellent. Not sure about the lyrics really -- but his playing..." 19:46 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "He didn't write the lyrics to that one, I don't think, so good news there." 19:47 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Oh! Good. I'll look him up when I'm back in my apartment, then." 19:47 <trenchfoot> "...is that a cover of Crossroads?" 19:47 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart clicks on it. "I guess...?" 19:47 <VoxPVoxD> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PE9HvSdcaL4 19:48 <Crion> "Hahaha." 19:49 <trenchfoot> Nels: "I'm better." 19:50 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Than Clapton? Easily." 19:50 <VoxPVoxD> This is another song his dad would've listened to. 19:52 <Crion> "Clapton was pretty good. But," Canterbury shrugs. "A mortal." 19:52 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Then he shouldn't have tried playing my song." 19:52 <Crion> "Wrote a really sad song about his kid dying, though. Very popular in my circles." 19:52 <VoxPVoxD> "Okay, so this is all a lot of 70s-ish guitar rock. Let's see what we can find from the electronic side of the 80s..." 19:52 <VoxPVoxD> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcyCQLewj10 19:55 <trenchfoot> She startles at some of the beats, but this is... pleasant. "I can see what you mean about the synthesizers," she says to Canterbury. "I kind of like them, though." 20:00 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart loads up the next one Nels picks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGBohd0V2Mo 20:00 <VoxPVoxD> "This one's neat because it's about technology being rendered obsolete by technology that was then rendered obsolete - they used to play music videos on TV the way they play songs on the radio. But now they're all on the internet." 20:02 <trenchfoot> Nels: "I wonder if someone who was around for that time of music videos on TV feels, well. Like I do." 20:02 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It was right before I was born. My parents would know." 20:06 <trenchfoot> Nels: "You pick for the next one. Um, can I try some more of that marijuana? It's - pleasant. Fuzzy." 20:06 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart packs another bowl for Nels and then pokes around. 20:06 <VoxPVoxD> "I like this one." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnDwBrm_jsY 20:07 <trenchfoot> She takes a slightly larger hit than last time and begins coughing. "Okay. Oh, wow. Out of practice." 20:08 <VoxPVoxD> That's the terror of knowing what this world is about... 20:09 <trenchfoot> Nels, dumbly: "He's got great range. Um, they both do, but the one more than the other..." 20:10 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Freddy Mercury." 20:10 <Crion> "R.I.P." 20:10 <VoxPVoxD> It suddenly hits Stewart that someone's going to have to explain AIDS to Nels. 20:10 <trenchfoot> There's also sort of a lot going on, and it's hard to focus on anything but the words and the voices. "That's a shame," and she means it. 20:12 <VoxPVoxD> "Canterbury, any requests?" 20:13 <Crion> "Yeah...I mentioned Bonnie Tyler. Welsh girl. But let's do something a little modern with it too." He walks over and searches for something specific. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVkc6UF1mzI 20:14 <Crion> "Now this song was written by a lad what went about calling himself 'Meat Loaf.' Jimmy Steinman." 20:15 <trenchfoot> There is even more going on here than there was last time. "He chose that name on purpose?" 20:16 <Crion> "All the weird shit with the heavy beats and the synth? That's the remake. 'Quixotic' is the DJ who did that. You take the song master -- or just high enough quality, really -- and you fuck about with it." 20:18 <Crion> Canterbury takes another hit. "Technically it was a group, but he wrote the songs and he sung them and got out on stage in the silly outfits. Wrote 'Bat Out of Hell' -- this is back when concept albums were big, so Bat Out of Hell and Bat Out of Hell II: Back Into Hell (no, that's it's name, swear on the Qu-- to God) were full of these 12 minute long indulgent epics that had to be chopped 20:18 <Crion> down for the radio." 20:18 <trenchfoot> Privately, Nels thinks they should have 'fucked about with it' less. Still, the singer's good, and she's not opposed to the concept. "And people just put up with that?" 20:20 <Crion> "Not particularly. Meat Loaf had some big radio hits but his passion really was musicals -- he wrote parts of Footloose, which is where that song originally comes from. Nowadays he's just an old man that says dumb shit on television." 20:21 <Crion> Stewart's probably able to gauge this better than Nels, but while Canterbury still has his posh English accent his vocabulary has become much more Americanized. It's always 'shit' and never 'shite,' for instance. 20:22 <trenchfoot> Abruptly Nels wonders if the other Nels Foulke ever became an old woman who says dumb shit on television. She doesn't think she wants to know. "Well, there's nothing wrong with a musical. Saying dumb stuff in public is pretty bad, though." 20:22 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart's given to wonder. Was his Durance somehow American? Hard to say, impossibly rude to ask. Probably never know. 20:23 <Crion> Might be that, might be the time he's spent here since. Hard to say and rude to ask though, yeah, probably. 20:24 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I grew up in the 1990s, and music on the radio had stuff like this:" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DH3jo8ThugE 20:25 <VoxPVoxD> "There was a period where they just, I don't know, raised hot teen dudes in kennels and trained them to dance and harmonize for food." 20:25 <Crion> "Suppose I'm high enough for a bit of the boy bands." 20:25 <Crion> He puffs again. "One of them fucked around and tried to go to outer space, if you can believe. Not from this group. The other one." 20:26 <trenchfoot> It takes her longer than she would like to realize he's making a joke. "It's good to know some things about music have barely changed." 20:27 <VoxPVoxD> "The 90s also had music like this:" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTWKbfoikeg 20:28 <Crion> "Never could get into grudge." 20:28 <Crion> "Grunge." 20:28 <Crion> "Whatever." 20:29 <trenchfoot> Nels makes a face. "I see why they used the kennels for the handsome ones. To stop them from making this." 20:29 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart snorts. 20:29 <VoxPVoxD> Then he giggles. 20:29 <Crion> "Lots of birds found Kurt here very attractive. But maybe they just loved the legend." 20:30 <VoxPVoxD> Birds? 20:30 <Crion> Well, there's a Britishism. 20:30 <VoxPVoxD> Oh, Stewart gets it. 20:30 <Crion> "Women, sorry," he says after a moment, seeming vaguely embarrassed. 20:33 <Crion> He puffs again. "I'm guessing we should let the summer lads talk about rap." 20:33 <Crion> "Or, just put on 'Hit 'Em Up and see what's what." 20:34 <Crion> He looks around the room. "That's the song that got Tupac killed." 20:35 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Who? How?" 20:35 <Crion> "The godfather of West Coast rap. And, bullets." 20:37 <VoxPVoxD> Ohh shit. Stewart's glad Canterbury's got this and is able to avoid verbalizing his anxiety. "Yeah I'm way out of my depth there." 20:37 <trenchfoot> Eventually 'I don't know what that is' is going to get old. Actually, it's already starting to. "That does tend to happen." 20:39 <Crion> "Rap is intertwined heavily with Black culture in--hell, I'm not the man to explain this, but here goes. You know how white people took jazz and blues from black people? Well, they did the same thing with rock and roll, and right now they're doing the same thing with rap. Except rap...well, rap doesn't sound like anything I wager you've ever heard before." He leans forward and searches for 20:39 <Crion> 'Hit 'Em Up dirty'. "Don't repeat half the words you hear on this in polite company, especially not that big one." 20:39 <Crion> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41qC3w3UUkU 20:41 <Crion> "Three months after he put this song out, Tupac was shot dead in Las Vegas." 20:42 <Crion> He puffs again. "Or was he? That's a fun rabbit hole to go down." 20:42 <trenchfoot> Nels: "This. Okay. Some of the other songs were a lot but this is the most." 20:44 <Crion> "An entirely different artistic tradition, love. Little to no live instrumentation. You take a recorded beat on a loop and you do something halfway between spoken word poetry and singing over it. Entirely a modern form. Can't do it without at least a cassette tape deck." 20:44 <Crion> "Well. And turntables." 20:44 <Crion> "But you're not walking in with a horn section or even a guitar and drums." 20:45 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart looks up at 'horn section' and then quietly resolves never to tell Nels about ska. 20:47 <Crion> "Since rap broke into the mainstream, it's become more and more highly produced. Interesting to note that the greater culture hasn't been able to steal it from blacks yet -- sure, it makes most of the money off of them, but you've only got a couple notable white rappers at all and none of them are an Elvis." 20:47 <Crion> He pauses, then to Stewart. "Holy shit, have you told her about Elvis Presley?" 20:47 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Nnno." 20:47 <Crion> Shakes his head. "Hard to understand American music without Elvis, mate." 20:48 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I don't really know anything about Elvis besides that- well I don't want to spoil the ending for Nels." 20:50 <Crion> Canterbury leans back to the computer again. "To understand what I'm talking about, here's what we do. This is the song 'Hound Dog,' originally recorded by Big Mama Thornton in 1953." 20:50 <Crion> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoHDrzw-RPg 20:51 <Crion> "Now, this song, it was massively successful...as a blues song. Spent something like a year charted. Big Mama Thornton's biggest hit by far." 20:51 <Crion> "Then, three years later, attractive, clean-cut young white lad Elvis Presley records...this." 20:51 <Crion> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eHJ12Vhpyc 20:52 <trenchfoot> Nels: "I hate him already." 20:52 <Crion> "This is one of the most famous songs of all time. It made Presley a permanent star. It helped launch an entire genre of music. And the main difference is...what? Slightly up tempo. Man singing. Stronger percussion throughline at the expense of the singer's emotion." 20:55 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh I get it! He's like the Notch of music." 20:56 <Crion> "Elvis was a fun character. We were talking musicals earlier; Presley was drafted to go to the Vietnam War, and he actually went. It introduced him to amphetamines and the drug use that would eventually end his life. Before he left, he met a 14-year-old girl named Priscilla...Beaumont? Something like that. He was 23. Yeah. Married her after a seven year courtship, the books will tastefully 20:56 <Crion> tell you. They made a whole musical out of this, called 'Bye Bye Birdie.'" 20:56 <Crion> He leans forward and does another search. "This was the fake Elvis song they came up with for it." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GP__tlb6yZU 20:57 <Crion> Canterbury seems not to hear the Notch comment, probably because he doesn't know who that is. 20:59 <trenchfoot> Nels: "And this man was - what, the history of American music makes him that important? I'm not glad I missed all of it, but I don't think I would've wanted to see that." 21:01 <Crion> "Much like Tupac, it's a big conspiracy theory that Elvis is still alive too." 21:02 <Crion> "Grimly funny, maybe, that Las Vegas, where Tupac was gunned down, is also the center of the world for Elvis impersonators." 21:02 <Crion> He glances at Nels. "That's people whose job or hobby is dressing up like Elvis and pretending to be him, no matter how little they look like him." 21:03 <Crion> "Strange years, here." 21:03 <trenchfoot> She just shakes her head. 21:03 <VoxPVoxD> "There was a movie where a whole bunch of Elvis impersonators who impersonated Elvis at different points of his life robbed a casino or something together." 21:05 <Crion> Canterbury grins. "3000 Miles to Graceland." 21:07 <Crion> "Heard that movie was shit. But what a cast." 21:10 <VoxPVoxD> "And then this is just all music for like, buying albums of or listening to people play live at shows. There's so much work going into music people hear just incidentally. Movie soundtracks, game soundtracks. People who make careers and fortunes setting music to other people's stories." 21:11 <VoxPVoxD> "These are mostly electronic or orchestral compositions. Like here's one:" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3SZ5sIMY6o 21:12 <Crion> "Morricone!" 21:12 <Crion> "Hahaha, and that fucker John Williams, right on." 21:13 <VoxPVoxD> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enuOArEfqGo "This is Morricone." 21:15 <trenchfoot> Nels: "I like Morricone better, I think," she says absently, fiddling with her skirt. "Oh, definitely, with the guitar and - I could do some of this. Could have. Huh." 21:17 <Crion> "The big guy now is this Hans Zimmer man. He's composing everything. Some guys just get all the work." 21:20 <VoxPVoxD> "And then there's video game music, like what you heard originally. A lot of it is totally synthesized but not all of it is." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Egn_VNVKzI4 21:21 <Crion> "Wasn't there that song that was just, Russian classical music that they stole for the theme to a video game?" 21:21 <Crion> "Metal something." 21:22 <Crion> "Metal Slug? Metal Solid?" 21:22 <trenchfoot> Nels hums along to the Weight of the World. Familiar, somehow. Not one of hers, but... familiar. 21:23 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Metal Gear Soli, yeah." 21:24 <Crion> "Really good song too. But then, that's why you'd steal it." 21:27 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Shitty thing to do. I mean - we play eachother's songs, it'd be hard not to, but you don't just... chop up someone else's work." 21:28 <trenchfoot> She yawns. "I should be getting back. Thank you for the education, and for the weed. It was... nice." 21:28 <Crion> He puffs. "Well, you do and you don't. Like I said about rap -- that's what 'sampling' is. But in rap you credit where the beat came from. This lad just passed it off as his own, so yeah. Very different."