Britney Spears: 1-6 How we filled the sad, lonely years between the release of "Ray of Light" and the invention of Lady Gaga.

September 4, 2010 8:46 AM

Twitter Discographies summarizes musicians' entire careers in 140 characters, album by album. (SLT)

Nirvana: 1 "If all of your feelings of rage..."; 2 "...were overheard by everyone on earth..."; 3 "...you might feel ambivalent about that."

Sonic Youth: 1-3 noisy noises; 4-5 noisy songs; 6 desert island disc; 7,8 songy songs; 9-12 songy noises; 13-16 Phish for aging hipsters.

Oasis: 1 "Boys"; 2 "All Together Now"; 3 "It's All Too Much"; 4 "Nowhere, Man"; 5 "Misery"; 6 "For No One"; 7 "The End."

Red Hot Chili Peppers:1-4 Seinfeld theme prototypes; 5 why somebody had to invent AutoTune; 6 "sorry, Dave"; 7-9 somebody invented AutoTune.

posted by Rory Marinich (34 comments total)

Nirvana: 1 "If all of your feelings of rage..."; 2 "...were overheard by everyone on earth..."; 3 "...you might feel ambivalent about that."

Win.
posted by nickrussell at 9:00 AM on September 4, 2010 [1 favorite]

Hilarious.
posted by Fizz at 9:04 AM on September 4, 2010

Who needs music critics when you've got this!

My favourite line has got to be "Lady Gaga: 2 "Duchamp put a urinal in an art gallery, but did it ever occur to him to wear one on his head?"
posted by joni. at 9:06 AM on September 4, 2010 [1 favorite]

Weezer: 1 "Remember that nerdy guy from high school?" 2 "The one who couldn't talk to girls?" 3-7 "Why are you still hanging out with him?"

Perfect.
posted by Huck500 at 9:15 AM on September 4, 2010 [5 favorites]

This was far far better than I expected it to be. Thanks for the link, Rory.
posted by komara at 9:17 AM on September 4, 2010

I suppose I can share my two favorites:

Smashing Pumpkins: 1-2 grandiose delusions; 3 Hubris!; 4-6 "Acquired Situational Narcissism" (cf. DSM-IV); 7 feelings of entitlement.

followed one hour later by:

To the 8 people who unfollowed in the wake of the Smashing Pumpkins discography: despite all your rage, you are still just rats in a cage.
posted by komara at 9:18 AM on September 4, 2010 [7 favorites]

Elvis Costello: 1-11 "the early funny ones"; 12,13,15,17,24,29 Shadows & Fog; 16,21-23,30 Crimes & Misdemeanors; 14,18-20,25-28 Zelig. 2:37 PM Jul 31st via web

OK this is like awesome poetry.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 9:28 AM on September 4, 2010

Fantastic. Thanks!
posted by dobbs at 9:28 AM on September 4, 2010

Love this! Very well done.
posted by flex at 9:39 AM on September 4, 2010

Nick Cave: 1-2 songs of death; 3 dead songs; 4-6 dead on; 7-8 deadwood; 9 death toll ≥ 66; 10 dead love; 11-13 dead boring; 14 resurrected.

Dead right!
posted by katillathehun at 9:45 AM on September 4, 2010 [1 favorite]

Wouldn't Ayn Rand and/or Neal Peart want you to do that by yourself? // RT @shighkin if you could do Rush that would be great.
posted by flex at 10:05 AM on September 4, 2010 [1 favorite]

I'll grudgingly admit that twitter forces a conciseness that some people have the skill to capitalize on. Pretty amusing stuff.
posted by Devils Rancher at 10:22 AM on September 4, 2010 [1 favorite]

The Rolling Stones one was spot on. I'll let y'all discover it for yourself.
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 10:44 AM on September 4, 2010

I agree with St Alia. Also I'd love to see them do the Pixies.
posted by jtron at 11:02 AM on September 4, 2010

Hilarious. My one complaint is when an artist has a complex discography (US only releases, compilations, etc etc) it's not always clear what albums are being referring to. For example, by my count the Kinks' Lola and the Powerman is in the "turgid" period, which is absurd!
posted by Lorin at 11:18 AM on September 4, 2010

I opened this link with low expectations. And it was awesome. Thanks!
posted by seventyfour at 11:43 AM on September 4, 2010

So Robert Christgau is officially obsolete now?
posted by Weebot at 12:05 PM on September 4, 2010 [1 favorite]

So Robert Christgau is officially obsolete now?

True, if said in 1974.
posted by Faze at 12:08 PM on September 4, 2010 [1 favorite]

Nick Cave: 1-2 songs of death; 3 dead songs; 4-6 dead on; 7-8 deadwood; 9 death toll ≥ 66; 10 dead love; 11-13 dead boring; 14 resurrected.

Dead right!

13 was pretty good, otherwise spot on.
posted by the_very_hungry_caterpillar at 12:12 PM on September 4, 2010

Sonic Youth [...] 13-16 Phish for aging hipsters.

Oh, ouch. Ha.
posted by jokeefe at 12:25 PM on September 4, 2010

The Police: (1-3)We were kinda cool when it wasn't (4-5)almost all about Sting.

Steely Dan: (1-4)Our brand of world-weary cynicism, (5-7) masked by slick production values and jazz hooks, (8-9) is no longer entirely feigned.
posted by logicpunk at 12:44 PM on September 4, 2010 [1 favorite]

> OK this is like awesome poetry.

Sad arc of Elvis Costello= sad arc of Woody Allen.

Huh. That's just about... brilliant.
posted by darth_tedious at 1:03 PM on September 4, 2010

So good: Van Halen: 1-6 Sean Connery; 7-10 Roger Moore; 11 George Lazenby.
posted by straight at 1:28 PM on September 4, 2010 [1 favorite]

Thumbs up for the link! Great ramble.
posted by bjgeiger at 2:26 PM on September 4, 2010

Man, this guy has the closes to my taste in music I've ever encountered.

Fuck Weezer and Smahing Pumpkins, the Doors are overrated. That about sums it up.
posted by cmoj at 2:51 PM on September 4, 2010

Sad arc of Elvis Costello= sad arc of Woody Allen.

Must be the glasses.
posted by octothorpe at 2:59 PM on September 4, 2010

My hat is off, this is concise criticism done right.
posted by tommasz at 5:31 PM on September 4, 2010

When I clicked the link I expected a smile or two. I certainly didn't expect to literally LOL, much less the gigglesnort sparked by:

Rage Against The Machine: 1-3 (thud-thud! sqwee!) Noam Chomsky, motherfuckers! (sqwee!); 4 carbon footprint reduced by recycling old songs.
posted by ErikaB at 6:24 PM on September 4, 2010

Came here to say what so many others have said - went in with low expectations, found myself consistently blown away. Great post Rory, thanks a lot!
posted by kcds at 6:31 PM on September 4, 2010

Who IS this? It's too good not to be someone whose byline we've seen before. Hmm, could the first tweet be a clue.... Dexy's Midnight Runners??!
posted by Scram at 10:38 PM on September 4, 2010

Interview: http://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2010/07/discographies-talks-identity-clues-inspiration-ple.html
posted by Auz at 7:00 AM on September 5, 2010

These are great. I liked:

Wilco: 1 "easy rockers"; 2 "I bought a Peter Laughner CD!"; 3 "I bought a Beach Boys CD!"; 4-5 "I bought Jim O'Rourke!"; 6-7 "easy rockers."

Especially as "easy rocker" is a term used by Tweedy in the Wilco documentary. In the context of rehearsing songs for tour - "we need one more easy rocker".
posted by Infinite Jest at 7:17 AM on September 5, 2010

This is fantastic, cheers Rory!

My favourite: Prince: 1-3 foreplay; 4-5 penetration; 6-9 ecstasy; 10-13 afterglow; 14-18 walk of shame; 19-35 occasional late-night booty calls.

It's the "14-18 walk of shame" that makes it, for some reason.
posted by Len at 9:20 AM on September 5, 2010 [1 favorite]

From Auz's link: "I’m definitely not a robot (unless it turns out that I’m one of those extra-complicated Philip K. Dick robots who don’t know that they’re robots)."

I officially have a(nother) twitter crush.
posted by immlass at 8:26 AM on September 6, 2010