In fairness, 10 car songs that hit on all cylinders is meant to tie the rise of muscle car culture to some specific instances of popular music, but I've been doing a lot with playlist assignments lately and can't help but sense a missed opportunity. I've been conceptualizing the playlist assignment as somewhere near the textual edge of a print/media continuum that can be helpful for thinking about educational change--instead of walking completely away from print activities and toward media compositions, instructors can traverse the continuum, weaving print and media literacies together as they go.

Playlists, then, work really well, because they require very few non-print steps to implement. HTML is nice, but with a word processor or pencil and pad, you can create the list. But, when you make the list, you also delve into the world of music and sound. Sure, you'll think about song titles. But for the list to really congeal, you'll have tap into the messages and the lyrics. Even better, you need to create patterns of sound based on the musical elements of the songs. Yes, the assignment is easy and composed with print, but selecting and sequencing the songs kicks you into a process of musical analysis and arrangement.

So, I'm not that impressed with some of what's on the list:

Mustang Sally, Wilson Pickett
Little Deuce Coupe, The Beach Boys
Little Red Corvette, Prince
Pink Cadillac, Bruce Springsteen
Hot Rod Lincoln, Commander Cody and his Lost Planet Airmen
409, The Beach Boys
G.T.O., Ronny and the Daytonas
Coupe de Ville, Neil Young
Rocket 88, Ike Turner
Pontiac Blues, Sonny Boy Williamson.

Now, some of these seem like possibilities for a car list, but others just seem to take up too literal a connection between the song and the message that might be woven into the list. I'm not all that familiar with Bruce Springsteen, but I know that any song with the lyrics,

Beyond the Palace hemi-powered drones scream down the boulevard
The girls comb their hair in rearview mirrors
And the boys try to look so hard

probably deserves to jump ahead of "Pink Cadillacs," even if that song has an iconic luxury car in the title. Other observations: no songs by the Beach Boys allowed in the list--no, it's not that I don't like the songs or appreciate the cultural reflections they create; it's just that it's too easy and direct a connection.

Well, it's easy to critique someone else's list, so I should probably offer some ideas of my own. It will take a while to really put together a list, but a couple of candidates that have shuffled across the earscape lately would be,

Neil Young, Unknown Legend
OMC, How Bizarre
The Doors, LA Woman
Citizen Cope, Sun's Gonna Rise
Buck 65, Wicked and Weird.

I'll need to think about this some more. It turns out wikipedia has a heckuva list started. Now to take those raw materials and compose.

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 09:33 AM
Taged as >> the sounds of cars reverberate through the earscape | Permalink

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 10:57 PM
Taged as >> past protests sound again | Permalink

Captain Planet 1.2mb	The End Game 5.4mb	Pretty Woman 1.5mb

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 07:30 PM
Taged as >> I almost forgot how much I like teachmix | Permalink

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 09:43 AM
Taged as >> audio messages sway with sound | Permalink

Using applications on the Web is a bit clunky still, but there are some clear opportunities for writing and teaching through the new Web. In addition to the bubblesnaps image and the mychingo voicemail recorder embedded here, I've been experimenting with snapvine, which brings the cell phone into the mix.

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 12:56 PM
Taged as >> teaching through applications of the second Web | Permalink

Paris Hilton Voicemail

Batman Voicemail

Mother Nature Voicemail

I'm thinking of a number of twists that might go with this assignment. The first would simply be to have both the voicemail prompt like these, and then to record a message from a caller that demonstrates a different character or perspective. As a challenge, I'd like to tell a story or make a point using a series of calls left on a voicemail.

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 02:55 PM
Taged as >> profiles in audio presence | Permalink

Rain & Voice 1.6 mb mp3

Rain & Voice & Text 12.5 mb mov

Voice & Image 2.6 mb mov

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 12:30 PM
Taged as >> dogwood poem worms its way and has its say | Permalink

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 11:13 PM
Taged as >> learning the way of the link | Permalink

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 11:35 PM
Taged as >> wav files fly like birds | Permalink

Which clip is the Pacific and which is the Atlantic? After you take a guess, reflect on why it might matter.

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 07:17 PM
Taged as >> listen to the breathing sweeps | Permalink

There are two places here--not cities, but environments or rooms. The key to recognizing them should be the background music. These are from a recent trip to New York, if that helps. If you can't get it, try a second audio file with more clues. (63 second audio file).

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 08:03 AM
Taged as >> sound files tell stories | Permalink

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 07:58 AM
Taged as >> just a small sampling of self | Permalink

I also came across this piece today with the engaging headline IPods More Popular Than Beer. Not much to the piece beyond its pointing out a wide open avenue for extending teaching and writing. Steve also recently discussed some of his podcasting efforts, and I really like the audioblogger channel he has set up for his classes. It seems like he's well on the way to streamlining the process of creating teaching materials and getting them to the earbuds.

Also this week, Jenny has posted about the enviable week she is spending at audio camp. She offers this helpful reflection,

- Think in terms of “scenes.” Audio documentaries need to create action and sounds/images within certain “sites” for the listener. This means that your sounds will need to create certain textures of scenes. Setting the action and narrative within scenes will help to make your words “thicker” for the audience. For example, one of our instructors played us an audio documentary about military wives, and the “scenes” included a woman talking in her kitchen. You could hear the sounds of kids playing around the table, while the narrative voice talks over the sounds. A little thing, maybe, but it gives the listener *some* image to hold see.

- Create layers and textures of sounds. More than just a music soundtrack (my audio drug of choice), textures of sounds include the kind of thing I just mentioned. This means, practically speaking, that you have to think about recording *sound*, and not just words for an interview. The sound should be 3-D so that scenes are created.

Finally, I need to make one connection with my previous post about e-books. One of the things that bothers me about Roger Sperberg's reaction to John Updike's speech was the sense I picked up in the podcast of Updike's struggle against new publication paradigms and media. Sure, it's easy to denigrate the speech for its unwillingness to seek common assumptions. But listening to the speech gives me pause. Perhaps I'm just too forgiving, but I read a confusion, a fish-out-of water effort to survive the e-book phenomenon. The key, though, is that I get this reading not from the words, which convey resistance, but from the sounds, the tone and resignation in the voice, which for some reason evokes in my sympathy. Here (to show I'm not a knee-jerk defender of Updike and the book paradigm) is a small snippet.

So, I'm eager to hear more sounds, to better learn to read them.

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 08:05 AM
Taged as >> there's something happening here | Permalink

There should be a couple of clues in there. Context and answer coming on Wednesday, unless anyone gets it first.

Posted by Daniel Anderson at 04:10 PM
Taged as >> on the road with m-audio | Permalink