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somerpmemes · 3 years

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Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist S1 Starters

Change as needed. More under the cut.

“Quick question: do you always have to play and sing your music that loud?”

“Why are you up so early anyways?”

“Oh, I didn’t go to bed.”

“So, you’re ready for this?”

“I just really don’t wanna screw this up.”

“Keeping it lean for the ladies.”

“I need to expand my horizons.”

“It was literally all you.”

“Now is not the time to be modest.”

“Let’s face it, the woman’s a narcissist.”

“Work your magic, feel the glory, in it to win it.”

“Well I’m not really comfortable with anything.”

“Alright, who wants some freshly delivered, slightly cold, mediocre pizza!”

“Could we maybe open a window or something?”

“They’re not that scary.”

“Are you sure this isn’t an elaborate teleportation device that will take me to an alternate universe?”

“I just wanna get this over with.”

“Is this supposed to be happening?”

“That sounds really sad.”

“Why are you singing right now?”

“Why would I sing to you? You don’t even like me.”

“Can I get you anything? Water? Vodka? Xanax?”

“Quick question: did you recently imbibe or inject anything that came from a “medicinal” type shop?”

“But I’m an open-minded person, I’m willing to roll with this.”

“Maybe you’re operating on a higher plane than the rest of us.”

“Child, I’m completely baked. Ain’t nothing going on in my head right now.”

“This is the first thing that I find remotely interesting about you.”

“Will we ever have joie de vivre?”

“My mom left me when I was young and my whole life has been a series of rejections from the opposite sex.”

“You sure you don’t hear that?”

“Let’s party like it’s 1978!”

“And you should really take everything I say when I’m high with a grain of salt.”

“That song is real dark.”

“Good music can make you feel things you can’t express in words.”

“Hey, not that I’m keeping tabs or anything but that’s like your fourth cup of coffee today.”

“That’s a whole lot of tmi I just spewed on you.”

“Who knows what other people are really thinking, right?”

“I’ve found in general death and dying tend not to be the best conversation starters.”

“If I show you something can you promise to keep it only between us?”

“This is the only thing that I can hold onto.”

“I’ve become a real expert on bottling my shame and pain and hiding it from the world.”

“Listen, I’m not an expert on this or anything but you can't just keep it in.”

“I should’ve been the one this happened to.”

“I think we’re just gonna have to stumble through it together. The blind leading the blind.”

“If you had the power to know what was going on in other people’s heads, do you think you’d feel guilty?”

“I’m going to be uncharacteristically honest with you so don’t get used to it.”

“I notice everything.”

“I just feel like everyone’s against me.”

“Two more hours and I would’ve gotten it, just saying.”

“There’s gonna be good days and bad days, remember? Let’s chalk this up to one of the good ones.”

“Mama needs an update.”

“No, no, don’t be flattered.”

“I view you more as a social experiment, like a rat running through a maze.”

“Sounds bougie, I’m in.”

“I'm not in trouble, am I?”

“Bottom line, please?”

“You’re yelling, bro.”

“I’m acting weirder than normal?”

“Believe it or not I didn’t really play any sports growing up.”

“This power is wasted on you!”

“Is this weird? This feels weird.”

“I gotta say, I am loving the energy.”

“I’m pretty sure nobody cares.”

“Any desire to tell me what this is all about?”

“Of course I know that song, it’s a very famous song. Do YOU know that song?”

“With great power comes a lot of nasty stuff don’t nobody wanna do.”

“I’m not NOT mortified right now.”

“Please tell me your day was better than mine.”

“Do I need to hide all of my breakables?”

“I can’t cook. You should see the inside of my fridge.”

“I guess we’ve just breezed right past the whole “knocking-and-waiting-for-the-other-person-to-answer” phase.”

“When I get inspired no doors will stand in my way.”

“Creative. Absolutely terrifying..”

“Could be cool. Could be confusing. Could be both. Let’s see.”

“And I’m kinda obsessed with you.”

“Door’s always open, honey.”

“So could everyone please act as if they care?”

“I haven’t breathed outside air in over forty-three hours.”

“Why did we come up with this stupid, stupid plan?”

“Dolly Parton is my spirit animal.”

“There are lots of reasons why people are unsatisfied, ___. 80% of it is sex related.”

“Do you just make these statistics up?”

“I’m gonna keep this one simple.”

“The only place I’m comfortable dancing is in my bedroom… closet.”

“Don’t ever say that again.”

“First of all, that’s terrible grammar.”

“I was a drum major in high school and that mess would not have been tolerated.”

“I have always found it helpful to vent when I’m feeling dissatisfied.”

“I don’t vent, I scream into a pillow.”

“You dress like a docent at a folk art museum.”

“Wow, we’re still talking about this?”

“___, are you growing as a person?”

“And the good news is I’ve been banned from the grocery store.”

“There’s been a radical shift in the way I perceive the world, you wouldn’t understand.”

“There is nothing in the world that I love more than your smile. But not if it isn’t real.”

“Don’t make this into a thing right now.”

“That term hasn’t been used in well over a decade.”

“I can see your side eye.”

“You can take the fifth and stop telling me about it.”

“Do you know anything about faith at all?”

“I think we might be vibing again.”

“Are you sure that everything’s okay with you because I feel like maybe it’s not.”

“See, that whole “leap of faith” thing really doesn’t work for me.”

“Empathy is a wonderful gift to have.”

“I have faith. You should too.”

“I recognize your tiny footsteps.”

“Okay, that’s enough gaping at the shut in for one day.”

“I swear this is the last one.”

“Why so secretive?”

“I am very aware of what a duet is.”

“Why do I even answer the phone this early?”

“My brain does not like functioning until night o’clock.”

“What’s the good of bad news if you can’t share it?”

“I love barely meeting expectations!”

“Is it great? Feels not so great.”

“I think you’re crushing it, that’s all that matters.”

“You two would be great in a female cop show.”

“Something’s going on with you, I can tell.”

“How do you do that? Really see me. No one else has the ability.”

“I’m just not used to negative feedback.”

“Care to tell me what the hell is going on?”

“Can I take a picture? I’m gonna take a picture.”

“Uh oh. Don’t tell me you’re depressed too.”

“My body’s doing all sorts of disgusting things to me like making liquid appear in my eyes.”

“It’s too gutless, it’s too passive-aggressive. I like aggressive-aggressive.”

“I just feel like I’m failing.”

“Why do you put so much pressure on yourself?”

“Wow. I just got a window into your soul and, baby, it is not a place I wanna visit.”

“Did you know I once stared at the ocean for literally seven hours?”

“How about you lead the way and I’ll just holler if I need any medical assistance?”

“You’d tell me if you weren’t good, right?”

“So, tell me some good news please.”

“Thank you for not trying to fix me or make me feel better. Thanks for just being real.”

“Why are you smirking?”

“Sometimes I just feel like I can’t do anything right.”

“Someone sounds like they’re in a good mood.”

“The world is waiting, so am I.”

“I have no interest in hanging around a bunch of 20-somethings talking about artisanal beer all night.”

“___, this is a classy affair. Of course they’ll be pigs in a blanket.”

“Now it’s time for a makeover which is literally my favorite thing to do.”

“No matter how hard I try I just never say the right thing.”

“At least let me help you accessorize.”

“I gotta admit this is kinda fun.”

“Now they just taste like water.”

“Who do we know with a hot tub?”

“You are super fun. Like sloppy, dance on a bar fun.”

“I might also be drunk.”

“I’m a mess… and emotional… also vodka.”

“Life doesn’t always go as planned. It just doesn’t.”

“Is it weird that I want one of those?”

“Yeah, nothing good happens after someone sings that song.”

“I hate when people assume I know their names.”

“So, you’re attractive and talented.”

“I can’t believe that happened, and how quickly…”

“If there’s something going on I’d love all our friends to hear about it.”

“You should probably leave this party before you burn something else down.”

“That’s almost funny.”

“I need that thing more than you’ve ever needed anything in your entire life and I’m ready to fight you for it if you make me.”

“I wouldn’t trust myself to ride that thing sober let alone now still halfway drunk.”

“The last thing I want to hear from you is another apology.”

“I really need to be mad at you right now.”

“Are you crying?”

“What? I’m not allowed to get emotional at a superhero movie? Lives were lost, ___. Ethical questions were raised!”

“He only responds in one letter. ‘K’? Who does that?”

“Just— let’s talk about you.”

“It’s hard to accept that I can’t do this all on my own anymore.”

“Wouldn’t peg you for a food court guy.”

“We are gonna be ultra professional from now on.”

“What’s the crisis? Did I cause it?”

“Can you believe it?! ...apparently you can and perhaps already knew?”

“___, are you okay? You look paler than usual.”

“You okay? You look shaken.”

“But I feel great and I’m gonna be totally fine.”

“Can you google that for me?”

“Are you seriously hiding from me?”

“I listen to true crime to calm myself.”

“Look, we both know I’m not good with feelings or emotions.”

“Mad respect for your pun game.”

“Men don’t check on men in bathrooms, it’s not a thing.”

“Well now I know you’re telling the truth because no one would ever lie about doing something that heartless.”

“Were we ever even friends at all?”

“Real friends have hard conversations. They owe it to each other.”

“I’m gonna get deep for a hot second so bear with me.”

“Stuff like this has been going on for a while now. You wanna tell me what’s up?”

“You’re starting to seem like a liability, man.”

“What’s the point of rising if we can’t do it together?”

“Here to pour salt on my wounds?”

“It’s all coming from a place of love.”

“It is not exactly what I expected but I’m rolling with it.”

“Watch how fast I nail this.”

“Are we talking witchcraft or just shameless career advancing?”

“I’ve got a super chill brain that never needs calming, so…”

“Was I just singing out loud?”

“Am I going crazy? I feel like I am. I mean, I don’t know what crazy feels like but I feel like this is it.”

“That’s… bad.”

“Are you fine? I mean, I know you’re not fine but…”

“Can you schedule your nervous breakdown for another day?”

“In solving one problem I’ve created another.”

“I… I don’t know why that happened.”

“Okay, yes, I’ll admit I’m in a good mood but it’s for completely unrelated reasons.”

“Okay, this is getting worse by the second.”

“I apologize in advance for whatever’s about to come out of mouth.”

“I'm really sorry. Just know, it’s not me, it’s my body.”

“That’s such a strange way to phrase that.”

“There you go, now you know. Hey, that rhymed.”

“I will go to the supermarket… one day.”

“I ruined my entire life yesterday.”

“I just call that uninspired.”

“Honestly, I think I’m broken.”

“What exactly is going on here? A creative inspiration or a massive cry for help?”

“I’m broken and I’m gonna die alone.”

“How do you go through all that suffering and not let it break you?”

“I don’t know what to do. And it’s tearing me up inside.”

“Hurt people hurt people.”

“I think it’s best if you don’t look at me or worry about and focus on what I’m thinking or feeling.”

“It can be challenging sometimes, knowing the right way and the wrong way to care for somebody.”

“Well, it’s the almost-thought that counts.”

“That’s a terrible surprise face.”

“I think it’s finally time I focus on my own happiness for a change.”

“I don’t want to talk. Lord knows that we’ve done enough talking.”

“I’m exhausted. And exhilarated. And thoroughly depleted.”

“Stay aloof, reveal nothing, keep small talk down to a minimum.”

“You’ve been there for me, I wanna be there for you.”

“Don’t smile at me, I don’t wanna look at your sad, appreciative eyes.”

“What? He’s hot, I’m weak, you do the math.”

“That might be the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in a hoodie before.”

“This would be a great place to murder someone, huh?”

“So, who’s ready to talk about death?”

“It doesn’t have to go down like this, ___.”

“You can only postpone the inevitable for so long.”

“In moments like these sometimes you have to haul out the big guns.”

“Someone better be dead or dying, I’m not in the mood.”

“I am worried. This is how I compensate.”

“I find you charming and disturbing, like a Pomeranian wearing a tutu.”

“I go big or go home.”

“Death is hideous and ugly and grotesque and wildly, wildly unfair.”

“Believe me, I’m not doing well but I’m not doing that badly either.”

“I guess we gotta face the music sometime, right?”

#zep #zoey's extraordinary playlist #rp #rp meme #rp starters #starters #sentence starters #sentence starter meme #ask meme

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lifetimeswiftie13 · 4 years

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17 things i learned before turning 17

when i met taylor last august, she told me that she loved my 16 things i learned before turning 16 post & thanked me for taking the time to write it. she explained to me that while she was writing hers, she hoped someone would do the same, so when she saw that i wrote one as well, it made her so happy ( 🥺?!!). soooooo!!! here i am again a whole year later with another!

1. appreciate the little things

- i find myself looking back on moments that seemed so insignificant at the time more often than anything else, so i’ve learned to appreciate and hold on to each little moment

2. life is unpredictable

-i think we can definitely all agree on this one hahshshs. sometimes things get thrown at us that we feel unprepared and scared for (like a global pandemic!) so it’s important that we keep in mind how crazy life can be so we aren’t thrown off gaurd

3. it’s okay to be vulnerable

-i’ve realized recently that it’s okay to let people in and open up to them (if you feel comfortable)

4. music plays a huge role in my life

-music has always been something I take comfort in and use as an outlet, but it wasn’t until recently that i’ve realized how important it is to me. sometimes I spend hours on spotify trying to find new artists / music to add to my playlists!

5. put yourself first

-it can be so difficult to do what’s best for you instead of what you think others want from you, but it’s so important to put yourself first and take a step back if you need.

6. be someone others feel safe to lean on

-being there for your friends when they’re going through a though time or just need someone to talk to is so important. check in and remind them how much you care as often as you can.

7. put yourself out there

-as someone who is terrified of social situations, this can be so difficult. i’ve always found it hard to open up to new people, which is why being new freshman year was pretty difficult for me. i went into junior year making it my goal to put myself out there as much as possible & now i’ve made so many new amazing friends who I feel so comfortable around :,)

8. take a break

-i used to constantly put myself down because of the way being on social media made me feel. i ended up deleting instagram for a while and i immediately felt so much better. i don’t think I realized until I didn’t have access to social media how much I let it control me.

9. i loooovvvveee to read

-i used to despise reading and would be so confused each time someone told me they read for pleasure. when quarantine started and I deleted social media, I was SO bored & decided to start reading books that weren’t school required and now i LOVE IT!! some of my favorites are the sun is also a star, call me by your name, conversations with friends, and red white & royal blue!

10. don’t be a doormat

-i’m the type of person who feels the need to constantly try to please people but i’ve learned that it’s okay to say no to things! you can be nice without letting people walk all over you

11. it’s fun to try new foods

-i’m the pickiest eater EVER but recently i’ve been pushing myself to expand my food pallet (which just consists of pasta. that’s it.) and i ended up trying so many new foods that I looovvvveee

12. go with the flow

-always trying to plan my life 2672828282 days ahead can be so stressful. though it’s important to be prepared (or in my case, over prepared), it’s really nice to let yourself relax and go with the flow

13. “my love for taylor swift grows more & more every day”

-this is a direct quote from my 16 things I learned before turning 16 but is still VERY relevant! taylor has been a constant in my life for as long as I can remember, but each day I feel my love for her grow stronger. she is truly just the best person I know. her kindness and generosity towards others is something i’ve always looked up to, she never fails to inspire me. i love her with all of my heart and I can’t even express how much she means to me.

14. you never know what someone is going through.

-social media is truly just a highlight reel of someone’s life. even if you’re super close to someone, they still have parts of their life they choose to keep private, whether you know it or not. try to keep this in mind!

15. speak up for yourself

-if something is bothering you or makes you feel uncomfortable, it is so much better to have a conversation about it rather than let it bring you down!

16. you are BEAUTIFUL!

-for some reason, i really struggled with confidence this year. i was constantly comparing myself to others and wishing i looked like them. though this is something i do still have a hard time with, i have to remind myself not to not try so hard to fit into some unrealistic standard of beauty. everyone is so beautiful in their own ways and it can be so hard to realize that about yourself.

17. we’ll be alright

-this year has been a rollercoaster. though 16 was pretty rough, it did come along with amazing memories that i’ll never forget. the rocky parts of the journey cause you to grow stronger and appreciate the not so rocky parts! i feel like i’ve grown so much over the past year, and i’m proud of myself for pushing through the dark and scary moments. everything is going to alright. i can’t wait to see what 17 brings!

love, kayla ❤️

#sorry this is long #HSHDJDJ #i wrote this in like 30 mins so pls ignore typos #me!

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billie33n8366-blog · 5 years

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Rock Music (Yes) Or Pop Music (No)?

Music actually started to separate into completely different categories throughout the Trendy era (1910-2000). That mentioned, everybody these days should be aware of the truth that songs are getting an increasing number of similar-y. Here is a video courtesy of ThinkTank speaking about how science is starting to quantifiably show that pop music is getting worse and that originality is getting increasingly more rare these days in in style music. In a while Rock and Roll style entered the scene and that fashion was additionally included and amalgamated in the pop music. Latin music was additionally adopted after which came the most recent development which is well-liked until date. That type was the novelty song which was based on comedy, humor and straightforward lyrics which will be understood easily by everyone. But I still have issues with it, www.magicaudiotools.com all the identical. Lot's of individuals complain that current pop-music is bad, and I don't think they're wrong. By definition they aren't fallacious, because pop music is meant to have broad in style enchantment and it increasingly fails to do so. There was a flavour of conventional British music corridor in two playful songs from 1975's A Night time At The Opera - Seaside Rendezvous and Lazing On A Sunday Afternoon. But on the next album, A Day At The Races, Freddie turned that influence into a success music. As its title instructed, Good Previous-Customary Lover Boy was Freddie in sweetly romantic temper. And I will say it, the mainstream nation music viewers and important press is partially responsible for this. If they don't seem to be keen to name mainstream country on its bullshit (which this web site does and I try to do as the only country critic on YouTube), then this shit is going to maintain occurring and it's going to keep selling until the pattern dies with my demographic and we all get sick of it. The present bubble isn't sustainable, and it's only a matter of time and larger numbers of individuals clicking in before it implodes. This is a simple one. However if you'd like a study to show it, we've got it When in doubt, don't accept simple listening restaurant background music. It should decrease gross sales of your food and drinks. In case you'd classify a track as elevator music, maintain it off your playlist. Oddly, given PoP's musical preferences, one of many label aspect's first signings was an Iron Maiden-ish hard rock band referred to as It is Alive, fronted by an extended-haired glam-rock singer named Martin White. PoP noticed that White — who, regardless of his metalhead persona, had a secret love of pop music — was a genius at crafting melodies. In his revealed medical report, Goergen famous the existence of a big, lovely, vaulted salon in his sanatorium designed for gatherings, carefully directed conversations, games, and especially for musical and literary shows acceptable for Gemüthskranke (see Goergen, 1820 , p. thirteen). In 1831, Goergen relocated his non-public sanatorium to Upper-Döbling, now in Vienna's 19th district. Nicolaus Lenau, who based on Ludwig August Frankl had the vision of a new music therapeutic system," was one of many sanatorium's most distinguished patients. He died in Goergen's clinic in 1850, then headed by Bruno Goergen's son, Gustav. Enjoying the soundtrack alone is a distinct experience. If the track (words and music) is good you will hear things you did not discover when viewing the video. If the monitor was only a machine to keep your ears busy when you watched then, as a music monitor, it will fall flat. 1. What's timbre? I know this myself (I've studied music concept), however the common Joe has no clue what it means. The example I personally use is that a A#5 on a piano sounds completely different than a A#5 on a flute. Timbre is what compromises the variations. Almost all Pop hits characteristic a strong, regular rhythm groove. That is how songs connect with listeners in a bodily manner. A rhythmic groove also expresses the perspective or vitality of your tune. There are dance grooves, strutting grooves, bluesy grooves, sad grooves, completely satisfied ones. Let the groove information you into your tune by suggesting words that match the mood or attitude. Music is available in many differing types and styles ranging from traditional rock music to world pop, simple listening and bluegrass. Many genres have a rich history or geographical significance, a cult following or music roots that go far beyond the twentieth century.

Within the final decade, East Asian media flows and connections have intensified. Media markets have rapidly expanded and transnational partnerships have been closely formed amongst media companies which pursue advertising and marketing strategies and joint production ventures spanning a number of completely different markets. The circulation of well-liked tradition is now not limited to the nationwide borders but finds a broader transnational acceptance within the region, resulting in the formation of new links amongst folks in East Asia, especially the youth. This trend has proven no signal of letting up. Asian markets have grow to be much more synchronized, East Asian co-projects in movie and music have change into more widespread, and singers and actors from across the area are engaged in activities that transcend national borders.Recognition - the state or situation of being liked, admired, or supported by many individuals. Subsequent, the songs had been sorted into subgenres via tags created by the 50 million users of , a UK-primarily based music discovery web site. (Mauch was working at in 2010 when he started to review the evolution of pop music with biologist Armand Leroi). Moombahton is a funky style that performs off of a fusion between home music and reggaton. It's one of many latest kinds of music that even those who assume they don't like EDM can take pleasure in. It will have you salsa dancing your approach downtown, and DJs like Dillon Francis find it irresistible as a result of it was created fully on accident at a home party one evening a number of years back.Though higher often known as a member of Saint Etienne, Bob Stanley can also be an experienced music journalist, and little doubt has a document collection to die for, which makes him the perfect candidate for the job, and with the perfectly titled ‘Yeah Yeah Yeah' he does not disappoint. It is a massive book that does an important job of describing the very best in pop music. His intention is to tell the whole story (inside sure parameters) and on the similar time to distil pop music into its purest kind, so that we'd come to a better understanding of pop and to give the respect it is due as an artwork kind.

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5-star-songs · 7 years

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Weekend Rant: My FIOO X5II

I post a blurb a day here, Monday through Friday, but from time to time I might post something music-related but not song-specific on a Saturday or Sunday. The occasion for this one: my love for my new mp3 player.

Maybe it’s odd that a guy who spent ten years helping build and evolve Rhapsody, and then the next four doing the same for Google Play, even has an mp3 player. My Android + the music streaming subscription service of my choice should serve all my needs, especially since Google Play lets me store 50,000 of my own songs on their servers, and mix and match them with everything else in their catalog.

But my phone’s battery is a precious resource I must conserve, and I spend too much time flying or driving long distances with no internet connection. And I prefer having access to my entire music collection at those times, rather than whatever subset of it I remembered to save for offline listening before the trip began.

For years, that meant carrying a 160GB iPod classic with me wherever I went. But Apple discontinued that a while back, and even before they did my collection had exceeded its capacity (roughly 31,000 songs), which meant that every new record I added to it required deleting an old one. And that caused me physical and emotional distress, every time.

So when my iPod started showing signs it was on the verge of failing for good, I began hunting around for a replacement. Which led me to my new favorite possession, the Fiio X5 2nd gen pictured above.

Fiio’s a Chinese company that makes, among other things, surprisingly affordable, audiophile-quality digital audio players. That means all the elements inside the player have been selected and engineered to appeal to people with picky tastes and expensive headphones and lossless audio files who like to fiddle endlessly with EQ settings.

While I own and appreciate well-designed amplifiers and speakers, I’m not really an audiophile. I can reliably tell the difference between a WAV file and a 192kbps mp3 of the same song, but bump that mp3 up to 320kbps and I can’t tell you which one’s which anymore. I believe there are people who can notice the difference (Neil Young is most definitely one of them), but I’m also pretty sure they’re less than 5% of the population, and I am not among them.

So the X5ii’s real appeal to me is its storage capacity: rather than the outdated hard drive of my old iPod, this Fiio holds two micro sd cards of whatever capacity you choose -- both of mine are 200GB at the moment, meaning this thing already holds more than twice what that iPod did, but as technology advances and 512GB cards become more affordable, I can expand it further, if and when I need to. So, while I don’t personally need my entire collection in any of the lossless formats Fiio supports, I do plan on upgrading all of those 120 and 192kbps mp3s I ripped or acquired in the aughts.

The X5ii has a similar form factor to an iPod, including a scroll wheel, but because Fiio is a small company the bulk of their resources are apparently focused on the hardware, not the software, leaving a few trade-offs for iPod users to get accustomed to. Most significantly, since the X5ii doesn’t come with any media management software, you have to update the device manually -- that means dragging and dropping any new songs directly onto the device via your computer, and that means taking some time, if you haven’t already, to organize your collection in a logical folder structure so what’s on your device can be compared at a glance to what’s on your computer, and swapped back and forth most easily.

Once you’ve got the music you want on the device, you’ll find that navigating within your collection takes longer compared to an iPod, and the UI feels like it was designed by nerds for other nerds, rather than by nerds for their parents. If, like me, you have thousands of artists in your collection, and feel like playing a specific album by someone in the middle of the alphabet (as pictured above), it’s going to take you a minute or more of spinning that wheel before the music’s playing. I do the bulk of my listening by putting my entire collection, or some large subset of it, on shuffle play, so I don’t really mind the lag.

(Addendum, 3/12/17: I started minding the lag, a lot. My breaking point came last month, on a flight, while trying to write up “Waterloo Sunset.” It took me so goddamn long to navigate to the track I wound up timing it: one minute and thirty-four seconds. That felt unacceptable, so I came up with a better solution: I re-arranged my filing system so that there’s a separate folder for each letter of the alphabet on simcard #1, and artists are filed in the appropriate folder like they might be in a record store (except, since it’s a digital age, Bruce Springsteen goes in B, not S, etc.). This change improved the navigation experience dramatically: I can now have “Waterloo Sunset” playing twenty-three seconds after wishing it, or more than four times faster than before.)

There’s only one thing I consider a serious degradation of my old iPod experience: my X5ii hates external playlists. Just getting one onto the device is probably too daunting for the average consumer: you have to export the playlist from your media manager, open it in Notepad, and do a universal find-and-replace operation so that all the paths to your tracks on your computer (ie: C:/Users/Tim/Music/Magnetic Fields/Love at the Bottom of the Sea) get switched over to the paths on your device (ie: TF1:/Magnetic Fields/Love at the Bottom of the Sea). (Or, as of 3/21: TF1:/M/Magnetic Fields/Love at the Bottom of the Sea.)

That I could handle easily enough. Unfortunately, it turns out that even though the X5ii can hold tens of thousands of songs, it can’t handle a playlist with more than ~3,000 tracks at a time. Attempting to play one uses up too much RAM, and the device freezes. That was a major bummer, since the playlists I rely on most are anywhere from ~5,000 songs (“4 and 5 Star Soul”) to ~24,000 songs (“4 and 5 Star Everything”).

I tried to deal with this by splitting up my massive playlists into smaller ones, and rotating through them. But that was unsatisfying, because it meant one of the eight “4 and 5 Star Everything” playlists was all songs that started with H, so I wound up hearing a bunch of songs about hearts in a row. Note to all musicians (including myself): you can stop writing songs about hearts, and how they break, and how to heal them. It’s been done.

There was one other solution, which I was hesitant to try, and even more hesitant to admit to actually going through with, because it’s kind of insane. But it’s also why I’m posting about this on 5 Star Songs, as will become clear in a moment.

For reasons I don’t quite understand, my X5ii can easily handle a playlist with tens of thousands of tracks if it’s made directly on the device. So, I could replicate my “4 and 5 Star Everything” playlist by clicking the device’s “favorite” icon 24,760 times (doing so actually required 74,280 clicks, because you have to click once to reveal the icon, click a second time to select it, and then click a third time to move on to the next song you want to flag).

This seemed nuts. But, if it’s not already obvious, I really like my music, and I’m really particular about how I listen to it. And I loved everything else about my X5ii. If I could just favorite those 24,760 songs I already knew I liked best, keeping that Favorites playlist updated as I added new music would be much simpler than constantly exporting, editing and saving Notepad files.

So, um, I did it. Took me a week -- turns out it’s something you can do each evening while binge watching Horace and Pete. And though I’m a little embarrassed about it (and my wife is completely bewildered by my compulsion), I’m quite glad I did. For one thing, I now have the perfect portable device, capable of powering the highest quality headphones while carrying the sum total of all music I’ve collected over the past forty-odd years.

For another, it made me commune with that collection in a manner that turns out to be much more immersive and satisfying than scanning the spines of LPs or CDs stored on shelves. Over the course of a week, I stared at every album cover briefly, and made note of each song title, learning things I’d never realized along the way (for instance: Mavis Staples covered one of my favorite George Soule songs; also: the list of things bands have written odes to waiting for or on (A Friend, The Guns, Superman) is pretty funny when considered in a row).

So, that’s why the header at the top of this Tumblr recently switched from saying, “My iPod has 31,302 songs…” to “My mp3 player has 36,374 songs...” The number, which had stalled for years as I had to banish songs that had commited no crime beyond earning a mere 3 stars, can now start growing again. And that makes me so happy, I don’t mind it took me clicking buttons almost 75,000 times. I will always be an obsessive idiot when it comes to music.

There are far worse ways to muddle through life.

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