Love The Cruelty of the iPod Shuffle
posted by on February 13 at 14:32 PM
For the past year and a half, I’ve had the limited privilege of being involved with a wonderful dude in a faraway town, and while in some ways it’s been okay—long-distance relationships involve long stretches of self-involvement marked by intense bursts of connection, which is kinda how I like it—in other ways it totally sucks. Divergent time zones sometimes make phone conversations difficult, air travel ain’t cheap, plus we’re both guys, and despite the homosexuality, we’re not that adept (or in my case, willing) to spend a lot of time talking about unpleasant emotions like sadness and loneliness and futile lustfulness.
So we try to stay connected through art appreciation and email and klutzy phone calls, for which we’re rewarded with glorious weekends together every six weeks or so. These visits are when long-distance relationships pay off—it’s like being on a weekend-long date with someone you’re totally into that you know is going to put out—and glory hallelujah, this weekend brings a long-awaited visit from Jake….unless this predicted storm screws up air travel from the east.
With Jake’s visit now up to the assholish weather gods, I turn back to the eternal comforts of music, as selected by my iPod’s random shuffle mode.
Over the past few days, my iPod has randomly selected—from some 15,000 songs—Randy Newman’s heartbreaking “Living without You” three different times.
Not only that, but each of the three times Newman’s agonizing isolation anthem has played, it’s been quickly followed by a song explicitly championing suicide.
Once it was Billie Holiday’s version of “Gloomy Sunday.”
Twice—twice!—it was the Replacements’ “The Ledge.”
Clearly, my iPod wants me sad, then dead.
-- i'm in a similar "long distance relationship" boat. i am lucky enough to have 2 ipods, so i fill up my shuffle and send it off with her for train rides and coffee shop listening. it is a nice way to communicate feelings for sure.
I love that story, iPod's random shuffle freaks me out sometimes! Once I was walking down the street only to see an ex and his new boyfriend crossing the street. THIS song from the band STARS came on, "Your Ex-Lover Is Dead" which starts with the line "God That Was Strange to see you again..." iPod timing is funny.
lyric here:http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/stars/yourexloverisdead.html
I too find the ipod shuffle decidedly UNrandom. I have many songs on there that have never come up and some that come up CONSTANTLY. My pod hearts the Dandy Warhols (of which there are several albums) and Billy Ocean (of which there are only TWO songs!). It's not so much with the hardcore.
There's definitely some sort of Shuffle connection to WORLDS WE CANNOT UNDERSTAND.
In the meantime, kick Shuffle to the curb and proceed directly to "I Can't Wait" by Nu Shooz. You feel better, if slightly stoopid.
My iTunes wanted me to listen to the Hairspray soundtrack so much that I had to delete it. 17 gigs of music and I'm stuck listening to goddamned Hairspray.
I *swear* there's some sort of psychotic elf living in each iPod that takes great delight in torturing the owner of said device.
I was in quite a low spot a few weeks ago, and trying to figure out to get out of it. What do I hear? Three in a row:
Barstool Blues -- Neil Young
So I Am Over You - Pete Droge
Here Comes a Regular - The Replacements
I think my iPod has a drinking problem.
I got my shuffle last Wednesday. I have let to give it control, but methinks now I should just to see what personality slant it has.
lame and pathetic. try shuffling in that song favorite "long-distance relationships never work" and you'll be fine.
I feel you Mr. Schmader. My ldr just ended. And I'm not being like the naysayer above. Mine ended because she moved to town. Across the street from my work. It's glorious. We met and dated from here to Vegas for 7 months. The only problem so far is that during our (35 days!!) together before the move, it was always in vacation mode, leisurely exploring each other's or a new city - so now that she's here - our day to day pace is severely affected by that. Not a bad struggle to have, but I'm sure if it doesn't change soon it'll become problematic.
And why does the iPod shuffle (the function, not the product) usually seem to like specific artists during any given shuffle? Sometimes it's poetic, sometimes it's a pain in the ass.
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