Harmonica Odyssey

January 9, 2009 11:47 AM

Take a trip through clinical depression with this spicy new single from the Jimmy "Pharmacy" Walgreen Jazz Happening, featuring Dr. Herbert Grosowitz and his Passive-Aggressive Harmonica. (Thanks, SongSmith!)

Bonus recordings:

- Matthewchen is Sucking
- Punk Rock Hurl
- More Like Rick Asstley Amirite
- You Are My Techno

The SongSmith demo lets you play with it for six hours for free, and at this point I'm having trouble imagining lasting that long. To be fair, I don't think I'm the target demographic, and there is some actual merit to the guts of this thing—it compares favorably, at least, to some aspects of the Band In A Box software I played with ten years ago in college—but I'm having a hard time imaging a broad set of circumstances in which someone would be both (a) willing to bother to and (b) competent to manage to produce anything of quality with it.

I certainly failed on the being-bothered-to-try front. Things got silly fast and didn't get better before I gave up.

posted by cortex (16 comments total) 7 users marked this as a favorite

Songsmith got it really wrong with that Astley one.
posted by bluishorange at 12:31 PM on January 9, 2009


Just between you and me, I think SongSmith may have a drinking problem.
posted by cortex at 12:43 PM on January 9, 2009 [8 favorites]


Wow, only 1:26 and I bailed out halfway through. Impressive, SongSmith! Have one on me!
posted by languagehat at 1:07 PM on January 9, 2009


Oh, man. You missed the nice noirish turn it takes toward the third act.
posted by cortex at 1:14 PM on January 9, 2009


I made it through the whole thing, but I was writhing in pain / convulsing with laughter by the end.
posted by jedicus at 2:26 PM on January 9, 2009


I think I'm going to set this site as my homepage.
posted by spiderskull at 2:51 PM on January 9, 2009 [1 favorite]


Mr. F just looked over and said "Ard, what are you doing to that poor animal."
posted by fairytale of los angeles at 3:23 PM on January 9, 2009


This is surprisingly not-so-terrible, if a little random. But then, not as random as one might expect.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 3:45 PM on January 9, 2009


I read the FPP, went to the site, heard this song . . . I still don't know what the hell is going on.
posted by arcanecrowbar at 4:45 PM on January 9, 2009


In short- everything except cortex's voice (or harmonica in this case) is computer generated. As in it made up a beat to roughly match the sounds it recorded. Soundsmith tries to generate the backup band to go with whatever vocals you provide it.
posted by mrzarquon at 6:00 PM on January 9, 2009


oh hell no.. I listened to the song before watching the video, and was expecting a video of some drunken beach bum with a mike.. or a reject American idol clip.
posted by xorry at 8:01 PM on January 9, 2009


Ah.. wrong thread.. oh dear.
posted by xorry at 8:02 PM on January 9, 2009


1:26, and I'm laughing my ass off! Holy crap!
posted by snsranch at 1:35 PM on January 12, 2009


I kinda like the Rick Roll one. I feel like it should have an Elvis remix-esque music videos to go with.

Mircosoft VideoSmith?
posted by niles at 3:15 PM on January 13, 2009


More: Kill Me Now, Queen.
posted by cortex at 11:07 AM on January 19, 2009


I almost fell off my chair laughing at the harmonica. I really, really did. Sweet tapdancing moses. Hit me with another belly-blast, Dr. Herbie!
posted by bicyclefish at 11:44 AM on January 19, 2009


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