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Song of the Day #1,504: ‘Looking For Nothing’ – Aimee Mann

I can’t think of a better choice as my first example of a ‘Melancholy’ artist than Aimee Mann. She’s probably the first three results on a Google search of the word melancholy (that’s the 21st century version of the old picture-in-the-dictionary cliché).

Yes, she’s the saddest, loneliest woman to ever strap on a guitar, and I love every damn minute of it. Nobody captures existential malaise or Gen X ennui as well as she does and, all the better, she does it with a mordant sense of humor and an acute melodic ear.

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Song of the Day #1,503: ‘Someone’s Gonna Break Your Heart’ – Fountains of Wayne

Fountains of Wayne is the first ‘Pure Pop’ representative in my personal musical genome project. They have pretty much perfected the art of power pop, synthesizing a host of influences into a supremely pleasing package.

My daughters are particularly drawn to Fountains of Wayne’s music. It started with ‘Hey Julie’ and ‘Stacy’s Mom’ then expanded to include ‘Troubled Times,’ ‘Hackensack’ and ‘Bright Future in Sales.’ And they didn’t know at first that all of these songs were by the same group.

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Song of the Day #1,502: ‘King’s Highway’ – Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

The next group of artists in my musical genome belong to a category I’m labeling “FOLK ROCK DERIVATIVES.”

The way I see it, most modern rock music derives either from folk, pop or the blues. I have examples of all three in the 35 artists I’m featuring during this series, but I have designated categories for only the first two.

The reason I’m calling this group of bands “FOLK ROCK DERIVATIVES” and not just folk rockers is they have all moved well past those roots into many different styles of music. But there’s no denying their earliest influences.

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Song of the Day #1,501: ‘Cryin’ Shame’ – Lyle Lovett

Up next in my personal musical genome project is Mr. Lyle Lovett, in honor of my sister, whose birthday is today. (Happy Birthday, Amy!)

Lovett falls into the ‘COUNTRY PLUS’ category. The “plus” is a designation my nerdy family has used for years to differentiate special movies and songs within certain genres from more generic examples. So Woody Allen’s movies, say, are “comedy plus” while your basic Adam Sandler vehicle is a plain old comedy.

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Song of the Day #1,500: ‘Claire’s Ninth’ – Ben Folds

Pandora tells me I like Ben Folds because his music exhibits major key tonality, melodic songwriting and a dynamic male vocalist. That’s how the musical genome project categorizes his music (along with dozens of other attributes they don’t surface, I’m sure). And according to that criteria, I should also like Josh Ritter, Ben Kweller and Death Cab for Cutie.

I don’t know two of those artists and I’m indifferent to the third but I’m sure they do sound something like Ben Folds and probably have some of the same fans. But does my love of Ben Folds necessarily mean that I’ll like people who sound like him? Maybe I like him despite his major key tonality (whatever that means), not because of it.

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