How Long Does An Over-Played Song Stay Over-Played?

So, how long has it taken you to be able to listen to some of the overplayed wonders of years past?

Until I hear it and don't go, "&^%$! not THAT song again!" For some that hasn't happened in the last 40 years . . .

Lol, great thread and observations, Roy. :lol:
I've worn out lots of songs all on my own and never gone back to them. Or as you observe, it can take decades. Even then, I'll drop the needle with a queasy feeling in my stomach.
Doubly painful are songs you never liked in the first place that get played constantly...
'How can I miss you when you won't go away?'
:)

until the artist's memorial service.

Too long.

Most rap "songs" and 99% of anything that is called R&B are overplayed the first time they're heard - and stay over-played, as far as I'm concerned.

That's why I don't listen to the radio anymore. It's iTunes all the way. "myTunes myWay". :D Years ago I used to listen to WPLJ in NYC, a m.o.r. pop rock station. They played I'm Your Lady and Wild Nights ad nauseum. I called the station to ask "what the... ?" I got a guy who said "hey man, we're sick of them too but we have no choice". He cited some reason they were forced to play the songs so many times per show. Eventually those songs tapered off and they latched onto something else. I thought oh no, here we go again and stopped listening.

I can't stand to listen to commercial radio. it's public for me. there is a great station, 90.3 FM (and streaming on the web).
it's a different radio station every hour. real people are on air playing cool records. the music is global.
back when we cruised in our cars the radio was on all the time. ya, Roy, the same songs were played over and over.
I could push one button and hear Creedance Clearwater Revival, hit the next button and her the same song ending.
I hated Creedance.
forty years, Roy. it's forty years. I really enjoy playing Creedance on my guitar. the guy was brilliant.

I very rarely listen to radio for this reason. But I've had this happen with songs I learn. "Sunshine of your Love" was the first song I learned on bass and I can't stand to listen to it now.

When you get up to change the channel.....it's too much

All I know is I still can't listen to anything off the Frampton Comes Alive album.
Wayyyyyyyyyy over played.

On the other hand I know guys who refuse to play Mustang Sally which I will
play whenever it is requested.

Hey! It gets the ladies up and dancing :wink:

:note1: :note1: :note1:

John

I have to side with the anti mustang-sally sentiment.

This afternoons' line up whilest cooking dinner was superb. Old Stones, Beatles, Alvin Lee & Ten Years After, Robin Trower's big one, the Bridge Of Sighs, I think I heard McCartny's Nineteen hundred and Eighty Five on there a week ago. Must learn on guitar. Yes, I like the strange ones.

I gotta agree about the CCR thing. I was sick of them until I discovered I could play them. Now I have three and I'm working on a 4th. (Willie and the Hand Jive?)

Celt, I remember when everyone who was someone had that album. Not too far north of you too. Yes, we heard it alot. I still don't own it. I do play one of the songs. Kind of fun....kind of sappy. If I don't think of Will To Power's cover, I'm good.

Oh yeah, Mott The Hoople doing their claim to fame followed later by David Bowie doing Major Tom. The 80's channel is fair game in the house. We both get offereings from that channel.

Boxboy, I hated that song before the school was out for the summer. Must have been 80, 81 maybe? Always switched it and have quite a collection in my head of alternative words that some or all would find vulgar or offensive, and likely both. Good times. I can now tolerate it now after watching it live in 95-ish. Same goes for Time, especially now that I can play it.
Lol, great thread and observations, Roy. Be afraid, be very agraid of the Roy!
Nah, it ain't that bad. My wife does find it fastenating how random thoughts are, Scary. Getting better though.

So what else? Who was around in the 70's and stuck with AM Gold? There was a song by Debbie Boone called "You Light Up My Life" that was all the rage. I' pretty sure I have not heard it over the airwaves since.

The only decent radio station in Birmingham (Alabama) in the late '70s overplayed Steely Dan till I got sick of them and still don't like to hear them. I've got a friend who was there at the same time listening to the same stuff on the same station and is obsessed with Steely Dan to this day. I got an overdose, but it was just right for him.

For me it depends on the song.

Some I never get tired of. I know Hotel California is worn out, but the structure of the song is good, and when the guitar solo comes along, it's still bliss for me.

I got sick of Stairway, but a few months after they quit playing it daily, it started sounding like an old friend to my ears.

Others never come back for me (I won't mention any names).

As some of you know, I play music for a living.

Some songs I have been playing for years and years, over and over, and I do them because they work with the audience. I found that the worst part of those songs is calling them. Whether it is for a request or if I know that this is what the crowd needs right now, I get the "oh, not that one again" thought running through my head. But I know I need to play it so I do. And then the funny thing happens, as soon as the music starts, I forget that the song is overplayed, I forget that there is nothing new I can find in the song, but the magic of the music starts and I find myself enjoying playing it, even if it's the millionth time.

Insights and incites by Notes ♫

I suppose it depends what you're listening to. If I'm listening to an oldies station, even some of the real cheesy 60's pop gets me singing along....on the other hand, some records seem to get played over and over again. Seems every time I turn "Gold" on lately, they're playing either "Indiana Wants Me" or "The Happening" - both of which I liked first time around, both of which I'm heartily sick of now.

Stairway? Hell, I've heard it so many times over the years, it barely even registers any more - same with Whole Lotta Love, I hate that long-drawn-out middle section with all the moaning and groaning - makes me want to change channels.

Some songs, though, NEVER get old - songs like More Than A Feeling and All Right Now, even though they both get played a lot, just make me reach for the guitar. Same with CCR, Stones, Who, Beatles, Dylan....never get tired of hearing them. Status Quo have been playing variations on a 12-bar blues for 40 years or so - never get tired of hearing them. Or seeing them, either - going to see 'em at a Festival (Guilfest 2010, at Guilford) in July, that'll make FIVE different decades I've seen that particular band in....70s, 80's, 90's, 00's and 10's.

And if I ever hear a song from the most over-hyped (at least here in the UK) band in history - Frankie Goes To Hollywood - that's an instant turn off. I liked the first couple of records back in '84, '85 - but they've been played so many times since I really can not stand to listen to them any more!!!

:D :D :D

Vic