help me pls - creating a short playlist of entrance music for a meeting at my workplace

so unfortunately it has gotten around my place of employment that i am a person who enjoys music an above-average amount, and i am being asked to create a playlist for a series of meeting we're having.

background: i work in a technology organization that is part of a large, fairly conservative, east coast financial company. our cio is holding a series of meetings at our u.s. sites where he will do one of his semi-annual business update things. following that, a series of speakers are being asked to give talks on interesting technology projects we have going on. as we attempt to drag ourselves kicking and screaming into modernity, these will be 6-8 minute ted-style talks with fun visuals and stuff.

i've been helping do some of the speaker coaching for this for some reason, and just got asked if i could put together 30 minutes of music for when people are filing into the auditoriums. being that i only listen to steely dan nowadays, i could use some help coming up with some upbeat, non-romantic, possibly-but-not-necessarily well known songs for this. joke requests also welcome.

march of the wooden soldiers

Touch and Go--Emerson Lake and Powell

these are all probably super boring suggestions but

Happy - Pharrell
Shake it Off - Taylor Swift
My Songs Know What You Did In The Dark - Fall Out Boy

etc

joke suggestion: 30 minutes of Idina Menzel 'Let It Go'

"Ali Farka Toure, Toumani Diabate - Kadi Kadi"

but really you should just play steely dan songs

Napalm Death - You Suffer
John Cage - 4'33"

Daughter by pearl jam 8 times

your cio should then say 'check your iphones, everyone' and everyone will have Daughter by pearl jam on their phones

'when will they shoot?' by ice cube

Kraftwerk, the tech dept will dig it......

yeah and then 'money' by pink floyd for the other guys

maybe do a mashup

is one of the u.s. sites memphis? if so, maybe 'walking in memphis'.

oh but 'talking in memphis' would work better

Boston, Aerosmith, Cars - hometown pride

When I worked in banking I got a lot of mileage out of

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUb450Alpps

and

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PyeWRd7ZEBs

for similar events.

I've been using a Grooveshark playlist I put together for my art classes this year, and one song I notice the kids react positively to is Todd Terje's "Inspector Norse." I always spot four or five of them just kind of spontaneously bouncing in their seats. Are fairly conservative, east coast financial people at all similar to 11-year-old kids? (I'm even setting you up for a joke there.)

BRING IN THE KATZ

maybe pull up 'QT - Hey QT' on youtube

AC/DC - Back In Black
Jefferson Starship - Jane
Sly & The Family Stone - I Want To Take You Higher
Parliament - Bop Gun
Parliament - Flashlight

also:

The Knife - "Heartbeats"
Haim - "The Wire"
Vampire Weekend - "Giving Up The Gun"
The Pixies - "Here Comes Your Man"
REM - "Driver 8"
The Breeders - "Last Splash"
Yellowcard - "Ocean Avenue"
Kanye West - "Champion" <--- screen this for cursing
Jay-Z - "Izzo (H.O.V.A)"
Fabolous - "Young'n (Holla Back)"
Nico & Vinz - "Am I Wrong"

BRING IN THE KATZ

― 💪😈⚠️ (DJP), Wednesday, September 17, 2014 6:49 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

maybe pull up 'QT - Hey QT' on youtube

― Bitterer than Bitter (Sufjan Grafton), Wednesday, September 17, 2014 7:03 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol i really should have headed these two off in the opening post

Imperial march

Primitive Radio Gods - "Standing Outside a Broken Phone Booth with Money in My Hand"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Juqm94sUV_E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZHGPmb-VfQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMt4DVmyuw4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DFarI9747U

lol

The vengabus is coming.

gotta hire the six flags guy then

Maura beat me to the WWE entrances.

joke suggestion: 30 minutes of Idina Menzel 'Let It Go'

Or "Let It Go" in 42 languages! You'd only need to play it twice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCtL0nK3TSg

Serious suggestion: Stereolab's "Ping Pong."

sincere thanks for the real suggestions and lol suggestions, you guys have def helped me get a start on this thing

are you going to post the final list?

Primitive Radio Gods - "Standing Outside a Broken Phone Booth with Money in My Hand"

just the noise outro on loop

http://open.spotify.com/user/callalldestroyer/playlist/6rp1LexjJMfMDBgdie2zYG

this is what i sent to my co-worker for a screening/second set of ears. ultimately i just didn't want to do anything that scanned only as middle-aged white guy music, so it's a combination of recent pop and 70s soul/r&b.

"champion" by kanye was the hardest thing to cut because i think it's perfect in a lot of ways, but he says shit twice and i didn't want to risk someone failing to get the clean version.

http://ask.metafilter.com/81152/Clean-upbeat-nonlove-songs

like the thought of using anything on this was extremely depressing.

haha i love how "happy" is first on the list, i remember someone here (lex) aptly describing it as a song for corporate meetings/conferences/team-building exercises

haha yeah it's a safe open because it's totally unfuckwithable for the situation

i was asked to come up with another 20 minutes or so....can't believe i forgot about "roar," duh

we had a party at work here on saturday --- party went for 5 hours or more, I swear they had maybe a 30 minute playlist on repeat the whole night

even the barstaff were commenting about how many times they'd heard certain songs

yeah i'm trying to pad this thing out a little bit because there's nothing worse than repeats

bastille - pompeii
imagine dragons - monster
imagine dragons - radioactive
onerepublic - counting stars

otm, those terrible songs are very good for my purposes. i did wind up using counting stars and radioactive.

Grass Roots - Sooner or Later

^ maybe fails the "non-romantic" test

gdammit all my hard work is getting ruined bcz ppl want to use the songs on like their workout playlists

Y'ALL READY FOR THIS

New Face in Hell -- The Fall

Gonna put this here, because it's about playlists and workplaces. A couple of times a week I co-lead a long shift at our local food pantry. Usually I let the other guy pick the music, which is fine by me, but sometimes I get to do it, which posed a fascinating (to me) exercise. How do you devise a playlist that essentially takes into account:

1) has to be relatively upbeat; no sad or quiet or mopey stuff
2) has to be relatively appealing to people aged 20-70
3) has to be relatively appealing across various other demographics
4) can't or shouldn't be profane/offensive
5) generally can't be aggressive (so nothing angry - no metal, not much rap, nothing noisy or distorted)
6) has to be generally catchy and/or familiar, so that people can hum, sing, bop along
7) has to be relatively consistent, volume-wise, so that (for example) Buddy Holly abutting Beyonce won't blow out your ears
8) has to be interesting enough to keep my own attention, which means limiting too many overplayed ringers
9) has to make Beverly happy

It was tricky! I was very proud of what I compiled, but it's really hard to make everyone happy all the time, though it's fun to try. My biggest takeaway? How many people don't like reggae and *especially* reggae-fied covers! Some months ago I put on a playlist of reggae versions of Beatles songs, but after a while it got gonged, because people just wanted to hear the Beatles. Last Saturday I put on the Derrick Laro & Trinity cover of Michael Jackson's "Don't Stop Til You Get Enough," because it rules. But Beverly (it's always Beverly) called me over.

"Josh, who is this?"

"Um, I'm not sure of their names off the top of my head. Why?"

"Because they are ruining this song."

How many people don't like reggae

Kind of surprised at this (ime people usually dig a mellow reggae vibe).

Reading Mood Machine, about (among other things) Spotify's insidious surveillance grasp. They should have a playlist ready for you by the morning, you just have to track it down.

The pan-demographic aversion to reggae surprised me, too. I think it's just too unfamiliar, maybe? Like, they'll dig some of the most played Bob Marley stuff but they (like I assume is true of most people) don't go much deeper.

Random songs that seemed to be appreciated the most the last go-round:

"Groove is in the Heart"
"What Have You Done For Me Lately"
"Mr. Blue Sky"
"Kiss Me On The Bus" (at least by the one person from Minneapolis that noticed I found a Replacements track to sneak in)

It was kind of funny how much of my favorite music or acts I just couldn't include. Like I said, a good exercise.

i'd say that the people most likely to complain about a piece of music are the people who are most likely to be averse to anything unfamiliar to them. there are people who seem to get genuinely agitated if they're compelled to hear something they don't know, no matter what genre they may hypothetically enjoy. and because they tend to be the squeakiest wheels it takes all the joy out of being responsible for this kind of programming, unless you're not bothered by audience feedback.

rusted root on my way

creed - "with arms wide open"

Actually, map, I was trying to think if I could get away with a single Gizz track, and not sure. Too weird, too manic?

haha probably

especially if reggae is too much!

Wax - Right Between the Eyes
The Cars - It's All I Can Do
Blondie - Hanging on the Telephone
Men Without Hats - I Like
Spiral Starecase - More Today Than Yesterday
Patti LaBelle - New Attitude
The B-52's - Song for a Future Generation
Pino Daniele - Keep on Movin'
The Monkees - Let's Dance On
Chic - Good Times
Daft Punk - Digital Love
World's Famous Supreme Team - Hey DJ
The 5th Dimension - Up-Up and Away
Miami Sound Machine - Dr. Beat
Don Downing - Dreamworld (Tom Moulton Mix)
Corona - The Rhythm of the Night

had to make a co-worker friendly office playlist recently and these are some of the songs that were on it

tom petty & the heartbreakers - "change of heart"
e.l.o. - "evil woman"
van halen - "dance the night away"
the grateful dead - "touch of gray"
inxs - "don't change"
vampire weekend - "this life"
van morrison - "glad tidings"
harold melvin & the blue notes - "bad luck"
stevie wonder - "sir duke"
charles wright - "express yourself"
pointer sisters - "automatic"
a tribe called quest - "can i kick it?"
earth, wind & fire - "happy feelin'"
the spinners - "i'll be around"

Stealing some of those (four are on my playlist already)!

Corollary to reggae controversy, literally everyone always likes Stevie Wonder.

play this on a loop next time

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mLc__NU5J8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aj-sXqpkYz8