JOBS YOU'VE HAD WHERE YOU COULD PLAY YOUR MUSIC AS LOUD AS YOU WANTED AND NOBODY CARED

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― Pinche Pendejo (Pinche Pendejo), Sunday, 8 February 2004 14:21 (twenty-two years ago)

DJ?

― David Allen (David Allen), Sunday, 8 February 2004 14:27 (twenty-two years ago)

Working in the Book And Comic Exchange in Notting Hill Gate. Occasionally we were told to turn it down but not often.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Sunday, 8 February 2004 14:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Disease Surveillance Lab

The other techs who worked with me may have cared but I was rude enough not to be bothered by them.

Night clerk in student admin
No one around to care

Microbiology clnical rotation bench superrvisor
The students didn't seem to be mind hands-on demos given while the CD player was rocking off the bench

― Pinche Pendejo (Pinche Pendejo), Sunday, 8 February 2004 14:32 (twenty-two years ago)

nearest i got was working at noo-neeja company where i was the only person who bothered to put different music on every day - not that loud tho as it was intended to be just background ambience while we successfully imagineered all kind of goalpost-shifting brand solutions, ya

― stevem (blueski), Sunday, 8 February 2004 14:49 (twenty-two years ago)

I was a dishwasher at a posh-o gourmet eatery out in the Hamptons in the mid-80s. They had a stereo system that played in both the front (where the counters and customers were) and in the kitchen (where m'self and the rest of the staff were). At first, the management were really liberal about it, and we were able to play whatever we want. After a while, though, we started to push our luck. Where we first started with Talk Talk and REM, when I slipped a copy of Snap, the Jam compilation, in there one day, the owner flipped out (during "Funeral Pyre," actually) and lowered the boom. After that day, there were only three tapes that would be played on the sytem: Diamond Life by Sade, Picture Book by Simply Red and.....worse yet....the original soundtrack to the Broadway production of "Annie". Suffice to say, within a week, we took matters into our own hands and disconnected the speaker wire that fed into the kitchen (you can only hear so much "Annie" before homicide starts to sound like a good idea). After that, we brought in a boom box (for the dishwashing area) and listened pretty exclusively to Black Flag and Iron Maiden.

At the end of the summer, though, I missed the job so much I went out and bought Picture Book by Simply Red, only `cuz it reminded me of the place. Boo hoo.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Sunday, 8 February 2004 16:42 (twenty-two years ago)

Pizza delivery! I could listen to anything I wanted as loud as I wanted. Except when I was having trouble finding an address, I would have to turn the music down, so I could see better. I later learned that I was not the only delivery guy who had this problem. Strange. There's probably a word for this phenomenon, but I don't know what it is.

― Salmon Pink (Salmon Pink), Sunday, 8 February 2004 17:33 (twenty-two years ago)

Oh, I loved delivering pizza, too. Smoking pot on the job was another perk. One New Years, someone tipped me two bottles of champagne.

― Kenan Hebert (kenan), Sunday, 8 February 2004 17:41 (twenty-two years ago)

Heh. I used to drive around with a six-pack of Mickey's Big Mouths on the back seat floor (screw-top lids), and got plenty of bong-hit tips. Yeah, those were the days.

― Salmon Pink (Salmon Pink), Sunday, 8 February 2004 17:46 (twenty-two years ago)

I used to work in an auto parts warehouse and we'd either play tapes of metal or listen to WSOU, the Rutgers University all-metal station. (They'd play some hardcore and "industrial" stuff, too...plus Kid Rock, way before anybody else. I heard "I Am The Bullgod" hundreds of times on WSOU, back when it was from some EP he released.) The station has since changed their format, and I have moved on to an office job, but I still get to play whatever I want, as loud as I want, because I have my own office.

― Phil Freeman (Phil Freeman), Sunday, 8 February 2004 18:57 (twenty-two years ago)

I work in a bike shop and our repair shop(my department) is seperated from sales by a courtyard. So I installed a full Denon stereo I found at a thrift shop with 4 advent bookshelf speakers. The only complaint we get is when it isn't on.

― Speedy Gonzalas (Speedy Gonzalas), Sunday, 8 February 2004 19:15 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm enjoying such a perk right now. In the basement labs (of the University of Toronto physics building) the walls are thick, and there are never any professors around. I've got BMRC, Trane, and Ekkehard Ehlers blasting away.

― Barry Bruner (Barry Bruner), Sunday, 8 February 2004 19:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Restaurant kitchens all the way, and ditto on the pot-smoking on the job perk. The words "walk-in fridge" will forever have an association for me that the inventors never intended.

― Nom De Plume (Nom De Plume), Sunday, 8 February 2004 20:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Driving around in a 24" delivery truck. There is nothing like delivering packages to warehouses on Piquette and John R in Detroit with Juan Atkins blazing from the stereo. No pot though, it would be hell on earth to deliver 40 stops around town by 5 PM wn a huge truck while you are stoned.

― Former Supposed So Called Nihilist Teenage Drug Disco Addiction Counselor (mjt), Sunday, 8 February 2004 21:11 (twenty-two years ago)

I work in a film school issue room. The louder we play our music, the more the students are afraid of us, the more we can control and humiliate them.

I was playing the Jammer Deuce mix and a totally preppy looking Abercrombie girl came up and said "oh YAH, I LOVE fucking EVIL drum n bass!".

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Sunday, 8 February 2004 21:16 (twenty-two years ago)

WSOU was Seton Hall, Pirate Radio. Sometimes I feel like I had some influence there. When I was in high school in the late 80s early 90s, it was all metal. At some point I started hanging out with all these sorta metal kids in my high school(west orange high) and I got them into Meat Beat Manifesto and stuff like that, and this was just before metal in general was going "nu-metal" or whatever, and the drummer of my band ended up SOU's station manager or music director or something and told me my influence got him to play lots of industrial and hip hop or whatever.

But I've never had a job where I could blast the radio. I worked at Oberlin's record store which was attached to a cafe and gift shop, even though it was a super hip store(just ask John McEntire and Liz Phair) One day I was playing Stereolab and the woman working at the cafe came over and asked if I could play something more "accessible." I was thinking, "you're lucky, this is the most accessible thing I've got!"

― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Sunday, 8 February 2004 21:29 (twenty-two years ago)

When I was an IMAX projectionist I pretty much had to play my music really loud 'cause I couldn't hear it otherwise. The real perk was inflicting my music on the theater patrons between shows--if in a bad mood I would play Harry Pussy over the 15,000 watt sound system. Ah, good times.

― adam (adam), Sunday, 8 February 2004 22:36 (twenty-two years ago)

Working in a rehearsal studio. You can play whatever you want at whatever volume you want AND have fun blasting glam rock or Coldplay-alikes with Merzbow, Art Ensemble Of Chicago or Ground-Zero when they take a break.

― udu wudu (udu wudu), Sunday, 8 February 2004 23:36 (twenty-two years ago)

i like the idea of alex having control over a swank gourmet eatery ... and disappointed that he wasn't blasting killing joke!

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Sunday, 8 February 2004 23:42 (twenty-two years ago)

... I almost forgot my days as a courier. Ears pounding after a day full of runs listening to everything so loud that I could never hear any sirens from emergency vehicles. FOrtunately I got in trouble for that only a few times.

― Pinche Pendejo (Pinche Pendejo), Monday, 9 February 2004 00:14 (twenty-two years ago)

I used to manufacture rubber stamps for a job, howver I did it in a small room in some old building the middle of the city, the actual storefront was in the an arcade a couple of blocks away. Anyhow this building was all but deserted, particularly the floor i was on so despite the fact i only have a shitty radio, i could play it as loud as i liked, and i did.

― ipsofacto (ipsofacto), Monday, 9 February 2004 00:31 (twenty-two years ago)

I used to manage the student union when I was in college so I took free reign over the stereo we had at the information desk. I used to blast XTRMNTR and le tigre to get people to go the fuck home so I could leave and get drunk.

I can also get away with listening to whatever I want now at my law firm paralegal gig but only at reasonable volume.. but it beats headphones at work any day.

― bill stevens (bscrubbins), Monday, 9 February 2004 00:36 (twenty-two years ago)

i like the idea of alex having control over a swank gourmet eatery ... and disappointed that he wasn't blasting killing joke!

Having control? I was dishdog for pete's sake. I collected the lowest paycheck of the bunch and had to fuckin' bike there and back every damn day. The only control I ever exerted was freeing the kitchen staff from the tyrannical overplaying of the soundtrack to "Annie" (on a stereo with auto-replay).

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Monday, 9 February 2004 00:39 (twenty-two years ago)

When I had a public service job at the Foreign Affairs dept in Canberra, I started in the mailroom in the basement. Because no one at all came down there unless they were desperate for a package before it got sent up to the them, we could wear, play, and do wtf we wanted within reason.

We had a large speaker on the wall attached to an amp/tapedeck in the corner. Thanks to the wonderful variety of my workmates tastes, it was in this, my first proper job, that I was introduced to Black Flag, Frank Zappa, Blue Oyster Cult, the Clash, 4skins, Led Zeppelin, MC5, and err.. Julio Englasias. I would bring in the Coc's and Dead Can Dance, and one day while DCD were playing, a diplomatic courier came in, his face lit up and he said "hey I used to live with these guys in a tower block in London".

We also used to play cricket inside the room (it was pretty huge but we broke a light once or twice), nick off with the confiscated food parcels (the stuff we sorted didnt go thru customs so we had to confiscate foodstuffs), and do stupid shit like bending Xray envelopes because it said "xrays do not bend" on the side so we had to prove otherwise.

Man, those were the days...

― Trayce (trayce), Monday, 9 February 2004 00:57 (twenty-two years ago)

furniture delivery. in the truck had am/fm radio. there was second truck that only had am - but oldies and talkradio will eventualy drive you mad so we had a boom box wedged on the dashboard. didn't obscure my view too badly.

― dyson (dyson), Monday, 9 February 2004 02:08 (twenty-two years ago)

I had a holiday job undercoating hundreds of lengths of skirting board and (very occasionally, as a special treat) architrave.

Totally and utterly mind numbing.

The only thing that prevented me from going out of my brain with tedium was being able to walk into town at lunch time and spend my wages buying records which I'd then play on the old player I'd taken in.

Although there must have been loads of singles and albums that I first heard there, the one I specifically remember getting (on the day it came out, of course!) is Another Music In A Different Kitchen.

― Stewart Osborne (Stewart Osborne), Monday, 9 February 2004 10:09 (twenty-two years ago)

The music store that I worked at was unfortunately located next to a dental office. We shared a wall. The dental assistants would come over all the time and ask that we turn down the music because it was making it difficult for the dentist to operate.

― grapeshine (grapeshine), Monday, 9 February 2004 10:19 (twenty-two years ago)

I work for a newspaper and I am always in my car. I can listen to whatever, whenever, however.

― Johnny Badlees (crispssssss), Monday, 9 February 2004 13:00 (twenty-two years ago)

Music Critic

― Huckadelphia (Horace Mann), Monday, 9 February 2004 14:49 (twenty-two years ago)

and dishwasher.

― Huckadelphia (Horace Mann), Monday, 9 February 2004 14:50 (twenty-two years ago)

Holiday job : Turkish nightclub (open air)

thursday eves, one mixtape very loud indeed.

― mark grout (mark grout), Monday, 9 February 2004 14:54 (twenty-two years ago)

I've had lots of these sorts of jobs (dishwasha, delivery in particular), but the best by far was the late-night office janitorial job, wherein my job duties included A) washing coffee mugs, B) taking out the trash, C) vacuuming, and D) blasting Fishbone and Talking Heads at the loudest volume my boombox could handle throughout empty office buildings during the wee hours of the night.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Monday, 9 February 2004 15:13 (twenty-two years ago)

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