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PaperclipPerfector  15hr ago (text post)   662 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for April 24, 2026

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Candidates for most agonizing recent song?

I submit for your consideration Lucinda Williams’ World Gone Wrong, a shambling eulogy for the Current Moment. Naturally, it’s seeing a lot of airtime on my local radio.

While I could provide any number of objections to its lyricism or production, I’d rather take a page from Clench Racing’s lesser-known cousin: Complete the Poem. Use your skill and judgment to complete the following lines.

A lot of people getting put on the street
It’s getting harder ___
He comes home every night ___
And wonders how much longer ___

If you need a hint, imagine the most drawn-out warble possible. The relevant rhymes should jump right into your brain.

As much as I think we've lost something in the way of common culture -- when I was a kid we definitely all heard the same music -- I've gotta say it's nice to be almost entirely insulated from modern pop music. Sometimes I go to a grocery store or a restaurant and hear what's current and can only shake my head in despair and irritation, but for the most part I'm just free, free as a bird, and like it this way.

My musical consciousness was formed on early 2000's rap and hip hop music. My specific tastes were very niche after my sibling one day brought home a copy of Tech N9ne's Absolute Power CD for me to listen to. Hard to say whether my preferences "developed" into that or it simply hit all the right notes in the best ways for what I always gravitated towards.

Spending a period of your life growing up in the hood leaves you permanently acclimated to the culture of the underclass in certain ways, even though I never made an explicit initiation into that kind of life. I've been in social settings where people put it to me to play the music in my kind of playlist but there's a reason that stuff will never be played on the radio. Playing any kind of music that represents banging and repping a hood will get you shot in the wrong places. I always liked what they called "horrorcore," and the dark stuff.

I also grew up on all the standard classics and oldies as well. I used to like to listen to the NOW music CD's when they were still around. My tastes are varied across genres, but it remains dominated by one side. But even so, a lot of modern rap and hip hop I can't listen to.

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