music – Coffee Spoons

Can You Hit the High Notes?

This is an older piece that I stumbled across doing some other work. I felt like it needed sharing. The interactive graphic shows the high and low note vocal ranges of major musical artists.

Good to see some of my favourite artists in the mix.

Interactive controls allow the user to sort the bars by the greatest vocal range, high notes, or low notes. Colour coding distinguishes male from female vocalists.

In particular I enjoy the bottom of the piece that uses the keyboard to show the range of notes. When the user mouses over a particular singer, the ends of the range display the particular song in which the singer hit the note.

Again, this is an older piece that I just discovered, but I did enjoy it. I would be curious to see how these things could change over time. As an artist ages, how does that change his or her vocal range? Are there differences between albums? This could be a fascinating point at which branching out for further research could be done.

Credit for the piece goes to ConcertHotels.com

Radiohead in Philadelphia

A week and a half ago my favourite band, Radiohead, played two shows in Philadelphia to close out their 2018 North America tour. I got to see the final of the two shows. And I decided to make this little piece over the weekend. Because it was totally fantastic.

The data shows that the band played a good mix of songs from across their discography. Admittedly they played nothing from Pablo Honey, but with the exception of Creep and Anyone Can Play Guitar along with some of the era’s b-sides, I really do not listen to that album all that often. They also skipped over Amnesiac, but did play five songs from my favourite album, Kid A, so, yeah, again, totally fantastic. Especially those final three songs to close the main setlist. Just brilliant.

Credit for this work is mine.

Nine O’clock on a Friday (Morning)

When I lived in Chicago, karaoke was definitely a thing I did. Billy Joel’s Piano Man was among the songs in my repertoire. And this Friday, well, we made it to another weekend. So raise a glass, toast Indexed, and forget about life for a while.

Me, I'm just practicing politics… — Me, I’m just practicing politics…

Credit for the piece goes to Jessica Hagy.

Distinctive Artists by State

This Friday’s post comes from Business Insider. And it looks at the distinctive artists by state.

And no, I have no idea who Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros are.

Credit for the piece goes to Paul Lamere.

The History of Viper’s Dream

My colleague Benjamin Byron plays the upright bass in a few bands, one of which is named Viper’s Dream. We were discussing the flexibility of jazz band rosters and I decided to make an infographic about the membership history of Viper’s Dream. Unfortunately, I know of nobody’s name but Benjamin’s, so they are all listed as [instrument] Guy.