Meanspeed Theory, applied: Mean speeds and meanemotions to Michael McDonald's Motown Two: Making Class-A Playlists

photo from the URL: http://www.pbs.org


A year after his biggest album, ‘Motown,’ Michael McDonald, the Missourian blue-eyed soul keyboardist, released a follow up, ‘Motown Two.’ iTunes.com lists every song under the genre of: Rock. They tell us who wrote every song. Notwithstanding, again, there is nothing given to us about how fast these songs are—even though iTunes provides an element called “BPM” which, if filled in, would allow anyone to manipulate their music and playlists in general by speed.

Which is where Meanspeed Music comes in—below is the information given us with the speed information—allowing for Class-A Playlist creation.

The track listings, composers and elementary speeds of the 14 tracks on this album are:

Track #1
“You’re All I Need To Get By”
composers=Nikolas Ashford, Valerie Simpson
mean speed=92 beats per minute
meanemotion=enthusiasm

Track #2
“I Was Made To Love Her”
composers=Henry Cosby, Lula Mae Hardaway
mean speed=96 beats per minute
meanemotion=enthusiasm

Track #3
“Reach Out, I’ll Be There”
composers=Brian Holland, Edward Holland, Brian Dozier
mean speed=120 beats per minute
meanemotion=victory

Track #4
“Stop, Look, Listen (To Your Heart)”
composers=Linda Creed, Thomas Bell
mean speed=74 beats per minute
meanemotion=grace

Track #5
“Baby I Need Your Loving”
composers=Brian Holland, Edward Holland, Brian Dozier
mean speed=120 beats per minute
meanemotion=victory

Track #6
“Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever”
composers=Ivy Jo Hunter, Stevie Wonder
mean speed=99 beats per minute
meanemotion=natural

Track #7
“The Tracks Of My Tears”
composers=Marv Tarplin, Warren Moore, William Robinson
mean speed=86 beats per minute
meanemotion=renewal

Track #8
“What’s Going On”
composers=Al Cleveland, Marvin Gaye, Renaldo Benson
mean speed=95 beats per minute
meanemotion=enthusiasm

Track #9
“I Second That Emotion”
composers=Al Cleveland, William Robinson
mean speed=93 beats per minute
meanemotion=enthusiasm

Track #10
“After The Dance”
composers=Leon Ware, Marvin Gaye, T-Boy Ross
mean speed=113 beats per minute
meanemotion=lust

Track #12
“Tuesday Heartbreak”
composer=Stevie Wonder
mean speed=101 beats per minute
meanemotion=natural

Track #13
“Mercy, Mercy Me”
composer=Marvin Gaye
mean speed=91 beats per minute
meanemotion=enthusiasm

Track #14
“Baby I’m For Real”
composers=Ana Gaye, Marvin Gaye
mean speed=50 beats per minute, in triplet rhythm
meanemotion=mixed slow.

In order to add these speeds to your iTunes “BPM” column, simply highlight a song, press Control and ‘I’—and there you go—you can input the speed information and go to town. I have only starting doing this on my iTunes account—and I think you might some fun in this—especially if you’ve read this far!

For more on the correlation between mean speeds and meanemotion, visit http://meanspeed.com.


Ian Schneider and Sarah Anthony
Meanspeed.com
March 22, 2007