Shop Music

How do you feel about shops that play music?

The Shop plays music, as approved by Nora.  Her opinion is that by having the Shop door open and the music playing, people will be more likely to come in, drawn by the music.  I can see how that can work - no arguments that good music will get people's attention and might get them to at least stick their head through the door.

The music that gets played is a mixture of things - there's the Beatles, a bit of Bowie, some Jacob Marley, folk music, a few Spanish numbers.  For the most part, it's fine.  Rather repetitive having to listen to same play list every day, but it's not too bad.

With the exception of Joanna Newsom.

If you've never heard of her, count yourself lucky.  I would have been perfectly happy to go through life without ever hearing her sing.  In fact, I'd give almost anything to erase the audio memories I have of her childish, nasally wailing.  She's an indie folk singer, but I swear when I first heard her singing, I was left with the mental image of an elderly lady with the voice of a nasally young boy whose voice was no where near breaking, as the notes wobble up and down.

Reading her Wikipedia entry, there's a mention that The Wire described her voice as 'untrainable'.  I could not agree more.  In addition, she knows her voice has been described as 'childlike' so it's obviously not just me that gets that impression.

[Incidentally, this relates to her debut album - apparently her manner of singing has changed (improved?) on her latest one - but that doesn't change my opinion that her first one is appalling.]

My apologies to any of her fans who may be reading this, but she is not my cup of tea at all!  I'm sure you all have singers you can't bear to listen to - Newsom just happens to be mine.  And I have to suffer every day that Nora is working with me, otherwise I press skip when the opening notes play.

Even the Beatles are wearing a little thin - you can have too much of a good thing, right?  The play list is so limited that on days that Nora isn't working, I bring in a few of my own Cd's to break the monotony.  However, in keeping with the atmosphere of the Shop, I only bring in classical music, Enya or something New Age.   I have a rather eclectic taste in music.  It's a pity I couldn't get away with playing something like Rammstein, Hayseed Dixie or Emilie Autumn - work would be much more fun!  The only downside would be my compulsion to sing along ...

Hmm, I wonder if something darker or more lively would encourage more people to come in?

What sort of music would draw you into a shop?