I Believe She's Lying

This one came as a surprise this A.M.  This comes from Rhett Miller, who I like, but mostly I like his band Old 97's.  Mr. Miller has released 7 studio albums without his well-respected alt-country band.  I happen to own one of his solo albums, which has more of a mainstream feel, which may be why two songs from this very album (The Believer) have now weaseled their way onto this blog, in spite of having less actual attention from my ears.

Today's song is called "I Believe She's Lying" and it's the sixth track on this now decade-old album.

SURPRISE!  This song is actually written by some other artists which I tremendously respect, Aimee Mann & Jon Brion (who frequently collaborate, quite magically.) 

Well whaddya know, Jon Brion recorded this very song on his ONLY studio album from 2001.  Here's Brion's version:








                       
Who did it better in your opinion?  I think I like Brion's version better, how fun to have discovered it just now. 

Quickly, I'm going to teach you a game I made up and you can use it next time you're bored or if you're on a roadtrip or something. 

The game doesn't have a name yet, but I'll call it "Shazam Surmisal!™"  (The exclamation mark is extremely important at the end.)

Here's how you play, first download Shazam on your smartphone, which, if you don't know, is an App that tells you the name and artist of a song you hear playing.  One other thing it does is that it tallies how many times a certain song has been "Shazammed"

So, how you play Shazam Surmisal! is simple.  Pick a friend, any friend, but preferably someone you like.  Go on a roadtrip and bring your favorite mixtape (preferably one you've won on thesongsstuckinmyhead.blogspot.com) or an iPod or the radio or whatevsies.  Start playing music and before you Shazam a song, guess how many times the song has been Shazammed!  You have to factor in several things as you play the game, such as:

-the song's popularity
-the artist's popularity
-radio play
-etc. etc. etc.

Then whomever gets closer to the actual Shazam number is the winner!  Simple and fun!

To get the best effect, listen through the whole song so that you're getting a neat musical experience as you play (rather than skipping the song after each shazam) 

I'm going to Shazam each version of this blog post's song and give it my best guess as an example.

First, Rhett Miller's cover of "I Believe She's Lying."  I'm gonna say there are 526 Shazams of this song......

Welp, as of today there are 205 Shazams, so if I were playing against my bff and they had guessed closer I would have lost.

Next, Jon Brion's original of the song..... hmmm, I'm guessing he's had less exposure than Rhett Miller, but I could be totally wrong, so I'll say 79 Shazams.... SHAZAMMING NOW.....

Well dang, I just ruined my own game.

Shazam doesn't recognize this song and I'm guessing it's because the album isn't available through iTunes?!?  Whatever, screw Shazam Surmisal!   it's a dumb game and I hate it!

Huggs.
Brady