Untitled
From This Might Be A Wiki
Screenshot of the animated video from Gigantic
| song name | |
| artist | They Might Be Giants |
| releases | The Frank O' Toole Show, (She Was A) Hotel Detective (EP), Don't Let's Start (Album), Miscellaneous T, Then: The Earlier Years |
| year | 1987 |
| run time | 2:33 |
| sung by | Gloria and two unidentified men |
Trivia/Info
- John Flansburgh explained this track in a 1995 Information Club Newsletter:[1]
Back when very few people called Dial-A-Song the phone machine that played the songs took messages. I came home one day and found the message tape full, instead of the ten or twenty messages it usually had. I rewound the tape and found that most of it was taken up by a woman who had called on a conference call with her friend, listened to the song and then proceeded to have a private conversation unaware that the Dial-A-Song machine was recording them. The recording on track thirteen is just an excerpt of the first couple of minutes of their conversation. It actually got much stranger, but it was unrelated to the band, and too freaky to put on a record.
- The identity of Gloria is not known to the band or to fans. Flansburgh has confirmed that Gloria must have been calling from the 718 or 212 New York City area codes,[2] as three-way calling was only available locally at the time.[3]
- This track is just an excerpt of Gloria's phone call, the full unedited recording is much longer. Flansburgh spoke about the full recording in a 2014 Tumblr post: "It's really really long (25 minutes?) and kind of dithering, although the conversation about having the upstair neighbour leaving their tub running over is kind of a NYC classic apartment living disaster scenario." Other clips of the phone call have been released through the tracks 'Gloria Says "This Guy's A Nut",' 'Gloria Says "Blast Her Out"' and "Untitled Remix."
- The Village Voice is a New York-based alternative newsweekly, in which the band often advertised Dial-A-Song. John Linnell, in a 1998 interview:
I think a lot of people thought we were making fun of her, but I really think there's something deeply interesting about this person, who is obviously from a kind of working class Brooklyn background, who is obsessed with obscure oddball things that you read about in the back of The Village Voice. And she pursues them, and is making a list of them, and really kind of obsessing on this stuff. And it makes me wonder what is going on there, you know, it's kind of fascinating. And she's obviously incomprehensible to her friends.
- "Another child is born in India" was a random improvised line that the band used to introduce the Dial-A-Song track that Gloria heard.[4] John Flansburgh doesn't recall which song it was that Gloria heard.[5]
- The ominous backing music at the end of the track is a high-pitched sample of "Funebre," an instrumental from Martial Mood / Humorous, Novelty, Titles, a 1971 LP recorded by the Westway Studio Orchestra and released by the Southern Library of Recorded Music. The instrumental was mentioned by Flansburgh in a 2014 Tumblr post:
It was what used to be called "needle drop" music (before that term became redefined to mean the OPPOSITE of it's original meaning) which is to say it was license-free background music made for television, film or commercials. The libraries, cut to vinyl, were often quite expensive—pro-rated for production houses. They covered a lot of ground, from symphonic to "beat combos" to electronic music (often relying on art composers in that field). John and I bought a bunch of these records at a junk store across the street from our apartment on DeKalb Avenue, and used them essentially for their intended purpose. I still have them, and peruse them on occasion for a possible sampling sessions every now and then.
- This track has no official title. All physical releases have either left the track unlisted, or have left a blank space in place of a name. The track has been listed on streaming services as "Track 13," "13" and "Untitled." Flansburgh and Linnell just call it "The Lady."[6][7]
- An excerpt from this track was used as an introduction on Dial-A-Song at least once.[8]
Song Themes
Bad English, Children, Dial-A-Song Reference, Geography, Intros, Language, Non-John Vocals, Questions, Songs With Samples, Spoken Word, Telecommunication
Videos
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