ILM Ballot Polls for 2014 and beyond -- order, timing, "I would have voted if I'd known about it," etc

A good way to kick off 2020

I'm going to do the 2000-10 albums and tracks poll but I thought maybe this summer would be a nicer time for it. Maybe spring though!

Sorry, I mean 2000-09

I would like to do a Serge Gainsbourg poll at some point, not immediately.

Quick scan of my files, and I've got so many great under-two-minute songs--another vote for that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INVKNhOpYhs

It'd also be a bookend for the long-song poll from a few years ago.

as a bonus, it would be a lot more practical to listen to the playlist of the short song countdown than it was to listen to the long song countdown.

i would stan hard for wire in the short song poll

yeah short songs is a great idea. Let's do it.

I was just marvelling at how great Dinosaur L's "#2 (No, Thank You)" was merely minutes ago!

leee if it ends up happening and you want any assistance just let me know

Short songs sounds fun. It's hard to guess what the consensus favourites would even be. "Outdoor Miner"?

No because the best version of Outdoor Miner is over 2 minutes

"Velocity Girl" and "What You do to Me" spring to mind

pay to cum, minor threat, some other hardcore song

anyway, i am very down

Some great rock n' roll classics come in under two minutes: Great Balls of Fire, All Shook Up, Surrender, Hit the Road Jack, Rave On, Yakety Yak, I Wanna Be Your Man, He's So Fine.... This will be a hell of difficult ballad to decide.

Big question, two minutes or under two minutes? And Your Bird Can Sing is 2'00 according to spotify.

Some other great ones that are exactly two minutes:

"Jamboree," Beat Happening
"Satin Slipper," Blades of Grass
"Your Love Keeps Me Going," Denise Scott & the Soundsmen
"Aerosol Burns," Essential Logic
"Pregnant Again," Knight School
"Look of Love," Lesley Gore
"Never Let Me Go," Monique
"Tighter," Paul Revere & the Raiders
"The Queen of Eyes," Soft Boys

So yes, big question.

i guess it will be to the discretion of the pollrunner if those songs are smol enough

is electronica included?

I still think On a Good Day is potentially my favorite track from Have One On Me.
Titans from Dawn Richard is 2:07. I'd like to be able to vote for such a wonderful track.
Could we consider going up to 2:30 ? Or does that open things up way too much because of certain genres (but who truly cares about punk right).
Or wait, even better idea, do two categories: one for lightning-quick songs up to 1:30 (for all Wire fans etc), and a second for 1:30-2:30 that are more like errr actual songs.
I don't really care, 2 minutes is fine, I have On a Good Day.

Outro With Bees by Neko Case is a perfect miniature.
Great Cop.

if anything i'd be in favor of going in the other direction: a 90 seconds poll would eliminate a lot of 1:59 stuff that i think is less interesting than the "miniatures". i don't want to poll a bunch of chuck berry and early rock N roll

i'm thinking stuff like "her majesty" or "naked, if i want to" or "field day for the sundays" or "till the morning comes"

in other words, two minutes is TOO LONG

tbh 2:00 is too long; 2:30 would be just 'vote for your favorite short-ish song'

1:45 seems like a decent compromise

the epics poll was 10 mins+, though, so the spiritual companion would mean a poll of songs 1 minute or less

100% down for 1 minute or less

Looking forward to arguments about the true lenght of Here She Comes Now.

Let's do it!!

bold move but i'm gonna call "pnoom" by can the winner

90 seconds with leniency of a few seconds seems acceptable to me. (Yes, I have a 1:33 candidate.)

I vote for the original 2:00. Historically, songs under 2:00 stood apart; if you were to comb old reviews, I'm positive that that would be the benchmark that warranted comment (e.g., the first Ramones album--six songs under 2:00). And if you dropped it to 1:30 or 1:00, you'd lose so many great songs. But if you raised it to 2:30, the field would be way too large, and there's nothing especially significant about a song that runs 2:25. I understand it's a completely arbitrary call, but 2:00 is a nice round number--like 10:00--that splits the difference well, I'd say.

I also suspect that dropping to 1:30 or 1:00 would lead to a disproportionate number of punk songs (which would certainly account for part of my own list, but there's a lot of great doo-wop, for instance, that falls in the 1:30-2:00 range--it'd be hard to find a great doo-wop song under 1:30).

agree

going through my itunes library and 2 minutes is way way too long. 90 seconds feels right

I'm down for this poll, however we decide on structuring it, though I vote for 2:00 as the cutoff. Whether an exactly two minute song counts is something we'll have to work out: all that it determines for me at this point is whether or not I get to include "Walking to New Orleans" by Fats Domino.

Idk, 2 minutes to me seems like a regular song length. There’s no novelty in it. Even shortening it down to 1:50 or 1:55 would make the results far more interesting imo

Should we just say anything < 2 mins?

two things, not sure if Leee is a regular poster any longer, unless he has changed his log in name? so someone else might have to take over that poll.

also, someone really needs to sign up and do Low now.

I expect little crossover between Low and the under-two-minutes poll.

let’s poll the options ?

1 min
1:30 m
2 m inclusive
2 m exclusive
2:30 m

I guess we know what #95 is going to be. Sounds like fun.

I vote 2 min inclusion

Likewise.

We also need to wait for the Metal poll to close as a courtesy.

2 minutes inclusive sounds good, although I'm wondering whether the technical cutoff should be something like 2:03, just to allow for silences and fadeouts in what are basically legitimate songs.

two things, not sure if Leee is a regular poster any longer, unless he has changed his log in name? so someone else might have to take over that poll.

leee's definitely still here! i see him a lot in the video game threads, among other places. he's probably just busy playing God of War right now ;)

one idea: just let leee decide the cut-off, since it was his idea! personally, i think 2:30 would be too long but i'd support anything 2 and under

two things, not sure if Leee is a regular poster any longer, unless he has changed his log in name? so someone else might have to take over that poll.

tbf, Leee hadn't posted for 70 minutes at the time Bee fretted

he's probably just busy playing God of War right now ;)

I won't have such aspersions cast about me!

I wasn't really planning on running any polls (though kind of musing about voting in a Cat Power one), but if the people want one, who am I to argue? I also don't want to lay sole claim to running a shorties poll, so if anyone has a burning desire, I'm happy to give them the responsibility. If not, I can still run it, though would welcome help with graphics.

Bumping for the US day crowd.

2 min and below sounds good to me.