sometimes i scroll through my music library looking for tracks of a particular length- its kind of fun when i need something that is 20 minutes or more, or then extremely short like i’m looking for now…
wondering if anyone has a favorite song that is about 30 seconds long or less? of course we all define what a “song” is differently, but just curious in a casual way if someone has something they really like which they find compelling as a “full composition” loosely speaking… maybe something a step above the brian eno microsoft start up sound, but those kinds of things are also fun too!
Honestly, if you move things up to ‘under a minute and a half’, there’s bunches of them. But I like grindcore a lot. “You Suffer” is just about the most fully realized composition you’re going to pack into a second.
The first one that came to mind was They Might Be Giants’ Minimum Wage. Technically, it’s 48 seconds. 48 seconds should qualify. I’d say generally speaking a short song is a song less than 2’30"
Melt Banana also have about 10 short songs and those kicked ass. They went over well at concerts and everything Melt Banana does kicks ass anyway.
Sweet Times by The Chills is just over 30 seconds (with the fade out on the last note lasting close to 10 seconds), but I’ve always been partial to it.
Let’s not forget about John Zorn’s contribution to the ‘really short songs’ genre with Naked City’s album “Torture Garden”. Longest song on it was like 1:10:
Cheney by Brakes. When I’ve seen them do it live, they sometimes do it twice in a row.
It’s borderline-novelty, but I appreciate their commitment to performing it identically every time; that makes it more like a song for me, because it emphasises formality.