The Most Unwanted Song
Encyclopedia
"The Most Unwanted Song" is a song created by artists Komar and Melamid
and composer Dave Soldier
in 1997. The song was designed to incorporate lyrical and musical elements that were annoying to most people. These elements included bagpipes
, cowboy music
, an opera singer rapping
, and a children's choir that urged listeners to go shopping at Wal-Mart
.
n-born American graphic artists Vitaly Komar
and Alexander Melamid
created a series of "most wanted" and "least wanted" paintings, based on visual aspects found to be most "wanted" and "unwanted" by people as measured in an opinion poll
conducted by a professional polling company. These paintings were included in the book Painting by Numbers: Komar and Melamid's Scientific Guide to Art, published in 1997.
The paintings, part of Komar and Melamid's The People's Choice series, inspired American composer and performer Dave Soldier to approach the two for a musical project, titled The People's Choice: Music, which again used the opinions of the public, as measured by polling surveys, to determine which elements of the medium were "most wanted" and "least wanted."
According to Komar and Melamid, the surveys revealed that the themes, instruments and other aspects that people least wanted to hear included cowboy music, bagpipes, accordion
s, opera
, rap music, children's voices, tuba
s, drum machine
s and advertising jingle
s. They then incorporated all of these elements into a 22-minute-long song, titled "The Most Unwanted Song."
To create the song, Soldier, Komar and Melamid collaborated with lyricist Nina Mankin. Komar and Melamid debuted the song at a 1997 New York City
performance, where they were joined by Soldier (who played a banjo
), soprano
Dina Emerson, and a children's choir.
and casual swearing. Emerson's rap is largely cowboy-themed.
In addition to the rapping, a children's choir sings about various holidays (Christmas
, Yom Kippur
, Ramadan
and Labor Day
, among others), ending each verse with the line "Do all your shopping at Wal-Mart!"
Near the end of the song, Mankin shouts political phrases through a bullhorn.
, bass
, piano
and drum
s, and lyrics about love were "most wanted" by the survey respondents, and are included in the song, which has been described as "Celine Dion
-esque".
The vocals for "The Most Wanted Song" are provided by Ada Dyer and Ronnie Gent; Living Colour
guitarist Vernon Reid
is featured on guitar.
Komar and Melamid
Komar and Melamid is an artistic team made up of Russian-born American graphic artists Vitaly Komar and Alexander Melamid . In an artists’ statement they said that “Even if only one of us creates some of the projects and works, we usually sign them together...
and composer Dave Soldier
Dave Soldier
Dave Soldier is an American composer and performer residing in New York.- Musical works :Some of his work is based on unusual collaborations. In the Thai Elephant Orchestra he built giant musical instruments on which he trained a group of elephants to improvise...
in 1997. The song was designed to incorporate lyrical and musical elements that were annoying to most people. These elements included bagpipes
Bagpipes
Bagpipes are a class of musical instrument, aerophones, using enclosed reeds fed from a constant reservoir of air in the form of a bag. Though the Scottish Great Highland Bagpipe and Irish uilleann pipes have the greatest international visibility, bagpipes of many different types come from...
, cowboy music
Western music (North America)
Western music originated as a form of American folk music. Originally composed by and about the people who settled and worked throughout the Western United States and Western Canada. Directly related musically to old English, Scottish, and Irish folk ballads, Western music celebrates the life of...
, an opera singer rapping
Rapping
Rapping refers to "spoken or chanted rhyming lyrics". The art form can be broken down into different components, as in the book How to Rap where it is separated into “content”, “flow” , and “delivery”...
, and a children's choir that urged listeners to go shopping at Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. , branded as Walmart since 2008 and Wal-Mart before then, is an American public multinational corporation that runs chains of large discount department stores and warehouse stores. The company is the world's 18th largest public corporation, according to the Forbes Global 2000...
.
Background
Beginning in 1994, RussiaRussia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n-born American graphic artists Vitaly Komar
Vitaly Komar
Vitaly Komar is a Russian painter and performance artist who was born in Moscow in 1943. He attended an art school in Moscow from 1958 to 1960, after which he studied and graduated from the Moscow High School of Industry. He began cooperating with Alexander Melamid in 1973 and collaborated with him...
and Alexander Melamid
Alexander Melamid
Alexander Melamid is a Russian painter and performance artist who emigrated to New York City from the Soviet Union in 1977 with Vitaly Komar. He was born in Moscow and attended the Stroganov Art Institute, where he collaborated with Komar in the Russian SOTS ART movement...
created a series of "most wanted" and "least wanted" paintings, based on visual aspects found to be most "wanted" and "unwanted" by people as measured in an opinion poll
Opinion poll
An opinion poll, sometimes simply referred to as a poll is a survey of public opinion from a particular sample. Opinion polls are usually designed to represent the opinions of a population by conducting a series of questions and then extrapolating generalities in ratio or within confidence...
conducted by a professional polling company. These paintings were included in the book Painting by Numbers: Komar and Melamid's Scientific Guide to Art, published in 1997.
The paintings, part of Komar and Melamid's The People's Choice series, inspired American composer and performer Dave Soldier to approach the two for a musical project, titled The People's Choice: Music, which again used the opinions of the public, as measured by polling surveys, to determine which elements of the medium were "most wanted" and "least wanted."
According to Komar and Melamid, the surveys revealed that the themes, instruments and other aspects that people least wanted to hear included cowboy music, bagpipes, accordion
Accordion
The accordion is a box-shaped musical instrument of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone family, sometimes referred to as a squeezebox. A person who plays the accordion is called an accordionist....
s, opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
, rap music, children's voices, tuba
Tuba
The tuba is the largest and lowest-pitched brass instrument. Sound is produced by vibrating or "buzzing" the lips into a large cupped mouthpiece. It is one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra, first appearing in the mid-19th century, when it largely replaced the...
s, drum machine
Drum machine
A drum machine is an electronic musical instrument designed to imitate the sound of drums or other percussion instruments. They are used in a variety of musical genres, not just purely electronic music...
s and advertising jingle
Jingle
A jingle is a short tune used in advertising and for other commercial uses. The jingle contains one or more hooks and lyrics that explicitly promote the product being advertised, usually through the use of one or more advertising slogans. Ad buyers use jingles in radio and television...
s. They then incorporated all of these elements into a 22-minute-long song, titled "The Most Unwanted Song."
To create the song, Soldier, Komar and Melamid collaborated with lyricist Nina Mankin. Komar and Melamid debuted the song at a 1997 New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
performance, where they were joined by Soldier (who played a banjo
Banjo
In the 1830s Sweeney became the first white man to play the banjo on stage. His version of the instrument replaced the gourd with a drum-like sound box and included four full-length strings alongside a short fifth-string. There is no proof, however, that Sweeney invented either innovation. This new...
), soprano
Soprano
A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...
Dina Emerson, and a children's choir.
Vocals and lyrics
The main vocals of the song are provided by Emerson, whose high-pitched, operatic rapping features both references to WittgensteinLudwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein was an Austrian philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. He was professor in philosophy at the University of Cambridge from 1939 until 1947...
and casual swearing. Emerson's rap is largely cowboy-themed.
In addition to the rapping, a children's choir sings about various holidays (Christmas
Christmas
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...
, Yom Kippur
Yom Kippur
Yom Kippur , also known as Day of Atonement, is the holiest and most solemn day of the year for the Jews. Its central themes are atonement and repentance. Jews traditionally observe this holy day with a 25-hour period of fasting and intensive prayer, often spending most of the day in synagogue...
, Ramadan
Ramadan
Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar, which lasts 29 or 30 days. It is the Islamic month of fasting, in which participating Muslims refrain from eating, drinking, smoking and sex during daylight hours and is intended to teach Muslims about patience, spirituality, humility and...
and Labor Day
Labor Day
Labor Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the first Monday in September that celebrates the economic and social contributions of workers.-History:...
, among others), ending each verse with the line "Do all your shopping at Wal-Mart!"
Near the end of the song, Mankin shouts political phrases through a bullhorn.
"The Most Wanted Song"
For The People's Choice: Music CD, "The Most Unwanted Song" was paired with "The Most Wanted Song," which incorporated musical elements that were "wanted" by listeners, again as determined by a public opinion survey. Instruments such as guitarGuitar
The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
, bass
Bass guitar
The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....
, piano
Piano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
and drum
Drum
The drum is a member of the percussion group of musical instruments, which is technically classified as the membranophones. Drums consist of at least one membrane, called a drumhead or drum skin, that is stretched over a shell and struck, either directly with the player's hands, or with a...
s, and lyrics about love were "most wanted" by the survey respondents, and are included in the song, which has been described as "Celine Dion
Celine Dion
Céline Marie Claudette Dion, , , is a Canadian singer. Born to a large family from Charlemagne, Quebec, Dion emerged as a teen star in the French-speaking world after her manager and future husband René Angélil mortgaged his home to finance her first record...
-esque".
The vocals for "The Most Wanted Song" are provided by Ada Dyer and Ronnie Gent; Living Colour
Living Colour
Living Colour is an American rock band from New York City, formed in 1984. Stylistically, the band's music is a creative fusion influenced by free jazz, funk, neo-psychedelia, hard rock, and heavy metal...
guitarist Vernon Reid
Vernon Reid
Vernon Reid is an English-born American guitarist, songwriter, composer, and bandleader. Best known as the founder and primary songwriter of the heavy metal band Living Colour, Reid was named #66 on Rolling Stone magazine's 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time.Critic Steve Huey writes, "[Reid's]...
is featured on guitar.