67 replies to this topic

[Jay]

As the resort is based on pop culture from the '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s, and '90s, what did you think they were going to play? 50 years of Bluegrass?

This is only the beginning. Lots, lots, lots more. Lots. More.

[freedomnoise13]

Quote

what did you think they were going to play? 50 years of Bluegrass?

I wouldn't mind 50 years of Polynesian music! Is the rumor true that each decade of the resort has it's own loop?

[Jay]

Holy smoke! The Classic Hall loop could end up being the longest in the history of the World! I've now got ten hours under my belt and there is no beginning or ending in sight!

What I do know is that the music is not on shuffle, it is now apparently digital/MP3, and it restarts with the same track (still unknown) at the same time (still unknown) every single day. Bizarre as it may sound, give or take a couple of minutes, you can show up every night at 11:30 PM, for example, and hear "Disco Inferno" by The Trammps.

What I have so far covers 5:30 PM to 1:30 AM — a full eight hours without a repeat. The music was already playing when I got there at 5:30 PM, and it wasn't done when I left at 1:30 AM (but I sure was!), so I don't have any idea how long this puppy is at this point.

Every morning at 8:00 AM the cast members invite you to join them in dancing "The Twist," and every evening at 6:00 PM, you can do "The Hustle."

This is only the Classic Hall loop, folks! There are separate loops for the Hippy Dippy Pool (the main pool), the Computer Pool, and the Bowling Pool. There is also a '70s loop playing near the '70s building. A lot of the songs that I heard while wandering around were repeats from the Classic Hall loop.

I'm already working on this monster over in Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom.

[Horizons]

Well, I thought I had the record with Pioneer Hall but it looks like you win.  Can you imagine a 24 hour loop!

[Jay]

There are some startling omissions in the Classic Hall loop.

Everyone who was alive in the 1970s knows that Elton John was the biggest act there was. No one else even came close. Elton was the 1970s. Yet, in eight full hours of music, I never heard a single Elton John song.

I have a feeling this has to do with licensing. Not on Disney's end, they could play whatever they want in Pop Century, as long as they're paid up on their ASCAP license. This has to do with the CDs that WDE used to compile this loop.

The Billboard CDs, for example, are notorious for leaving out the biggest hits of whatever year(s) they are pretending to represent, simply because they don't want to pay the licensing fees. "Too bad if you were actually #1, Elton, we decided to go with #2, because she was cheaper."

Depending on what CDs WDE used for this loop (I will have it all figured out in the end), some of your favorite recording stars of the '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s, and '90s could be totally MIA.

[Tannerman]

Well, consider this a "value" recording to match the level of the resort

[Jay]

I am back in the trenches. It looks like the Classic Hall loop is going to clock in at around 10 hours. How disappointing. I was hoping for 18-20 hours!

[eyore]

Jay, on 02 July 2010 - 06:30 PM, said:

As the resort is based on pop culture from the '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s, and '90s, what did you think they were going to play? 50 years of Bluegrass?

This is only the beginning. Lots, lots, lots more. Lots. More.

Wouldn't be that bad - I'd probably have the CDs for that too  
Hootie and the blowfish don't sound like my cup of tea at all though. Am I missing out  

OK, found them. Not too bad at all.
I withdraw my comment.

[dkrfla]

Just wanted to say thanks for compiling this list. I started to do this once before a few years ago while I was staying there but it was just too time consuming. I just sat there in Classics Hall writing them down as they played but after a few hours I got bored and wanted to go to the parks. However that being said it appears that the list hasn't changed at all since then and I think that was 2005.

Dusty

[TofuForBrains]

Wow!  Thanks for doing this, Jay.  This is kind of fascinating, actually!  I know the bus loop is shorter because it's awfully repetitive (although I guess since it's GPS-controlled it could just be that I got stuck in the same part of the loop over and over since the bus rides are pretty standardized).  lucky Pop employees have the best chance of not going insane due to hearing the same 1-hour loop on repeat all day ;-)

Seems like you need shift workers/people staying on property to figure this out?  My earliest  next trip isn't till the fall, but if you've not finished it by then, I could take an hour or two at least...Your stamina is impressive!

[TofuForBrains]

Oh, whoops, look at that.  There's a second page of posts to this thread...prolly should've read all the way to the end before posting.  I got excited!

What about Billy Joel?  I could swear I heard some Billy there.  You're right about Elton, but it's hard not to think of one without the other!

[Jay]

TofuForBrains, on 05 July 2010 - 11:17 AM, said:

What  about Billy Joel?  I could swear I heard some Billy there.  You're right about Elton...

No sign of the Andrews Sisters, Nat King Cole, Patti Page, Rosemary Clooney, Tony Bennett, Perry Como, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, The Platters, The Champs, The Everly Brothers, Doris Day, Debbie Reynolds, Pat Boone, Ricky Nelson, or Bobby Darin for the 1950s — instead we get way too many Elvis Presley songs (and I happen to love Elvis).

No sign of Mark Dinning, Connie Francis, Hollywood Argyles, Brenda Lee, Brian Hyland, Chubby Checker, The Drifters, Del Shannon, Roy Orbison, The Tokens, Joey Dee & the Starlighters, Gene Chandler, Bobby Vinton, Little Eva, The Chiffons, Jan & Dean, Jimmy Gilmer & the Fireballs, Mary Wells, The Dixie Cups, The Animals, The Shangri-Las, Herman's Hermits, The Byrds, Rolling Stones, The Lovin' Spoonful, The Turtles, Nancy Sinatra, Bobby Gentry, Otis Redding, Herb Alpert, Marvin Gaye, The 5th Dimension, The Archies, or Peter, Paul & Mary for the 1960s  — instead we get way too many songs by The Beatles (and I happen to love The Beatles).

No sign of B. J. Thomas, The Guess Who, Three Dog Night, The Carpenters, Neill Diamond, The Osmonds, Janis Joplin, Paul Revere and the Raiders, James Taylor, Rod Stewart, Cher, Don McLean, America, Roberta Flack, Sammy Davis Jr., Looking Glass, Johnny Nash, Helen Reddy, Billy Paul, Carly Simon, Stevie Wonder, Elton John, Tony Orlando and Dawn, The Edgar Winter Group, Paul McCartney & Wings, Jim Croce, Grand Funk Railroad, Gladys Knight & The Pips, Steve Miller Band, Barbra Streisand, Terry Jacks, John Denver, Ray Stevens, Gordon Lightfoot, Barry White, Bachman-Turner Overdrive, Harry Chapin, Barry Manilow, Linda Ronstadt, The Eagles, The Doobie Brothers, LaBelle, The Captain & Tennille, KC and the Sunshine Band, David Bowie, KISS, Bay City Rollers, Paul Simon, Fleetwood Mac, Commodores, Blondie, The Knack, Styx, or Rupert Holmes for the 1970s — instead we get way too many disco songs.

No sign of Queen, Pink Floyd, Billy Joel, Christopher Cross, Kenny Rogers, REO Speedwagon, Chicago, The Police, Eurythmics, Lionel Richie, Van Halen, Kenny Loggins, Phil Collins, Cyndi Lauper, Duran Duran, Prince, Bryan Adams, Dire Straits, Whitney Houston, Starship, Heart, Genesis, Peter Gabriel, Janet Jackson, Boston, Bon Jovi, U2, Bob Seger, Billy Idol, George Michael, INXS, Guns N' Roses, Poison, New Kids on the Block, Michael Bolton, Sinead O'Connor, Mariah Carey, Wilson Phillips, Celine Dion, Boyz II Men, TLC, Spice Girls, Aerosmith, Britney Spears, Ricky Martin, Destiny's Child or Santana for the 1980s and 1990s — but we do get Jennifer Lopez and a couple of odd selections from Madonna!

The person(s) responsible for this loop failed miserably just putting together a collection of top pop/rock hits, as they were apparently attempting to do, but they failed even bigger at capturing "pop culture" of the '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s and '90s. Why not also include popular television and movie themes? Then the couple of Disney songs that were tossed in wouldn't stick out like a sore thumb. How about popular commercials (I'd Like to Buy the World a Coke, It's Slinky, Plop, Plop, Fizz)? How about some famous soundbites like we hear during the Golden Dream segment in Epcot's American Adventure?

It's too bad that WDE doesn't put more thought and/or research into most of these loops. For Disney's Pop Century Resort, all of the answers were staring them right in the face, had they bothered to look inside of the shadow boxes that are displayed on the walls in Central Hall. If you've got a photo of The Addams Family on display, it would make sense to include Vic Mizzy's wonderful theme. "Neat. Sweet. Petite."

Instead of getting inside of their subject matter, it seems as if these people just drive over to the Virgin Megastore, buy the first couple of CDs that have pretty album covers on them, and then call it a day.

I really need to submit a résumé!

[Jay]

The Classic Hall track list is done, by the way. I will move it out of Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom and into the 'Playlists' section as soon as I've figured out which albums were used.

As feared, it looks like the Billboard Top Hits series is the source for most if not all of the tracks. When you look at the Billboard CDs, and then look at what is in this loop, it is plainly obvious. "Eye in the Sky," indeed.

[TofuForBrains]

Thanks again, Jay, for this tremendous amount of work.  I've been thinking lately about whose job it is to "audio-Imagineer" the music loops these days.  I remember about a decade ago that if you had a question about anything, there was a place you could go where some Disney librarians would do research and get back to you.  (My friend asked a question about the fuzzy dice on the dash in Body Wars, as I recall.)  I think they dissolved the department, unfortunately, which is why they're fortunate that people are willing to do free archival work for them on the internet...and why the 'net community is lucky, as well.  If you don't work for their audio dept., Jay, I should think they'd be glad to have you!

[Jay]

I have gone ahead and moved the work-in-progress playlist out of Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom, even though I haven't added the correct albums, playing times, links, etc.

I did this mostly because I wanted to make sure that I could combine existing topics into a playlist support topic without blowing the entire forum to bits.

I will work on completing the Classic Hall playlist as time permits. And, of course, I will be re-visting the Pop Century Resort in order to take care of the other loops around the pools, etc. Again, as time permits.

[TofuForBrains]

Hip, hip, hooray, Jay!  Thank you!  If I buy any songs to add to my own playlist, I'll wait for the links so that magicmusic gets "credit"!  THANK YOU!

[TofuForBrains]

Hi, all...
Not sure if this should get its own thread, but having returned late last night/early this morning from WDW, I can now confirm that Pop does indeed have a Halloween loop!  unfortunately they just started it yesterday, so I only got to listen to a little of it whilst waiting for my DME.  Curious whether this loop is nabbed from any of the MNSSHP stuff but I don't think so.  The songs I caught included:
Purple People Eater
Sugar Sugar
Magic Man
Witch Doctor
Monster Mash
Haunted House
and (couldn't hear this one very well) possibly Spiderwebs?

It was playing in and around classic hall, and in front of the DME waiting area....I overheard that it will be playing throughout October.

[Horizons]

Are there any accessible speakers in these areas?

[TofuForBrains]

Define "accessible" :-)
There was an obvious speaker right over the DME waiting area.  It was pretty obvious, as I recall.  Didn't get a chance to look at the other areas, but I'm wondering about the outside waiting areas near the resort bus pickups.

[Jay]

Horizons, on 07 October 2010 - 04:04 PM, said:

Are there any accessible speakers in these areas?

No. There is a speaker in the restroom, next to the arcade, but it is currently out.