Lately I have noticed that TV commercial music has been infesting my consciousness. Most mornings, I discover I have a tune from some commercial running through my head as I wake up. And it is damn hard to shake these implanted tunes. It’s always moronic stuff like
Its easy oh so easy
zoom zoom zoom
etc
Now of course the best way to eliminate this would be to stop it at the source, and watch less TV and consequently fewer commercials. But for me that’s a problem, I have tinnitus and I keep the TV on all the time. It’s either moronic TV, or a constant ringing in my ears. It’s a tradeoff. I figure there must be some sort of mental armament I can use to make it a less painful tradeoff. And here is where the real question comes, I guess.
I vaguely recall reading an article a long time ago that described this phenomenon. It described a group of psychiatric patients that were suffering terrible agony due to incessant music running through their heads. ISTR the name of this disorder was “musicolalia” but I’ve searched and been unable to locate a single reference to this word. I remember the article said that some people with this condition are driven to suicide. But I don’t recall anything else about the condition.
So I’m wondering if anyone has heard of musicolalia or any similar mental disorder. I don’t suppose this condition is particularly relevant except I’m interested in the mental mechanism that grabs onto a melody and won’t let it go. And surely there’s no cure for the average guy’s musical fixation. Anyone know more about this condition?
Oh, and despite a previous warning from the mods not to post violent thoughts to the SDMB, I will post one that I’m sure the mods will condone. Probably most US TV watchers are familiar with the commercials for a sandwich shop featuring the obnoxious voice of Gilbert Godfried. It’s gotten so I involuntarily grab for the MUTE button every time I hear the opening bars of “o solo mio.” And maybe that’s part of the implantation process, I notice that most commercials try to get their hook in the first 3 seconds, before you get to the MUTE button. The commercial is programming you, perhaps they MEANT for you to be programmed to hate their commercials enough to grab for the remote like a robot, although I can’t see how that would sell sandwiches.
But anyway, here is my fantasy. I want to meet Gilbert Godfried, come up to him and say, “Hey, say something in that voice that sounds like you’re being strangled!” And then after he does, I grab him by the throat with both hands, squeeze as hard as I can, and say “NOW make that voice AGAIN!”
I hate that stupid shadow-puppet ‘mascot’ with the Gilber Gottfried voice. The only thing he ever did worth-while was Iago. Sadly, it’s a step up over their last advertising effort, which featured a chubby girl dancing VERY poorly to someone chanting “Wrap, wrap, wrap it up!” to advertise their ‘wraps’ which are really fuckin burritos or something. A BURRITO IS NOT A WRAP! DON’T DANCE LIKE THAT, YOU CHUBBY BITCH! Sorry. How can the sandwiches be oh-so-good, but the advertising oh-so-bad?
Gilbert Godfried did have ONE more good role… His (small)part in Beverly Hills Cop where Eddie Murphy goes in to arrest him for unpaid parking tickets and Gilbert claims they’re for his wife’s car and picks up the phone and yells “Bitch!!” into it before turning back to Eddie. Not much of a role, but something the rest of us can live with.
The OED (Oxford English Dictionary) doesn’t mention Musicolalia but does mention Musicogenic. Not the same thing as you describe, Chas.E, but all I could find. It relates to some epileptics hearing music shortly before having a seizure.
When people at work have a song stuck in their head I can almost always get it out, but the cure is worse than the disease. I just start singing the first part of the “Barney” song. It gets rid of their song but then Barney is stuck in their head… then I get pelted with rubber bands for the rest of the day. It seems that you have to replace the song with another, or get distracted in some way (getting really busy at work, playing a trivia game, play some sport…).
I too have tinnitus. I may post later on helping you get rid of jingles in your head, but there are alternatives to sleeping to the noise of the TV. A ceiling fan on high makes a soft smooth sound, and keeps things cool, which helps many sleep. A wall unit AC will make a louder, but still soothing hum. I have one and use it, but would prefer central AC. In the cool months, a good cd played softly plus the ceiling fan is really cool. If all else fails, take the Zen approach and embrace that high-pitched hum and utilize it to smooth out all other distracting noise.
Hey, let’s not let this descend into a Gilbert Gottfried bashing thread, no matter how much he deserves it. I’ll take another stab at getting this on track.
Long ago, I read the amazing book “Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television” by Jerry Mander. He argues that the audio track of a commercial was more important to the advertiser than the video track because TV is a low resolution video medium but a high-resolution audio medium. He claimed that many advertisers spent as much money on the audio production as the video. But then, this was the 70s and video was much more primitive. But still, I buy his argument, the basic resolution of TV has not changed, while they have continued to improve the audio quality… with some notable exceptions. My local CBS affiliate still broadcasts in monophonic sound!
Anyway, Mander argues that the audio track gives more potential for subliminal advertising than the video. He cited an example of the classic commercial “sure you’ve got a headache, but don’t take it out on the kids” that pulses a throbbing heartbeat while a bunch of children scream at the actress. He said the commercial is actually intended to INDUCE headaches and thus sell more aspirin. And he says the key is the heartbeat, it invokes an involuntary response in any listener.
Now I’m sure that advertisers have become much more sophisticated over the years, and their techniques have become much more obnoxious. They’ve figured out how to implant that hook in my head. I want to know how to get it OUT!
Anyway, thanks Road Rash for the advice, I don’t sleep with the TV on but I do usually sleep next to a noisy fan. The white noise does help. But if I’m awake, white noise doesn’t seem to be enough.
And I just have to add, Gilbert Gottfried cracks me up. I just can’t help it. Every time I hear him. Man, I’m laughing just thinking about that commercial.
Hey thanks donkeyoatey, that was just the sort of thing I was looking for. I notice they don’t have a name for the syndrome other than “musical hallucinations.” Darn. I just love obscure medical terms.
Anyway, I obviously don’t have anything close to this level of disturbance. The original article I read seemed to indicate that everyone was prone to this problem as a matter of normal brain function, it is only when something goes seriously wrong that it rises to the level of disturbing, constant hallucinations. So there is some sort of link here, I guess.
The problem with having a song stuck in your head is that you’re only remembering a small segment of the song. What you need is closure.
The next time you have a song stuck in your head, you should mentally sing an entire song which you know by heart (I use “Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer”). This song will drive out the stuck song. And when you finish your new song, the fact that it’s completed will enable your brain to move along to other things.
And while I’m not generally a fan of Mr Gottfried’s work, I thought he was good as the parrot in Aladdin.
Hmm… that closure idea sounds good. I’ve tried to play music to eradicate the unwanted tune, but it is a minor “battle of the bands” at first, I probably never noticed that it ended when the music ended. Maybe I should pick a quick, brutal tune with a lyric I know by heart, like a 2 minute Ramones track and keep an mp3 easily available.
This phenomenon really started bothering me a couple of years ago when I had an intense bout of stomach flu. As I alternated puking in the bathroom and lying in bed fitfully trying to sleep, I had a commercial running through my head: “I feel like chicken tonight, chicken tonight!” Oh man, my mental images of the commercial full of flowing gray chicken gravies, I’m sure it made my stomach flu about twice as intense.
Following up on Little Nemo, there’s another way to get closure on songs, which is to provide the final chord yourself. It works every time for me. I’m not sure whether you need to know much music to do this, just pick something “final sounding”, and imagine a big “ta-da” conclusion.
Having music echoing excessively in your head can also be a symptom of a brain tumor or Parkinson’s disease. Unusual, but also useful for stoking hypochondria.
People who are susceptible to musicolalia in any form should stay away from oldies stations in particular, unless they want something particularly revolting like Little Peggy March infesting their brains, i.e.
I love him! I love him! I love him! And where he goes I’ll follow! I’ll Follow! I’LL FOLLOW! (Repeat ad nauseaum).
Fortunately for me and my hypochondriac tendencies, I had a full MRI and PET scan series recently, while neurologists were checking out my tinnitus. My brain is just fine (organically speaking, that is). Personally, I’m a lot more concerned about unwanted advertising jingles rattling around in my subconscious, than I am about tumors growing in my brain.
Hey, that raises another question. How come it’s only BAD music that gets stuck in your head? How come I never get stuck on a GOOD song?
I don’t know if this will help but I remember reading somewhere recently that one of the best ways to get an annoying song out of your head was to hold your breath for three seconds. This, supposedly, reduces the amount of oxygen to your brain for long enough period of time to get that annoying song out of your head. They also mention trying Little Nemo’s technique in the same article if holding your breath didn’t work. Anyway, it’s worth a shot and I hope you’re not suffering from anything more serious.
This is along a different vein than the other posts…
I used to have a clock radio that would “beep” and play the radio in the morning. I would tend to sleep through the beeping (I can sleep through anything – including the fire alarm), but the radio would seep into my head.
I would then have whatever song they were playing at that wee hour of the morning running through my head all day. Often, I didn’t even realize that that was where I had heard the song. It would just sort of haunt me all day. Then I noticed that, if the radio wasn’t playing music, I would think about whatever they were talking about. Sometimes, I would have the day’s weather forecast in the forefront of my thoughts. Sometimes, it would be the traffic report. Too often, it would be the commercial for some product.
So, since you play the TV all the time, could it be that the music you hear comes on the TV at a time when you are especially susceptible to suggestion? Perhaps you could set the TV to turn off after you have fallen asleep. In our house, we now have a clock-radio that only beeps. It doesn’t play the radio (unless you want it to).
I went to my psychologist, and since i am coming off of ssris, she said that i may experience some returning OCD symptoms, in different forms than they were before. One of the symptoms thaat i experienced was musicolalia. It is a very real form of OCD, and can drive people crazy. One day I had the fairly odd parents theme stuck in my head, and i actually threw up a couple times from it playing in my head over and over. there are ways to deal with it though. One way that i found helped was if i brought the music to a CRASHING end. Like a BIG finale. This taked practice, and it can stop the music for a couple minutes until it comes back and you just do it again. Also, if you’re like me, and the music keeps you from doing things like reading and doing work, you can try reading out loud. That helps keep me somewhat focused on the words on the page in front of me. Hope that helps.
