…I will also mention that off and on, over about 26 years, I had a classical music piece stuck in my head that I could never identify. It was so catchy that it kept returning, maybe once every few months or so. Occasionally I’d try to find it by searching through samples of classical music and such, but I finally, just this last week, found it. Imagine, almost 3 decades of a song and not knowing what it was.
(it was, FTR, Vivaldi - Concerto in C Major, RV 558)
Daily to Weekly, depending on where I am.
From just the past week: “This Is the Day That the Lord Hath Made”; “Manamana” - Jim Henson voicing the Sesame Street version; “The Ballad of Jed Clampett” (Theme Song to “The Beverly Hillbillies”), “Roll Um Easy” – Lowell George / Little Feat
The only thing that works is to replace it with another song that’s not likely to get stuck in my head. Usually, I have to actually sing it out loud for that to work.
Hope I don’t skew this poll too much.
Monthly
The worst part is, I don’t know most of the lyrics, so what sticks is one particular musical phrase over and over again. The phrase going in my head now is “…when I ruled the world”.
Time, patience, and life’s other distractions.
Daily to weekly.
Can’t remember the most recent as they are legion, but the worst ever was on a week’s boating vacation. The sound of the boat’s engine triggered a terrible radio jingle I’d heard in the 1970s: “Holiday, holiday, holiday rock… Holiday, holiday, holiday rock…” Which plagued me incessantly for the entire vacation and many years beyond.
Hum Karma Chameleon by Culture Club, as this is such a horrendously catchy cheesy tune that it will drive any other music out of your head. This does of course have its own drawback…
Probably once or twice a week.
-Free Credit Report dot com commercials (may dogs consume the living flesh of the ad execs and when they die may they burn in hell somewhere between Hermann Göring and the space reserved for Carrot Top)
-Donna Lewis “I love you/always forever”
-Lots of Michael Jackson songs recently but that’s because they’re being played constantly
-Wishin’ and a Hopin’
-THE JEFFERSONS & GOOD TIMES theme songs
I drive them out with either Civil War songs (particularly STONEWALL JACKSON’S WAY or LORENA) or MEADOWLANDS or low tempo showtunes (Coalhouse Demands from RAGTIME and “In a very unusual way” from NINE are two that I’ve used). For some reason- I guess because they’re about as far away from pop as you can get- they drive out the others without getting caught in my head, something like the King Snake that eats the Rattler.
About once a week
Last night it was “Piano Man” by Billy Joel. It was gone but now that I’ve seen this thread, it seems to be worming its way back in again, damn it. Before that there was a jingle for a local car dealership. Before that was a short melody that I couldn’t place and whose lyrics I couldn’t remember. I just now figured out that it was a few bars from “Little Willie” by Sweet. For some reason it was playing in my head at a slower rhythm than they performed it.
When I fall asleep at night they’re usually gone by morning. For really persistent ones, I find that listening to a recorded version of the earworm over and over again sometimes gets it out of my system. Ten consecutive listenings of “Billy Jean” banished it after it had been in my head for several days following the death of Michael Jackson.
I’d say weekly, though it can be more or less frequent depending on my listening habits and/or exposure to things with music that can be catchy (movies/games/etc)
Caramelldansen (speedycake remix) - Caramel
Twister - Takeharu Ishimoto (Written), Sawa (Performed)
Square Pegs - Pain (also Suckerpunch, Midgets With Guns, Goggins, and a few others of theirs)
And I’ll spare you the laundry list, but suffice to say that almost every Sonic the Hedgehog character theme and a quarter of all level themes from the old games (and Sonic Rush… especially Sonic Rush) in my head at some point.
Somewhere between monthly and yearly.
You Are My Sunshine - (c) Charles Mitchell; Jimmie Davis, but probably written by Oliver Hood
They’re Gonna Taste Great! - The Frosties Kid*
Umbrella - Rihanna*
*partially adopted to knowingly infect others with ‘earworms’
What strategies have you successfully used to rid yourself of earworms?
As has been mentioned, it is possible to replace one earworm, with another more virulent form, but to little psychological benefit. Personally however, I’ve never really been afflicted with the persistent forms of this phenomena, beyond a period of a few minutes. I’d like to credit this to a combination of a stupefying short attention span befitting of the YouTube generation, and my long practised ability and zen like ability not to occupy my brain with very much thought at all. Actively trying to forget is a lost cause, like trying to think an itch out of existence; so do the initial scratch, but without too much conscious effort divert your brain with other things, like maybe this. Note it also helps if the replacement media or task is itself somewhat banal.
I think had I been in your position, I would have been swinging from a rope along time ago.
So we are still pretending Cecil Adams is a real person?
Mmmm, okay. Thanks Una for fighting some ignorance.
1)Monthly
2) Fuckyou, mr rock&roll,You’re Pretty Good Looking (For a Girl)
At least weekly.
My earworm library is way too vast to narrow it down to three, but some recurring ones are The Imperial March by John Williams, various music from Super Mario Bros. 3, Mighty Quinn by Manfred Mann, too many commercial jingles to list, even ones I haven’t actually heard in decades, and, oddly, sometimes if I hear a song I’ll get the Weird Al Yankovic version stuck in my head, especially “Eat It” and “I Lost On Jeopardy”.
Usually just listening to other music gets rid of them. My brain has difficulty keeping a song running in my head while listening to another.
Talk about cutting off the head to cure a headache.
1/ More than once a week but not daily
2/ At the moment, mostly children’s songs from CD’s my young ones listen to. I don’t want to think about this in any more detail as they will come back and that would be bad.
3/ Thinking about another ear-worm song.
I can get 3-4 a day, easily. There’s other times I’ve got the same one for several days, now that is what I call bothersome (specially when I don’t like the darn song).
Heck, you think I keep track of the earworms I get within the year? That’s hundreds! They include children’s tunes (I don’t think you’ll be familiar with Tengo Una Hormiguita or Había Una Vez Un Barquito Chiquitito), hymns (I’ve had Nuestra Señora del Camino “on” for about two hours after this morning’s Mass), classic rock (Great Balls of Fire, Cadillac Solitario), classical (fragments from Aida anybody?), recent or current songs (can I make Beyonce eat the ring? There’s lots of songs of hers I like, but I hate that one!)…
Eh, if it isn’t quite bothersome, I just let it run its course, they don’t usually last long. If I hate it, playing a few catchy tunes which I do like (specially if I can sing along) usually works. If not only is it playing constantly but it’s “stuck” (I can remember only a fragment of the lyrics), finding the complete lyrics or listening to the complete song will usually make it go away.
It used to happen to me once in awhile, but now it is quite common because I moved into a neighborhood where the church across the street plays the same 3 tunes, 3 times a day for a week. I find that the last tune sticks in my head until I realize I’m hearing it and replace it with something else, which has to be replaced again and finally will go away.
Now, I usually turn on my stereo when it’s time for the bells to go off and drown them out with various music I like. This seems to work.
Many people where I live complain about this but we are all hesitant to go to the church people (superstition maybe?). I have found myself apologizing to God for being irritated, even though I know it’s not His doing, but they are, after all, supposed to be His people. I would imagine that they feel they are doing us all a favor by reminding us that God is here and cares but I, myself, would much rather look at the cross on top of the steeple for that effect. I find it a lot more inspiring.
We had a whole thread on that commercial awhile back. And you saw this, right? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAMSX8-zWO8&feature=related
I thought you said earthworms, but…
My frequent earworms seem to come from most recently heard songs. They are irrespective of artist – sometimes they are songs I wrote, but never recorded or released commercially. Sometimes hearing an old song on the radio will trigger a re-episode. They can last for days.
They are always songs or parts of songs that I like, so it’s never annoying, although I admit I am curious why this happens.
For me an earworm is usually a song I know and like, but it’s just a snippet. The refrain or maybe a certain section that repeats over and over and over.
a) Woke up singing “I like to Move It, Move It.” The version from Madagascar 2 with will.i.am - just the refrain really
b) “You can leave your hat on” (that’s the only line I know from the song) - the Tom Jones version
c) Black & White - Three Dog Night (mostly the just the piano riff at the start)
Mostly I ignore it since it’s always there in the background. But if an earworm is particularly strong, there’s a few songs that will always overwrite whatever earworm I have playing by taking over the earworm station. I call them ‘Earworms Prime’
a) “Total Eclipse of the Heart”, Bonnie Tyler
b) lately, the Plants vs Zombies theme song, “Zombies on your lawn”
c) “Diamond in your Mind” - Solomon Burke / Tom Waits
totally.
Monthly, on average.
There are currently several, mostly because I made the mistake of acquiring an album called Glam Crazee, with the result that I now have Hello’s “New York Groove”, T. Rex’s “Metal Guru” and “Son Of My Father” by Chicory Tip rattling around in my head. I was doing an autopsy yesterday and could not get rid of “New York Groove”. Very annoying.
There is no cure…but there is hope.