10 Crazy Music curiosities!
The world of music is full of curiosities and eccentricities. Here you can find ten fun, surprising, embarrassing and unexpected good ones!
1. Axl Rose and his name
Axl Rose is considered one of the greatest singers of all time, something gained with effort and talent before becoming the joke he is today that reminds us more of Mickey Rourke than to the great star he was back in the days. The leader of Guns N Roses grew up being William Bruce Rose Jr and in the 80s he would change his name by the one we knows and which is nothing but an anagram of "oral sex".
2. The person behind Fender Guitars
If you like music, words such as Telecaster or Stratocaster will be familiar to you and you´ll know I´m talking about the famous Fender brand guitar models. And if you do not know what we are talking about, surely if you see them you will recognize them. Both models are the work of Leo Fender who designed the guitars in 1950 and 1954 respectively, and the funny thing about this story is that Leo never knew how to play guitar.
3. Lifespan of the musicians
After studying deaths of music artists between 1950 and 2014, a professor of the University of Sydney concluded that musicians' lifespans are 25 years shorter. The study was made by comparing that to averages by sex and decade for the US population. The research also found that suicide rates were between two and seven times greater for musicians and homicide rates were up to eight times greater.
4. Heavy Metal music and the Nordic countries
To find the origins of Heavy Metal music we have to go to the US and UK. However, according to data from the Encyclopedia Metallum's archive of metal bands, Finland has the most metal bands per capita in the world. And to be precise, there are 53.5 metal bands per 100K people. The funny thing is that Sweden goes second in this particular list, followed by Norway and Iceland.
5. Music to heal (or torture)!
Music can change your mood for bad and for good. That's probably a fact that we all take for granted and it's already proved that by listening to music, chronic pain can be reduced and depression can be alleviated. And yet, history has showed us how the government of the USA has used music to torture people (epic when they bombarded Panams´s former dictator Noriega 48h in a row with AC/DC music until he surrendered).
6. Music, plants and cows
There is another study, this time conducted by South Korean scientists that concluded that plants grow faster if they “listen” to music. Surprised? Well, psychologist from the University of Leicester proved in 2001 that by listening to "Everybody Hurts" (R.E.M.) and "Bridge Over Troubled Water" (Simon & Garfunkel) cows increased the production of milk in a 3%, whilst cows who listened to other genres like techno or rap suffered of stress, slowing down the release of oxytocin, fundamental for producing milk (fact no one asked for).
7. The most successful song of all times
Do you know which is the most profitable song of all times? Maybe one by The Beatles, Elvis, Michael Jackson, Elton John or even Queen? Cold! We have to go back to 1883 when the Hill sisters wrote the Happy Birthday song for their kindergarten class. Obviously the song has had many owners but since 1990 it belongs to Warner Music (they paid $ 15 Million back then). Today the song makes more than $ 2 Million per year (using the song in movies or TV costs 25K). Not a bad deal after all.
8. Janet Jackson and YouTube
Remember when Justin Timberlake showed Janet Jackson's nipple during the Superbowl and the world (or better say the USA) protested...against her? Years later Jawed Karim would tell that the 2004 popular mid time show had inspired him to create the popular site YouTube (together with other two partners) which (as incredible as it may seem) it did not exist back then.
9. Michael Jackson and The Simpsons
In the early 90s The Simpsons were just a massive success with fans all over the world and Michael Jackson was counted as one of them. For years there were rumors that the song “Do The Bartman” had been ghost-written by Michael Jackson although it would not be until many years later that Matt Groenning finally confessed that the rumors had all the time been true. Michael always had to keep the secret since he was contractually forbidden from writing for another music label.
10. Loud music and alcohol consumption
Ever wondered why music is so loud in bars so when people talk you have to scream and simply there is no way to listen to music or hear the friends you are with? Well, maybe the fact that loud music makes you drink faster has anything to do with it! This was proved in 2008 after a research conducted in bars with males in their mid twenties only drinking beer while secretly being observed by people manipulating the music level.
