Drive Everyone Completely Insane Mix

In the past, we at Sparklife’s Tactical Music Division have explained how to enhance your study experience using music to help you stay on track or even to feed you the answers. Today we build on that knowledge by asking a few questions:

“If we’re graded on a curve wouldn’t it be easier just to break everyone else’s concentration and drive them crazy?”

“Couldn’t we do that with a mix too?”

“And wouldn’t that be a lot more fun?”

As the following songs demonstrate, the answer to all of these questions is “Yes.”

Dan Deacon — “Woody Woodpecker”

Never let anyone tell you that Dan Deacon isn’t brilliant. Who else would think to take the world’s most annoying cartoon character, loop his grating laughter over and over again and make it into a song? The best part is that the angrier people get the more this song will bother them—nothing enrages a person quite so much as being laughed at by sixty psychotic woodpeckers.

Man Man — “Engwish Bwudd”

Let’s see… nonsense lyrics—check; high-pitched children’s voices—check; a lively polka—check. And, as a bonus, a chorus of sweaty men screaming lines from “Jack and the Beanstalk.”

Aphex Twin — “Omgykya-Switch”

Instrumental music has a reputation for being relaxing, do-your-trigonometry-in-a-shady-grove type of stuff. But just speed it up to 600 beats-per-minute, change the rhythm every 5 seconds, add plenty of scary sound effects, and you’ve got a recipe for a really uncomfortable group study soundtrack.

The Pixies — “Broken Face”

This song is a favorite among Pixies fans. Most everyone else, however, seems to find Frank Black’s squealing and shouting about how his face is falling apart to be unsettling. Actually, this is true of pretty much every Pixies song.

Battles — “Atlas”

“Oh, man! Alvin & the Chipmunks are back, and they are rocking harder than ever!”

The Unicorns — “Jellybones”

The first 30 seconds of this song tend to grab people’s attention. It’s catchy, yet it sounds like someone teaching themselves how to play a $20 keyboard. Then we get a nice story about someone’s kneecaps falling off. Diagnosis: Jellybones.

What songs have your friends climbing the walls?