iTunes has been upgraded and now features a gizmo called - with characteristic understatement - Genius. This allows the user to select a tune, click a button, and be presented with what is allegedly a playlist of similar songs by similar artists, in a similar genre. This works pretty well, and I have already created a few playlists which have dragged out forgotten pearls from the darker corners of my iTunes library...Cold Blooded Old Times by Smog being one of them.
This morning, I hit 'Boys Are Back In Town' by Thin Lizzy, and the Genius device felt it necessary to include Toni Basil's 'Mickey' amongst more predictable fayre from Iron Maiden, Motorhead, Led Zep, etc. Now, I have been a big fan of Mickey more or less since it came out, but I am mystified at how it could be slotted beside hairier and noisier tunes like Immigrant Song.
There are certain artists it seems to have a particular fondness for - Fleet Foxes are thrown up time and again, making me wonder if a less random element of selection is at work...
