Aug. 29th, 2009

davidn: (rabbit)
On realizing that so many power metal groups seem to write a set quota of songs from a library of specific titles every year, I went through my efforts over the past few years Googling their names with the word "lyrics" to see just how unique my own library was.

Song titles that are apparently unique or that I'm the first result for are bolded (linked), and songs where I could specifically recall another song with that name without even checking (mostly, songs by bands that I really enjoy and probably borrowed the title from myself) are italicized.

Worldcrafter - Original, but a band called Nasum have done one called Worldcraft. This also seems to be the former name of the Valve map editor.
Before the Moon Falls - Done by "The Fall"
The Edge of the World - Emery, Faith No More, Fisher, loads of people
Tears of an Eagle - Original! Didn't turn up a tidal wave of vomit-inducing patriotism as I'd feared
Silicon Dream - Too many to count, including Helloween
With My Unblinking Eye - Original, and I'm glad of it because I really love this title. My brother came up with that one.
Save the Savior - Originalish, also done by what I think is an independent band from Texas
Heart of the Beast - Used all over the place, exact title used by "Brothers of the Baladi"

Hand of Fate - Done by absolutely everyone including Gamma Ray
Open Your Eyes - Taken by (among countless others) Snow Patrol, and to my great consternation, Sum 41
A Thousand Lives - A song by Angry Panda, apparently. "Cindy of a Thousand Lives" is more common. I was actually going to call this one "The Hero With A Thousand Lives" until very shortly before its release, until I decided it was a bit too long. And a bit too silly.
Lazarus - Unsurprisingly everyone, including Placebo
Eye of the Beholder - Metallica (from their good phase, though!)
The Fallen Angel - Going right across the Atlantic, done by Iron Maiden - and this sone was consciously an imitation of their style, too.
Forever - Kamelot, probably Stratovarius, many other power metal bands, billions of other people
My Kingdom - Variants are all over the place, but... Echo and the Bunnymen. That's something I didn't expect to come up.

Welcome to the Machine - Pink Floyd, famously, although when I wrote this I hadn't realized that the place that I got the title from had in turn got it from them.
Be More Than Just a Number - Unique! It was about time I had another of those. But I will instead reveal that, shamefully, I actually got this title because it was the name of one of the fairly late on levels from Lemmings. Now you know.
Two Souls, One Mind - First of all I want to mention that I released this about the week before a certain shock video started circulating, which was really annoying. I'm the first Google result for it, but I've since found out that both Sonata Arctica and Vanishing Point have gone for Two Minds, One Soul instead.
Tale of the Cave - I'm the first song result on Google for this, but... you know where this is from.
Temple of Rust - Mine! Also used in the lyrics of a song called "The Desolation Called Niflheim", cheerily enough.
Rule the World - It's a Kamelot song, as [livejournal.com profile] kjorteo told me this about half an hour after I released it. Also one by Take That, distressingly enough.
Wonder - It's difficult to search this one. I'm assuming there must be about a hundred other songs called that.
Invisible - The same goes for this.

Unreality - A load of bands I've never heard of, like Celesty, Sadus and Fading Colours.
The Truth - Unsurprisingly universal
My Children - Also predictably all over the place
This Corruption - Got one again. The "this" is what saves it!
The Machinist - Done by Have Heart as well as the uncomfortably-spaced MyChildren MyBride
Promise - Oh, billions
Ängel Eye - Using a gratuitous umlaut is a nice way to cheat the system. (I promise that there's a very good reason for it, that being that this song started off as a direct mockery of the character of an artist that I know, and I'm really glad that he hasn't yet discovered it). Otherwise, "Angel's Eye" is an Aerosmith song and I don't believe for a moment that I'm the only one to use the singular variation, but it's at least less common.

So... 8 out of 31 unique ones (counting two halves). I'm not sure how impressive that is - most notable is the My Kingdom album, which contains no completely unique titles and is composed of half consciously borrowed ones. Still, in the near future, "One Perfect Soul", "Find You" and "Carry the Rings" all look happily unique, but that middle one turns up a Jonas Brothers song as the first result so I may be forced to hastily rename it anyway.

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