[Headless_Caboose]

Er.. can you re-explain what all this seeding stuff is about? I don't understand at all.

LawnsOfDawns you've described the Kingfisher/Monkey&Bear dilemma perfectly. I was also lucky enough to see an amazing version of Kingfisher live. It was the moment the concert shifted from wonderful to transcendent. But I can't say I have a totally clear conception of the lyrics either. I know it makes a number of references to a wartime setting, but beyond that I don't really know where the characters fit into it all.

It's going to take me a little while to choose.

[Jordan~]

I'd have voted Monkey & Bear over anything except maybe Only Skin. It inspired me to come out when I did four years ago.

[ursulabear]

dewd. Monke and Bear is why I am Ursula. Monkey and Bear is the song I sing to myself when I am sad. I do have a phrase from Only skin carved into my thigh (too personal?) If it comes down to those two, it is going to be sososo hard.

[LawnsOfDawns]

Yes, Monkey and Bear probably wins. I just feel bad being so unbalanced toward Ys. Still, I can't deny it, every time that song starts: "Down in the green hay...", I know I am in for a good time. And I like having a good time.

And if you can't say things like that on a Joanna Newsom message board, then where CAN you? The internet is a wonderful thing. (Can I ask what phrase?)

[ursulabear]

Heartbroke and Inchoate.

[Weirdelves]

[Gerritsón]

Group 1: - In California
Group 2: - Sprout And The Bean
Group 3: - Emily
Group 4: - Only Skin
Group 5: - Go Long
Group 6: - Swansea
Group 7: - Sawdust & Diamonds
Group 8: - Sadie

[Wanbli]

Group 1: - In California
Group 2: - Monkey & Bear
Group 3: - This Side Of The Blue
Group 4: - Only Skin
Group 5: - Go Long
Group 6: - Colleen
Group 7: - Sawdust & Diamonds
Group 8: - Clam, Crab, Cockle, Cowrie

[ursulabear]

actually, I got help halfway through so I have 'H' on one leg and 'INCHOATE' on the other.I plan on getting tattoos over it, because so many people ask about them.

[ursulabear]

also, my mother made me a monkey & bear themed bedroom. I have monkey lights and bear doorknobs. I also have an owlet over my telly.

[elseanio]

Group 1: - In California
Group 2: - Monkey & Bear
Group 3: - Baby Birch
Group 4: - Only Skin
Group 5: - Go Long
Group 6: - Colleen*
Group 7: - Peach, Plum, Pear
Group 8: - Clam, Crab, Cockle, Cowrie* Hang in there!

[LawnsOfDawns]

Group 1: - In California
Group 2: - Monkey & Bear
Group 3: - Emily
Group 4: - Only Skin FTW
Group 5: - Good Intentions Paving Co.
Group 6: - Have One On Me
Group 7: - Sawdust & Diamonds
Group 8: - Clam, Crab, Cockle, Cowrie*


So, for group 2, I thought to myself, if I had to never listen to one of the songs again (monkey and bear or kingfisher), which would it be? And I just wouldn't be able to stand the loss of monkey and bear. I could easily see myself voting for kingfisher at a tournament next year, but as of right now, I choose Monkey and Bear. Perhaps its the performance on Kingfisher that loses me. It's good, but her voice is high so often that it doesn't have the emotional power I feel like it could. Or whatever.
Also, @ursulabear, that is so awesome that your mom did that! My whole family abhors Joanna Newsom (they hate most of the music I like, but especially her due to her voice), and between all of them wouldn't be able to name one of her songs. It blows. I HATE GROWNUPS. (Even though I sort of am one. At least, at 23, I think most people would tell me I am a grownup. And I know lots of cool grownups who are older than me. But still, parents just don't understand.)

[Jessie]

Group 1: - In California
Group 2: - Monkey & Bear
Group 3: - Baby Birch
Group 4: - Only Skin
Group 5: - Go Long
Group 6: - Colleen
Group 7: - Sawdust & Diamonds
Group 8: - Cosmia

[Steve]

Now up to an amazing 13 votes already. Thank you to the most recent contributors: Gerritsón, Wanbli, elseanio, LawnsOfDawns, and Jessie - the last two named being those who proposed & seconded the whole JNST in the first place.

A word about seeding, as an answer to Headless_Caboose and anyone else who is interested. If you're not - you won't miss anything JN related by skipping all this:

In order to maintain maximum interest, and to get the fairest possible outcome that an elimination tournament allows, I felt it was important to ensure that the most favoured songs were not matched up against each other too early in the competition. It's the same process as is used in many events - such as in Lawn Tennis: you wouldn't want Sampras to face Nadal in the 1st Round, and have one of them go home on the first day. Therefore, tournament organisers will 'seed' those they expect to do well, and ensure that in the early rounds, seeded competitors are pitted against less well favoured ones. The expectation is that these favourites will progress, eliminating the lesser ones. Meanwhile, middle-ranking entrants battle against each other, and so you get one or other of these going through to subsequent rounds. If the draw is constructed properly (and that's where the JNST differs, say, from Wimbledon - they have to do the whole draw in one go at the start, whereas I can draw up the groups just ahead of the start of each round), then a typical tournament would run something like this (simplified to just 16 entrants, in pairs, and with the ties not jumbled up for clarity):
ROUND 1 -
tie 1 - most favoured entrant v least favoured entrant
tie 2 - 8th most favoured v 9th most favoured
tie 3 - 5th most favoured v 12th most favoured
tie 4 - 4th most favoured v 13th most favoured
tie 5 - 3rd most favoured v 14th most favoured
tie 6 - 6th most favoured v 11th most favoured
tie 7 - 7th most favoured v 10th most favoured
tie 8 - 2nd most favoured v 15th most favoured
ROUND 2 -
tie a - winner tie 1 v winner tie 2 [projected: 1st v 8th most favoured]
tie b - winner tie 3 v winner tie 4 [projected: 5th v 4th most favoured]
tie c - winner tie 5 v winner tie 6 [projected: 3rd v 6th most favoured]
tie d - winner tie 7 v winner tie 8 [projected: 7th v 2nd most favoured]
ROUND 3: SEMI-FINALS -
tie A - winner tie a v winner tie b [projected: 1st v 4th most favoured]
tie B - winner tie c v winner tie d [projected: 3rd v 2nd most favoured]
FINAL
tie I - winner tie A v winner tie B [projected: 1st v 2nd most favoured]

As you can see, if all goes according to the seedings [for to be "nth seeded" means nothing more than to be the "nth most favoured entrant", as decided by some pre-tournament process], then the top two [predicted] entrants will meet in the Final (something that could not happen if, say, the second seed was placed in any of ties 2, 3, or 4 - the "top half of the draw" - in the example above), and each other entrant would progress to exactly the round which their perceived quality would indicate: ie in Round One the weakest 8 entrants (9th to 16th most favoured) would be eliminated; in Round Two we'd lose the next weakest 4 (5th - 8th); and the 3rd & 4th most favoured would go out in the Semi-Finals.

To implement that here, I needed some way to 'rank' Joanna's songs at the outset. Of course, I could have just listed them by my personal preference - but that would hardly be fair or objective, since my favourites might not correspond with the general consensus (in fact - looking at the way Round 3 is going ... I can safely say that they don't, at least not in every case). The method I used, then, was to analyse a couple of the earlier threads on this forum, where people had expressed their favourite songs. (I know there were more threads going back into the old MilkyMoon forum, but sadly these seemed to have disappeared shortly before I started this). This had not been attempted in a rigourous or structured way before, but I was able to apply some sort of consistent analysis to these haphazard postings, and produce a list of 34 songs that at least one respondent in these threads had listed as their favourite - or as one of a small group of favourites.

Using this ordered list as a basis for determining 34 seeded songs, I then prepared a 1st Round draw (32 ties) in such a way that seeds 1 & 2 were at opposite ends of the scale, 4 & 3 were at the quarter points, etc, in the same way (but larger) as in the above little example. With only 32 ties and 34 nominated songs, I had to pair no's 33 and 34 up with no's 32 and 31 respectively. As for the remaining songs, these were loosely categorised from the remaining, unseeded "mainstream" songs, down to the unreleased live recordings, other obscurities, and collaborations, with an element of randomness introduced within each category. These were then distributed among the groups, in such a way that the lowest were matched against the highest. I also did a bit of manual shuffling, to minimise the number of groups where two songs from the same album were matched up, and to randomise the vacancies (32 groups of 3 songs would have required 96 entrants - I knew only of 90, having overlooked Picture, so 6 groups only had two entries).

Once Round One was completed, I made a new draw for Round Two (and so on), adhering broadly to the above principle, but also introducing 'corrections' for songs that had 'over- or under-performed' against the expectation from the seeding. This can be explained by the fact that at least one of the analysed threads dated from soon after the release of HOOM: as we know, one of the fascinations of Joanna's work is that songs 'grow' over a period of time, so I was very prepared to believe that tastes had matured since some of those earlier preferences had been expressed. There was also a bit of shuffling to accommodate the 'best losers', and to avoid, where feasible, songs from the same album facing up.

One factor I have been aware of is to try not to give away too much about the seedings, and also to present an unbiased "ballot paper" for consideration. So - apart from the stated rule of thumb that a reprieved song will be listed 3rd within a group when the draw is published - I have randomised the order of the other songs within each group: I literally toss a coin to decide which is shown first and which second. Then - unlike the example above where the ties are neatly shown 1, 2, 3 etc, with the top seeds in ties 1 & 8, I have randomised the order in which the ties (in our case, Groups) are numbered. I feel that, to do otherwise, would introduce a potential 'skew' and may be open to accusations that I had presented the groups in such a way as to favour a certain outcome. Admittedly, I know the full workings behind the draw, and I am still voting - but why shouldn't I join in the fun?! And besides, I am only one voter, and hopefully that will be insignificant among all the many respondents who have kindly taken part.

After the competition is over, I'll be happy to give more details about the original seeding order.

I hope the above helps give some idea of the mechanics I have employed in designing the Joanna Newsom Song Tournament. Thank you all for your interest and for taking part.

[Steve]

Plan for final stages of the Joanna Newsom Song Tournament
I am considering a slight change for the final stage - a series of straight pairings conducted on a "group basis" between the final few surviving songs. To make this work and to maintain interest, I think I'll need to publish a new set of pairings every 2 or 3 days. But don't worry if you miss a 'rotation' for at this stage the songs won't be eliminated, but I will compile a group table of the successes in each match-up. If there are 6 songs in the Final, for example, there will be a total of five rotations of pairings. For example:

Rotation 1 – a v b; c v d; e v f
Rotation 2 – a v d; b v f; c v e
Rotation 3 – a v f; d v e; b v c
Rotation 4 – a v e; f v c; d v b
Rotation 5 – a v c; e v b; f v d

[ursulabear]

My mother also loathes Joanna. She just pays attention.

[u-som]

Group 1: - In California
Group 2: - Sprout And The Bean
Group 3: - Emily
Group 4: - Only Skin
Group 5: - Go Long
Group 6: - Have One On Me
Group 7: - Peach, Plum, Pear
Group 8: - Cosmia

[claire]

Aw, I'm going to be so bummed if Swansea doesn't make it through this round. Definitely the best song on MEM and one of her best overall, in my opinion.

[Weirdelves]

[clamcrab]

Hello everyone!

I am a new user here, I signed up a while ago but my account was only just verified, which is annoying because I would have liked to vote in all these rounds! Oh well!!

Anyway, here are my votes for this round-

Group 1: - In California
Group 2: - Monkey & Bear
Group 3: - Emily
Group 4: - Only Skin
Group 5: - On A Good Day*
Group 6: - Swansea
Group 7: - En Gallop*
Group 8: - Clam, Crab, Cockle, Cowrie* (<-----to win the whole competition!!!!)