On hold with a local ENT office after an adult tonsillectomy on 8/11/2022 at 10:54am
In November of 2002, Red Cap and Activision Value released a computer game called “Donald Trump’s Real Estate Tycoon” where players are able to compete against the deal maker himself while rising to the top of the fast paced real estate market. While slinging fiber board condos and renovating historic housing districts into cheap offices, you need a sound track that can keep you going even when the snow dries up. If you were like me in 2002, you might know the joys of digging through the value computer game bins at big box stores. This was the straight to DVD concept for some developers, pump out highly reproducible content for pennies with music that was the clip-art of soundtracks.
To be fair, “Donald Trump’s Real Estate Tycoon” has some decent graphics for an early 2002 tycoon game, but Grand Theft Auto III also came out that year and it had bangers like “Shake it Up” by Elizabeth Daily which really shows what the Don could have be capable of in that year. Hold music and 2000’s bargain bin PC games are kindred spirits when it comes to musical direction and aural emotion. Both tend to lean heavily on bright notes with forward motion to a destination that does not exist. The music’s job isn’t to sound good, but to fill a quiet hole that would otherwise remind you that you got home from work, tired and a little sweaty. You want to unwind with some TV or maybe a game on the computer, but honestly you just want some noise to distract you from the day. As you sit down, you keep smelling something like old sour cream, but can’t quite tell if it’s coming from you or your dog. Maybe playing that real estate simulator game you found discounted in the checkout line of OfficeMax will be fun. Maybe it will be fun for you.
Piano, guitar and saxophone are familiar friends, but please don’t be surprised when some flavor of samba bursts from the corner, even if only for a sweet Brazilian interlude before returning to mild jazz-adjacent. I think that hold music got stuck in the 2000s and can’t escape. This isn’t fair to the 2000s because the decade has so much to offer and certainly isn’t a monolith of culture, but I think that it created a safe space for energetic, weekend dad-rock bands that play in the local park for the “Sounds of Summer” program your mid-sized town offers every year. Except with more marimba.
The album is titled Purple Passion and features and dark purple ocean deeply lit by a murder red setting sun. The font is a relation to some san-serif Helvetica. The image makes me feel very little, but it is serving me some “all-in-one vampire for Halloween costume pack. Includes real fangs!” The song starts forgettable enough with a stuttering drum beat to accompany piano chords similar to workplace safe PSA intros. The drums build letting us know that we are leaving the intro and heading into the basic verse. A bass line gets lost wandering beneath while and piano, saxophone and flute take turns standing on its head. Once in awhile we can hear some kind of flicking noise that might be a guitar getting creative. Finally the xylophone makes it as it rails out probably the best part of the song. Between 1:06 to 1:32 that xylophone gives us something to care about, something to dream for. At first it is shy, hiding and belying its true nature. You might confuse as just another restamped solo akin to the flute or sax, but no watch as it flips hair and stares. Lips pout. There it goes, disappearing as fast as it came into the deep purple ocean, lit only by a murder sun.
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For your reference, the soundtrack to “Donald Trump’s Real Estate Tycoon“
Hold Music Reviews 