They Might Be Giants' John Linnell Shares His 5 Must-Have Apps

"You'll notice none of my favorite apps have anything to do with social networking or interfacing with other human beings," said John Linnell, one half of the stalwart weirdo-pop band They Might Be Giants. "They're all these personal, solitary ones, so I guess that maybe tells you something about me. I'm not trying to reach out to anyone with my phone, which was intended to be a machine for communicating."

"I can see the headline already," I joked, "Antisocial Jerk John Linnell Lists His 5 Favorite iPhone Apps."

"Well," Linnell deadpanned, "I know my wife would like it."

For almost three decades They Might Be Giants have been the coolest nerdy band on the planet, rocking out in their own unique way, with hits including "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)," "Birdhouse in Your Soul," and the theme songs to both "Malcolm in the Middle" and "The Daily Show." Their new album Join Us will be released July 19 on Idlewild.

I asked Mr. Linnell to share his five favorite smartphone apps, and in typical TMBG-fashion, he interpreted the request a little differently. After giving me his two favorite iPhone apps (that actually exist), he offered 3 that he really wished would be invented. And really, who knows where his suggestions will lead? One day, They Might Be Apps (sorry).

Here is 5 Apps With John Linnell of They Might Be Giants:

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SoundHound (free version, with ads; $6.99, ad-free)

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"I have SoundHound, which is great. For me it's torture to sit in a restaurant or a diner and listen to some weird, off track from the 90s and not know who it is but feel sort of oppressed by it...I have a personal, almost autistic problem, which is--I can't ignore music when it's playing in the room. So the great thing about SoundHound is that I can kind of point the laser at the thing and identify and neutralize it, in a way. You know, it's like, 'Ohhh! It's Avril Lavigne. Now I can move on.' "

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"I have SoundHound, which is great. For me it's torture to sit in a restaurant or a diner and listen to some weird, off track from the 90s and not know who it is but feel sort of oppressed by it...I have a personal, almost autistic problem, which is--I can't ignore music when it's playing in the room. So the great thing about SoundHound is that I can kind of point the laser at the thing and identify and neutralize it, in a way. You know, it's like, 'Ohhh! It's Avril Lavigne. Now I can move on.' "

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Comments

[LuLou Murder]

03:20 PM on 07/14/2011

I'm so ready for the new album to drop. I've had the Join Us EP on heavy rotation for the last week.

[ThePlague]

02:45 PM on 07/14/2011

The bird call id app is straight forward to do. Have a database of birds and their corresponding sounds. Then the app listens to whatever the current sound is, and matches it within some margin of error to sounds in its database, and gives you back the right one. Matching can be done with a neural network type of program. Not saying it is simple to do, but doable.

[appleheart]

12:51 PM on 07/14/2011

Oh John Linnell, I probably love you more then is healthy.

[lonecone]

02:27 PM on 07/13/2011

There really is a Universal TV remote app and it works very, very well. The problem come in that it's a system. Pretty reasonable as far as those things go. Check it out at control4.com

[RevSpaminator]

01:15 PM on 07/13/2011

"They Might Be Giants have been the coolest nerdy band on the planet"

The nerdiest band on the planet is Negativland. :)

[ccsims4life]

04:08 AM on 07/14/2011

I love Negativland.

[themoosespeaks]

12:58 PM on 07/13/2011

FYI to Android users: Google Sky Map (free). Seems similar to that Star Walk app.

[blizzard man robot voice]

11:39 AM on 07/13/2011

They are still a band?

[mikebmbx]

11:23 AM on 07/14/2011

I've decided to write long responses to the types of short, dumb, pointlessly negative comments that I read on the internet. Yours is the first one I read on the internet this morning! (A dumb, pointlessly negative, not funny comment.) Congratulations! Feel free to read my reply to your comments here - (it's long)

http://updates.mikeoshea.net/archives/271

I'm not sure if this will solve the problem of the small ulcers that people like you create? But I'm going to try and see.

[blizzard man robot voice]

12:00 PM on 07/14/2011

You have a blog?