
Ben Folds Chatroulette Piano Ode to Merton - MikeCapone
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfamTmY5REw
======
andrewljohnson
I think I prefer this on Reddit where I first saw it. This is only vaguely
topical here.

~~~
blhack
Agreed. I think there has been a mass exodus from reddit in the last few
weeks. The quality of content there has gone down, and the quality of content
here has slid as well as reddit's users bring their brand of news to the site.

~~~
gridspy
Note that the poster "MikeCapone" has been a HN user for over 750 days - the
counterexample to your thesis.

~~~
endtime
Not necessarily. It's possible that he's always been submitting such articles,
but only now are there people upvoting them.

~~~
MaysonL
He hasn't, as you can readily see by checking his submissions. He does seem to
have a bit of a bias toward green energy, though.

------
MikeCapone
For the original Chatroulette piano improv video by Metron, see:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32vpgNiAH60>

~~~
mawhidby
When I first saw the Ben Folds video, I thought it confirmed my belief that
Merton is Ben Folds, but after thinking about the title "An Ode to Merton",
I'm confused. Are Merton and Ben Folds different people, or the same?

~~~
wfarr
They are different people.

~~~
portman
Can anyone point to proof that they are in fact different people? I know
Merton _claims_ to not be Ben Folds, but the voice, style, and facial
structure are _extremely similar_.

<http://www.broadwayworld.com/columnpic/ben-folds1.jpg>
[http://technabob.com/blog/wp-
content/uploads/2010/03/piano-c...](http://technabob.com/blog/wp-
content/uploads/2010/03/piano-chat-improv-merton-chat-roulette.jpg)

~~~
petercooper
It's hard for me to provide _proof_ but I've been a Ben Folds (Five) fan for
14 years and been to almost as many gigs, and I didn't believe Merton was Ben
Folds for a second. His playing style isn't similar (as far as pop rock
pianists go) and his voice is _quite_ different (Folds' North Carolina accent
usually comes out when doing impromptu stuff - less so with studio
recordings). Merton also looks somewhat younger (Folds hasn't aged too well in
the last cpl years IMHO).

------
jeromec
I admit to not knowing who Ben Folds was until a few years ago when I stumbled
onto an entertaining site called improveverywhere.com which did a prank
imitating him, which of course somehow drew the attention of the real Ben
Folds, and the prank was scaled up to include him...
<http://improveverywhere.com/2006/11/19/ben-folds-fake/>

------
gkefalas
His old band, Ben Folds Five, also were an early adopter of cybercasting some
of their concerts back 'round the turn of the millennium or so. I can see why
Bam's where he is in this video-I would probably crap myself as well if this
is what I was greeted with while using Chatroulette...

~~~
brandnewlow
Over on Reddit it was pointed out that "Bam" was probably a masturbator who
was too chicken to do it in front of 2000 people.

------
mcdowall
I think I prefer the Youtube dumbed down (ie no cocks!) edit of Chatroulette.

------
kareemm
This makes me appreciate how awesome Ben Folds is.

~~~
Specstacular
I've seen Folds live about 10 times over the past decade. He's always had
crazy improv skills. It's great to see him getting coverage and recognition of
this beyond his rabid but small fan-base...

------
hunterclarke
This guy is absolutely genius. The fact that he can think that quickly in
front of a crowd shows a lot of skill. No doubt he will become an internet
superstar.

~~~
zmmmmm
He's amazing at improv stuff - another example where he just wanders into a
studio and creates something out of nothing:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4KI78874qbU>

~~~
petercooper
He did even better than that. Before his last studio album was released, he
went into a studio and recorded an _entire_ fake album in 24 hours then leaked
it to the net.

Funny thing is, a few of the "fake" tracks are better than the real ones that
ended up on the album, such as this:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTKRckEmKZQ#t=0m22s> (a user created music
video for the fake "Dr Yang" - the real version kinda sucks)

Another prime example was "For Those of Y'all Who Wear Fanny Packs" from the
Naked Baby Photos album. It's a totally impromptu 6/7 minute "song" performed
totally on the spot by him and his band. No prepared lyrics, music, or
anything - they just riff off each other.

------
gridspy
There is only one reason I would log into chat roulette - and that would be to
'chat' with Ben Folds.

------
whatwhatwhat
That was excellent!

------
andrewljohnson
I think I prefer this on Reddit where I first saw it. This is only vaguely
topical here.

~~~
earcar
It's interesting how two identical comments are at the top and the bottom at
the same time.

~~~
boucher
People downvote duplicate posts all the time to express displeasure (and
hopefully to get the author to delete the duplicate).

It's not more significant than that.

~~~
gjm11
When I notice a duplicate of an otherwise-reasonable comment, I almost always
upvote one copy and downvote the other, not to express displeasure or provoke
deletion but to help make there be one canonical one to reply to.

