Earworms

by Phil Houseal
Feb 4, 2009

Seeking a good cause for a telethon? How about this: brain itch.

Brain itch is the annoying phenomenon of getting a piece of a song lodged in your head. Those irritating snippets of melody that run over and over inside your brain also have a name: earworms.

Brain itch is not an urban legend. Real scientists have done university studies verifying that it is part of the human condition.

We all have experienced this affliction. The specific song depends on your age. For some of us it might be the Theme from Mission Impossible or The Lion Sleeps Tonight. Younger folks are tortured by MmmmBop and Whoomp There It Is, or pretty much anything by Beyonce. Earworms have been around a long time. Remember Purple People Eater and the insidious Mairzy Doats? Reportedly even Mark Twain and Mozart were susceptible to the annoying "jingling rhymes."

Not surprisingly, some people embrace earworms. These people are called advertising executives. Research by marketing departments shows that 98% of us are susceptible to catching catchy tunes and lyrics in our heads. It is no accident that we go around repeating "Two all-beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese" or "plop plop fizz fizz, oh what a relief it is."

Various miscreants have compiled lists of the top earworm offenders. You can come up with your own top ten, but here are some of the songs that appear often (warning: stop reading if you don't care to spend the rest of your day humming the Jeopardy theme):

Y.M.C.A.
The Barney Song (I love you, you love me...)
We Will Rock You
The Macarena
The Theme from Gilligan's Island (or Happy Days, or Three's Company, or every other insipid sitcom)
I'm Too Sexy
It's Raining Men
Who Let The Dogs Out
Mambo No. 5
Tubthumping by Chumbawamba (remember that one?)
And perhaps the worst offender: It's a Small World After All

You jazz and opera snobs don't get off the musical hook. Also making the list were Take Five by Dave Brubeck and the Anvil Chorus from Il Trovatore.

(In fact legend has it that Verdi tried to keep anyone from hearing La donna è mobile from Rigoletto before its premier in Venice. Alas, it leaked, and the next morning all the gondoliers were serenading riders with the catchy tune.)

Now that you have "... a three-hour tour..." stuck in your prefrontal lobes, how can you get rid of it?

You can't.

Substituting another tune won't work - that just makes the new tune get stuck in place of the original one. Reciting the times tables doesn't work. Singing the song to a friend so the earworm moves to their head is just wishful thinking.

Research shows that the only way to kill an earworm is by repetitive exposure. In other words, you can only get rid of the annoying song by singing it over and over and over until brain fatigue sets in. That is a cure worse than the disease.

Earworms are like the common cold: treated they go away in one day; untreated takes 24 hours.

So someone get busy with that telethon idea. Here's a suggestion for a theme song:

"Come and listen to my story 'bout a man named Jed..."