When you do live shows again

[Rudolf Wagner]

Hi Bill,

For us it’s too early to think about that as we’re still neck deep in other projects. Also, we can’t see ourselves hitting the road anytime soon as we don’t want to play venues with any restrictions still in place.

Because everything is so hard to predict right now we haven’t done any planning ahead for live show projects, and we will just keep focusing on songwriting, new videos and the MLT Club for now.

That might be disappointing for some but the current climate simply takes all the fun out of it and makes it almost impossible to plan performances on a bigger scale. We’d rather focus on other things we can do and create on our own terms 🙂

Hope you’re having a groovy day!

[Tom Fones]

We will have to be patient.
Cheers

[Jung Roe]

Hi Mona,

Sounds like a thoughtful and sensible plan. I think channeling your energy and creativity into the right things at the right time is so important. Trust your music business sense and instinct on this. It certainly kept you in a good place when the pandemic hit and everything shut down. You have so many avenues to reach your audience and get your music out to the masses. We all want to see you both live on stage one day when the time is right, but until then can’t wait for your new music and projects. Just keep doing what you love!

Here is what a million views look like that you are hitting regularly now with your videos on Youtube. You Can’t do That hit the mark in 1 year, Mr Postman/Wipeout in 6 months, and many more about to turn over all those zeroes!

[Johnnypee Parker]

You are right, Jung. One million views in six months is huge. It’s difficult to picture a million in my mind. Does that mean it is in a perpetual stream with someone somewhere watching it at any time?

Bill, I think we all have this dream of seeing a live MLT show with the majority of the audience being comprised of club members. The band would have to avoid eye contact with us, as our tears of joy would be too much of a distraction, eh?

Not even for a day ????

JP

[David Herrick]

That’s an interesting question, JP. I just did the math on that, because I’m one of those geeks that does math for fun. In order for Please Mr. Postman / Wipeout to reach a million views in six months, it would on average have to be viewed simultaneously by about 16 people at a time. So yes, there might always be someone streaming it!

Of course, that’s assuming it is watched all the way through. If people typically abandoned it a tenth of the way in, for example, then the average viewing rate would be ten times smaller. But such people would have no soul and can (and should) be ignored.

If anyone would like to apply this to other cases and possibly compile a list of the most frequently viewed MLT videos (I’m looking at you, Lynn), here’s the formula I used:

If V = the total number of views, M = the number of months since the video was posted, L = the length of the video in minutes, and F = the fraction (between zero and one) of the video that is assumed to be viewed, then the average number S of simultaneous views is given by

S = ( F * V * L ) / ( 43800 * M )

where 43800 (for those who are still awake) is the conversion factor between months and minutes, i.e., the number of minutes in a month.

[David Herrick]

Okay, I got impatient and went ahead and did the calculation for the MLT videos on YouTube, and found the top ten at the moment. The results are skewed toward the most recent postings (with only one entry being more than 15 months old), presumably because the viewing rate tends to be the highest when a video is new, so the list will need to be updated occasionally. Assuming each video is watched to completion (F=1), here are the ones with the largest average number of simultaneous views (S) over their lifetime:

1) Please Mr. Postman / Wipeout: S = 16.7
2) Both Sides Now: S = 16.2
3) Wish You Were Here: S = 13.0
4) Nowhere Man: S = 8.7
5) You Can’t Do That: S = 5.8
6) Lola: S = 4.7
7) While My Guitar Gently Weeps: S = 4.3
8) Sunshine Superman: S = 4.2
9) I’m a Believer: S = 4.0
10) Till There Was You: S = 3.2

[Johnnypee Parker]

Thanks, David. That’s awesome!

JP

[Jung Roe]

David, that is brilliant. That S number will only increase across the board.
S = ( F * V * L ) / ( 43800 * M ) is also a beautiful equation.

If you can excuse my geeking out here a little, but here is an interesting tidbit:
Do you know there is a list of the most beautiful math/physics equations. Currently the title goes to Paul Dirac, a 20th century Physicist, for his Dirac Equation.

“Perhaps most dramatically, the Dirac equation predicted the existence of antimatter – the mirror image of all known particles. Antimatter was later found to exist in the real world.” “Aesthetically it is elegant and simple,” says Jim Al-Khalili of the University of Surrey in Guildford, UK. “This equation is very powerful, mainly because of what it signifies and the role it played in the history of 20th-century physics.”

Euler’s formula is #2 followed by Pi. I think your equation should be included! 🙂

I’m just fascinated by the link between music and physics/math. Bach saw it and Einstein appreciated it.

Beauty exists in many forms and Einstein took inspiration from the beauty he perceived in both music and physics. “Music provided Einstein with a connection to the creative genius of great composers and to what he perceived as the sense of harmony underlying the universe. The beauty of harmony in physics as well as in music, filled him with awe.”

[David Herrick]

Thanks for the praise, Jung, but my formula isn’t that brilliant. I basically just set it up as a Fermi problem, but most of the variables have known values, so not much estimation was required.

I plan to redo the calculations in about a month. It will be interesting to see how the S values change. I expect that the number for each video will gradually decrease over time, with new videos constantly replacing the slightly older ones at the top of the list. (Just since yesterday the newest video, Both Sides Now, has slipped from 16.2 to 15.8.) But as long as awareness of MLT grows, the numbers for whatever constitutes the top ten at any time should gradually increase.

Many of those equations in your list are quite familiar to me as a former physics major. They are all insightful, useful, and… well, yes, mathematically beautiful. (I’m not quite sure why pi is counted as an equation, though.) I assume the poll was directed at physicists and mathematicians. Do you know what the sample size was?

I’m surprised that Maxwell’s equations of electromagnetism weren’t included. They were the subject of the first science geek tee shirt I ever saw:

https://museumstore.mit.edu/wp-content/uploads/Maxwells-Equation-Tshirt-Front.jpg

[Bill Isenberg]

Thanks Mona for your reply, I know in the USA it is getting a bit better day by day and we have live shows scheduled in Pittsburgh This summer, one show I would like to see is James Taylor and Jackson Browne. But yes a bit too early to talk about the live shows for the Mona Lisa Twins but when you do have the green light? I know me and the club members will be there to support and love seeing you in concert.

[Jacki Hopper]

OK, Jung, JP, David…You 3 lost me at that math equation stuff… had no clue , what the heck that all meant.?.could someone explain in layman’s terms so that non-Math enthusiasts like me can better understand just what all that meant, …lol… you’re good at confusing me from time to time with your posting antics…lol….????????

[Jung Roe]

Hi Jacki! Our resident math genius, David, came up with a math equation that shows, at any given moment how many people are watching any particular MLT video on youtube.

#1 at the moment is “Please Mr Postman” (my fave video from the live album BTW 🙂 ) with 17 people watching that video at any given moment from across the world.

Nowhere Man is #4 with 9 people watching the video at any moment.

Now I was trying to show that math geeks see beauty in these formulas. Usually the simpler and more efficient and powerful the formula the more beautiful.

I am amazed by how Einstein was inspired by the beauty in music, and related it to the beauty in math as there being an underlying harmony that links music and math/physics in the universe. The story goes, Einstein took frequent breaks to play the violin as he worked on developing his General Theory of Relativity with the implication his music had a factor in providing inspiration behind some of his scientific discoveries.

[Johnnypee Parker]

Thanks Jung. I was half following/not following you guys, too. ???? I understood the results, but I got lost on the way there.

JP

[Jacki Hopper]

Thanks Jung, now I understood your simply layman’s terminology….????

JP… glad to know I wasn’t alone on confusion….????

[David Herrick]

Jacki and JP,

Sorry if I got a little too nerdy, but what Jung said is right on the money: the S number gives you an idea of how many people are probably watching the video at the moment. I didn’t really try to explain WHY that formula should work, but I could get into the weeds on that if anyone really cares.

There are just a couple of complications. First, there’s no way to know how many of the views are just partial, i.e., not all the way to the end. I’m assuming a best-case scenario that they are all complete views, but you can make whatever adjustment seems reasonable. For example, if the typical view ends halfway through, then the S number would be half of what it says.

Second, the S number is based on data for the whole lifetime of the video, so it’s sort of an average over time. I expect that each number would be highest when the video is fairly new and being viewed the most often, and then it would gradually decline. So the number you see is probably less than what it once was, and more than it would be now if I were keeping track of the day-to-day change in viewing rates.

I’m thinking I may start a new thread soon in which I provide once-a-month updates on the top ten; perhaps more or less often than that depending on how quickly the numbers change. Lynn mentioned views on Facebook rather than YouTube, and the same sort of analysis should be possible with those.