STP lyrics
She turned away – what was she looking at?
She was a sour girl the day that she met me
Now that I’ve gotten this Stone Temple Pilots joke out of the way, STP lyrics are the least likely to exist among all the types. There can be some Se thoughts about the general environment, like with SFPs, but with lower F there’s not as pressing a need to talk about it.
Se-Ti might get into more obscure topics – ones that are stereotypical to ESTP professions. With Se-Fi, the lyrics will be about what they purport to be about, and the Fi will tell you why the singer is singing them. With Se-Ti, you will have that face value aesthetic, but you might never find out why the singer is singing them. Without F or N, STP lyrics might just come off as informative – or to quote Strong Bad, a “lavishly produced grocery list.”
STP music
STP music stands a good chance of being technically complex. Progressive rock, metal, and jazz fusion will all have some appeal because of how much sensory data there is while having a unique structure to them.
The problem is that some of the more progressive styles will Ne-hop around; that’s not wanted here. If there are multiple complicated parts, Ti needs to know how they relate to each other. But apart from that, it’s about Se-ing to the max.
Some ESTP songs
“Human Behaviour” by Bjork (Lyric typing)
The first line of this song is one of the most efficient lyric mood establishers of all time:
If you ever get close to a human…
I’m sorry – what now? This is quite an outside perspective to talk like it’s some unusual event. All right, Bjork, what are your thoughts on getting close to a human? Taking selected lines in order (mostly the ones I can actually make out with help from a lyrics site):
Be ready, be ready to get confused
There’s definitely, definitely, definitely no logic to human behaviour
But yet so, yet so irresistible
And there’s no map
They’re terribly, terribly, terribly moody – oh, human behaviour
Then all of a sudden turn happy
But oh, to get involved in the exchange of human emotions
Is ever so, ever so, ever so satisfying
And there’s no map, and the compass wouldn’t help at all
Besides the factual description of human emotions as alien for not making any sense, they’re also fascinating, and tangling with them is “satisfying.” I’m calling that out because that’s not something stereotypically associated with ESTPs perhaps, but it points to child Fe. There’s this sensory data of emotional outbursts and moods, and there’s no way of putting them in a framework, but they are interesting as data. I see this with ENTPs, where people are fascinating objects thanks to that child Fe; Bjork ESTP-ifies it by focusing on the actual sensory impressions rather than drawing any conclusions or trying to talk about anything else. She’s just here to inform you that emotions are gnarly.
“Rock Lobster” by the B-52’s (Lyric and music typing)
The entirety of the lyrics is reciting sensory data from a beach party (although the data goes imaginary after awhile). There’s no interpretation, no context, and no leading to anything; the data points merely exist. We learn nothing about the three vocalists; we just learn about some party animals.
You could argue there’s Si-Ne from mixing surf rock, other ‘60s pop, and new wave tempos. But the song never feels like it’s assembled that way. This is in part because of how fast the song is; it doesn’t stop to let you observe its novelties. So it comes off as following its own understanding instead – which fits with the lyrics having one foot in reality and the other in nonsense.
“Song of Solomon” by Animals as Leaders (Music typing [it’s an instrumental])
This has a structure or two it sticks to, but it’s hard to notice while you’re up to your neck in guitars and drums. Like with ENTPs, the structure and motifs are all that keep it from going off the rails as complete noise.
Some ISTP songs
“Breadcrumb Trail” by Slint (Lyric and music typing)
Post-rock is heavily IxTP, but the S and N varieties are very different. The N types are what I label kitchen-sink post-rock, where a billion non-rock genres are thrown into a pot; Stereolab and Tortoise are usually these. The S types are more likely to use anthemic guitars and switch between quiet and loud parts. Slint is one of these, but what ups the ISTP game here is the lyrics. They’re the type of lyrics that would have deeper meaning if an N wrote them – some conclusion about life or something. But there’s nothing at the end except the end, if you get my meaning. The lyrics read like a junior high essay version of describing your weekend:
I decided to check out the tent
It seemed like I could hear music coming from inside
As I walked toward it, I passed a crowd of people at the sideshow
I couldn’t figure out why they would want to wait in line
I pulled back the drape thing on the tent
There was a crystal ball on the table
And behind it, a girl wearing a hat
She smiled, and asked me if I wanted my fortune read
I said okay and sat down
Then I thought about it for a minute
And asked her if she would rather go on the roller coaster instead
We change into a new music part, and instead of softly shrugging speaking, we get into some screaming. What is so important that it needs to be screamed? Just the next part of the story:
Creeping up into the sky
Stopping at the top and starting down
The girl grabbed my hand – I clutched it tight
I said goodbye to the ground
Later, the fortune teller girl vomits from the roller coaster ride.
We learn from the last line that she is blushing at the end of the day; apparently, it turned into a date. But do you know how weird it is to describe a song with “it might be about a date; I’m not sure”? For more common types, you would have a billion indicia clarifying that.
“Drove Through Ghosts to Get Here” by 65daysofstatic (Music typing [it’s an instrumental])
There’s a lot in this song and almost nothing in this song at the same time. The first half is mostly the same idea repeated with slight additions each go-round, except…the tempo is constantly slowing down and speeding up. The structure of this song is what hits you first, the guitar/drum blasts within that structure hit you second, then it all comes together for a sensory extravaganza, and then everything finally slows down. Love of Ti in music can yield tracks as playful as Ne if the focus is on messing with structure and only structure; this song stands out for demonstrating how creative Ti-Se can be.
“MMM MMM MMM MMM” by the Crash Test Dummies (Lyric typing)
(Before discussing this song: it gets on a lot of lists of bad ‘90s songs. I genuinely like it and always have, just so you know that I’m not putting this song on as a trolling thing. It came out when I was 8, and liking it was one of my earliest points of individuation from my mom where I was proud to stand by it. It’s also fun to sing on karaoke.)
This song has some personal meaning to singer Brad Roberts, but you wouldn’t know it from listening. It’s decontextualized into three separate accounts of odd real-world sensory things happening to/near kids. While the last account is considered “worse than” the first two, that’s as much commentary as we get. They’re not presented as part of a pattern that needs to be stopped (contrast this with “What’s the Matter Here?” by the 10,000 Maniacs); if anything, they’re just puzzle pieces. So I consider this to be Se serving Ti, though I might be saying that more from the lack of other functions than the clear presence of Se/Ti.
Next part: MBTI v. Spotify Personality Types
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